‘Very long way to go’ despite drop in homeless numbers

Charities have warned that the Government still has a very long way to go in fully addressing the homelessness crisis after latest figures indicated a fall in the number of people in emergency accommodation during December.

The latest data, released by the Department of Housing on Thursday, shows there were 5,508 adults and 3,079 children without permanent accommodation last month — a fall of 16 compared with the figure for November.

The number of families in emergency accommodation decreased by 122 to 1,408.