This paper is one of a series of six commissioned by Pathway to inform policy development through the NHS 10-year plan and the cross-Government homelessness strategy.
Drawing on the expertise of our Pathway Fellows, other experts, and our colleagues with lived experience of homelessness, each paper identifies actionable policies for change. All the papers underline the importance of a preventative approach, prioritising action which stops social and economic disadvantage leading to exclusion, collapsing health and early mortality.
You can watch the launch of our Policy Papers for Inclusion Health here.
Better Homes, Better Care, Better Health
This paper addresses the direct and detrimental impact of poverty and housing insecurity on the health of people in health inclusion groups identified by Lord Darzi in his NHS review. For people in these populations, their ‘home’ directly impacts on their access to, and experience of health care, and their health outcomes.
Despite strong evidence for these links and policy attempts to drive integration between health and housing, meaningful integration remains elusive.
Going with the grain of the Government’s ambitions to take a mission-based approach to policy, the paper sets out recommendations to drive the integration across housing and health needed to tackle these health inequalities, including both a single integrated budget and the local infrastructure needed to achieve outcomes of both better homes and better health care for people in health inclusion groups.
About the author
Over the past 27 years working in local government, housing, health, care and criminal justice systems across England, Gill Leng has sought to enable everyone to have a home in which to ‘start, live and age well’. She held national homes, homelessness and health adviser positions in Public Health England and MHCLG from 2014 to 2022, and has also worked for the NHS, the Local Government Association, and the Healthy London Partnership. Gill is a Trustee of the Nationwide Foundation.