On receiving the phone call to inform her that she would be given £2,000 cash as part of a no-strings-attached payment, Aeryn was shocked.
“My partner and I were just staring at each other. I was speechless for a good 10 minutes,” she said. “These things don’t happen often to me; I’m not a very lucky person.”
Aeryn had been chosen to participate in the first UK trial to test the impact of unconditional cash transfers on homelessness, which saw young people leaving care given a one-off £2,000 cash lump sum.
Findings collated by King’s College London and the Centre for Homelessness Impact showed that young people who had received the money were more likely to be in stable housing and less likely to be “sofa-surfing” than those who had not been given the payment. They were also found to be happier and to have stronger relationships, and were less likely to stay overnight in hospital.
Aeryn was placed in care between 2019 and 2021, before deciding to rebuild her life and apply to university.
At the time when her personal adviser informed her that she had received the money, she had been saving for a computer to help with her studies.
“I was working on a laptop that was slow and it kept crashing. I’d been saving for a new PC, but when I got the money, it meant I could finally get the thing I really needed to help with uni,” she said.
She was also able to treat herself and her boyfriend to a trip to Liverpool, where they spent the weekend walking around the shops, making a Build-a-Bear, and visiting iconic Beatles landmarks.
As part of the trial, 99 young people leaving local authority care in nine areas of England received the one-off £2,000 payment from June 2023. Their outcomes were tracked at six and 12 months, and compared with the outcomes of 200 similar care leavers who did not receive the payment.
It concluded that participants who received the money were 8 per cent more likely to be in stable housing six months later, with a 6.6 per cent drop in sofa-surfing. It also found that between 2 per cent and 4 per cent fewer care leavers experienced an eviction linked to antisocial behaviour.
Young people who received the money were initially more likely to engage with health services, such as seeing a GP, and less likely to stay overnight in hospital, with 17 fewer stays. Social workers were required to inform researchers if any participants had experienced adverse outcomes, with none reported.
Those who received the cash also consistently reported that they spent 12 per cent less on alcohol, tobacco or drugs than they had previously.
Speaking of the impact it had, Aeryn said: “I think it pushed me forward. I was performing better at uni because I had the PC, but I could also use the PC to play games online.
“My partner was living a long way away, but having the PC meant we could actually spend time together online.”
She added: “For me, I didn’t have a lot of support; it was a case of having that money helped. It was quite a good feeling to have, because it meant that my care experience had been worth something.”
While Aeryn invested some of the money in things that would help with her studies, other care leavers were able to invest it in hostel stays, clothing, and going to job interviews.
Aeryn is studying forensic investigation at university, and hopes to become a crime scene investigator.
Professor Michael Sanders, director of the experimental government team in the Policy Institute at King’s College London, said: “The findings from the trial are encouraging, with consistent positive effects on participants’ housing stability, wellbeing, social connectedness, contact with health services and other outcomes we measured.
“Effects on some housing outcomes appear to shrink over time, which suggests that a one-off transfer of this amount may be insufficient to have durable effects on housing outcomes. But even so, these results highlight the potential benefits of unconditional cash transfers, which are not only easier and cheaper to administer than other types of interventions, but also allow recipients more agency and dignity, recognising that they themselves are usually best placed to make decisions about their lives.”
Dr Ligia Teixeira, chief executive of the Centre for Homelessness Impact, said: “Cash transfers have a strong evidence base internationally as a simple tool for preventing harms from poverty. We are excited to have the first results from rigorous causal research to test their effectiveness in preventing homelessness.
“Policymakers and local authority leaders should consider direct financial support for young people leaving care, with no strings attached, as a policy tool and a practical way of helping their transition to independent living.”
The trial was funded by the Centre for Homelessness Impact and the Cabinet Office evaluation task force, through the Evaluation Accelerator Fund.
The government has been contacted for comment.
