作者：编辑团队英国首相安迪·伯纳姆表明，面对现代英国最棘手的问题，他并不缺乏雄心。问题在于，他能否将这些大胆的言论转化为真正的改革。
By The Editors UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham has demonstrated that he doesn’t lack ambition when it comes to the most intractable problems facing modern Britain. The question is whether he can turn that bold talk into real reforms.
无家可归问题是一个很好的检验。在这方面，伯纳姆为自己设定了一个更紧迫的目标：承诺“在圣诞节前让所有人都住进住所”，并为此投入4.42亿英镑，同时召开全国峰会讨论该议题。这是一个值得追求的目标——在街头度过一个冬天，可能会给年轻人带来终生的影响。在上周的工党会议上，伯纳姆重申了这一承诺，并宣布将启动战后繁荣时期以来规模最大的公住房建设计划。
Homelessness offers a good test. Here Burnham has given himself a more immediate deliverable: a promise to “get everyone in for Christmas,” backed by £442 million and a national summit on the topic. That’s a worthy aim — a winter on the street can mark a young person for life. At a Labour Party conference last week, Burnham repeated the pledge and promised the biggest council-house building program since the postwar boom.
但这也是英国此前已经听过的承诺。特雷莎·梅曾承诺到2027年终结街头露宿问题。鲍里斯·约翰逊将这一期限提前到了2024年。基尔·斯塔默的政府去年12月启动了一项耗资35亿英镑的国家计划，旨在“彻底”终结无家可归问题。然而，根据最新的年度估算，英格兰的街头露宿人数创下了历史新高，连续第四年上升。
It’s also a promise Britain has heard before. Theresa May promised to end rough sleeping by 2027. Boris Johnson brought the deadline forward to2024. Keir Starmer’s government launched a £3.5 billion national plan last December to end homelessness “for good.”Yet England hit a record high in its latest annual estimate, notching its fourth consecutive rise in rough sleeping.
而这仅仅是可见的冰山一角：截至3月底，有135,580个家庭、177,530名儿童居住在临时住所。2024至2025年度，各地方议会用于临时住所的支出达到了28亿英镑。
And that’s only the visible edge: 135,580 households and 177,530 children were in temporary accommodations at the end of March. Councils spent £2.8 billion in 2024-25 on temporary accommodations.
伯纳姆作为大曼彻斯特市长的经验或许会成为他的优势。他推行的“每晚都有床铺”政策并非一时兴起的冬季噱头。该政策在改善居住条件准入标准的同时，确保居民每晚都有固定的房间，并配备专职工作人员协助他们联系相关服务。与其他举措相结合，这一政策帮助2017至2020年间将无家可归人数减少了53%。
Burnham’s experience as mayor of Greater Manchester may prove to be an advantage. His “A Bed Every Night” policy was no winter gimmick. It lifted conditions for access while providing a consistent room each night and a caseworker to connect with services. Alongside other initiatives, it helped reduce homelessness by 53% between 2017 and 2020.
然而，从那以后，压力再次出现，无家可归人数也重新开始上升。如果不断有更多人陷入困境，或者永久性住房短缺，那么仅仅让人们离开街头是远远不够的。
Since then, however, pressures have returned and the count has resumed rising. Getting people off the streets isn’t enough if more keep arriving or there’s a shortage of permanent homes.
流 homelessness 当然是一个全球性问题。但尽管住房市场和机构存在差异，一些值得学习的经验仍然适用。苏格兰的一个项目绕过了收容所，直接将复杂需求人群纳入永久租赁住房；其“房屋优先”试点计划将他们直接安置到永久租赁中，两年后仍有80%留在原处。休斯顿不仅专注于住房和支持服务，还将100多个原本各自为政的机构整合为一个统一系统，共享数据并减少碎片化。
Homelessness is, of course, a global problem. But while housing markets and institutions differ, some lessons bear emulating. One program in Scotland bypassed shelters for people with complex needs, and its Housing First Pathfinder moved them directly into permanent tenancies; 80% were still there two years later. Houston not only focused on housing and support but also got more than 100 agencies that worked in silos to operate as one system, sharing data and reducing fragmentation.
芬兰提供了一个典范和一个警示：在经历了十年的下降后，2025年流 homelessness 人数上升了20%，部分原因是租金上涨、失业率增加和福利削减削弱了支持体系。
Finland offers both a model and a warning: After a decade of decline, homelessness rose by 20% in 2025 as rising rents, unemployment and benefit cuts pulled support away.
那么，伯恩汉姆的峰会应该产生什么成果？工党党政值得赞扬在规划改革方面迟到但到来的努力，但仅凭建设是无法足够快速地解决当下问题的。应赋予地方政府权力购买并改造现有建筑，释放公共土地，并在经济效益可行时使用模块化住房。对于最难以安置的人群，住房必须伴随着长期的治疗和支持服务。
So what should Burnham’s summit produce? The Labour Party deserves credit for long-overdue planning reform, but the country won’t be able to build its way out of today’s problem fast enough. Local authorities should be empowered to buy and convert existing buildings, release public land, and use modular homes where cost-effective. For the hardest cases, housing must come with treatment and support over time.
其次，计划应旨在防止流 homelessness 问题根深蒙埃。英格兰流 homelessness 的最常见途径包括房东的退租通知、亲属撤销 spare bed 安排或 domestic abuse。对于那些濒临危险的人来说，紧急现金、债务帮助和法律干预往往能有效防止他们陷入露宿街头，避免相关的 mental illness 和 addiction 风险。就业支持和技能培训也同样重要。任何离开监狱、医院或 care（或 Home Office 安置）的人都不应在没有安全住处的情况下离开。
Second, the plan should aim to stop homelessness before it becomes entrenched. The most common routes into homelessness in England are a landlord’s notice, a relative’s spare bed being withdrawn or domestic abuse. For those on the edge, emergency cash, debt help and legal intervention can often prevent a slide into rough sleeping with all the mental illness and addiction risks it poses. Job support and skills training matter, too. And nobody leaving prison, hospital or care (or Home Office accommodation) should do so without having somewhere safe to stay.
最后，协调合作至关重要。各委员会、国家医疗服务体系、监狱和慈善机构应当携手合作，共享必要信息，以识别高风险人群，并确保他们获得住所与支持。伦敦所谓的“CHAIN”系统表明，个人层面的数据可以指导服务提供；下一步则是将这些信息同各地方政府的住房资源对接起来。
Finally, coordination matters. Councils, the National Health Service, prisons and charities should work together and share the information needed to identify those at risk and get them housed and supported. London’s so-called CHAIN system shows that person-level data can guide services; the next step is connecting that knowledge to housing availability across local authorities.
国家层面的领导工作不仅需要设定目标和预算。如果仅仅投入数十亿资金用于临时性的冬季应急措施，却不解决无家可归问题的根本原因，那么这个问题很可能永远无法真正解决。尽管伯纳姆的圣诞援助行动为那些被安置进室内的人带来了帮助，但这项行动只能被视为一个开端。更严峻的考验还在后面：在下一轮无家可归者调查中，是街头巷尾露宿的人减少了，还是只是换了一批人？
National leadership requires more than setting targets and a budget. Simply spending billions on temporary winter fixes — without addressing the underlying causes of homelessness — is unlikely to ever fix the problem. Although Burnham’s Christmas drive matters for those it brings indoors, it should be judged as a start. The harder test comes later: In the next homelessness survey, are there fewer people in the doorways or merely different ones?
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