Manchester Homelessness Partnership E-bulletin: January 2026

Click here to read the full edition of the January 2026 e-bulletin.

Stagecoach Manchester supports homelessness organisations with £100,000 social value investment
Ten VCFSE homelessness organisations across Manchester have each received £10,000 in funding thanks to a social value initiative from Stagecoach Manchester, which was distributed through Forever Manchester. The funding is designed to strengthen frontline services that support people experiencing homelessness or housing insecurity across the city.The awards followed a conversation between Stagecoach Manchester’s Social Value Lead and Manchester Homelessness Partnership, exploring how the company could invest meaningfully in the city’s most vulnerable communities. The resulting grants are now helping organisations maintain essential services during a period of rising demand and increasing costs.
Accommodation Action Group
On 21 January, the action group held a Frontline Workers session at the Booth Centre. There were 29 attendees from across 12 different organisations.
The aims of the session was to develop a Frequently Asked Question brief as a resource for workers and enable networking and strengthening of relationships amongst different workers and organisations. The attendees work with and support people experiencing homelessness and accessing temporary accommodation.
Group discussions were held around what works well, what are the common reasons for contacting the city council and what would make things better.
Thanks to Beth and the Booth Centre for the soup, bread and salad which was very tasty and for the use of their space for the session. 
All of the feedback is currently being written up and will be shared back with the attendees and with Manchester City Council to help partnership working. This action group is led by Justlife, Barnabus and the Booth Centre. 
Women’s Insight Meeting
The next insight session from the Accommodation Action Group is taking place on Thursday 12 February 2026. 
It will be held at the Booth Centre from 1pm to 3.30pm with a light lunch provided.  
This meeting will be focusing on women’s experiences in temporary accommodation.
Reasonable travel expenses will be reimbursed and a gift voucher will be given as a thank you to women for sharing their time and insight. 
Please share this information with women you are working with.
Places must be booked and you can book a place via Eleisha at eleisha@barnabus.org 

Real Change MCR Funding Panel
Thank you to Manchester Specialist Market team at Manchester City Council for the cup donation scheme for Real Change MCR on the Christmas markets and for raising £2904 for the fund. It is greatly appreciated. 

Greater Manchester Urgent Dental Care Telephony ServiceHours of operation are from 8am-10pm, 7 days a week.
Who is eligible to use this service? All residents of Greater Manchester and temporary visitors to the area, however daytime appointments are only available to patients without a dentist. Evening/weekend/Bank Holiday appointments are available to all Greater Manchester residents who require urgent dental treatment or advice. Following triage, patients will be offered a same day or next day appointment, given advice or signposted to other services. Appointments are confirmed by text message.
What happens from 10pm to 8am when the new telephony service is not available? Patients can still call NHS 111 for urgent dental advice. If patients do call NHS 111 with a dental issue between 8am and 10pm they will automatically be redirected to the Greater Manchester Urgent Dental Care Telephony Service.

‘It’s like torture: Life in Temporary Accommodation for Neurodivergent Children and their Families’
A new report, titled ‘It’s like torture: Life in Temporary Accommodation for Neurodivergent Children and their Families’, was launched on 27 January 2026 based on the findings of a UK-wide call for evidence. The call was led by Dr Rosalie Warnock and Professor Katherine Brickell from King’s College London, through the All Party Parliamentary Group for Households in Temporary Accommodation, and with support from the Shared Health Foundation, Justlife, and Autistica. Based on the evidence submitted, the report makes a series of recommendations to improve the experiences of neurodivergent children and their families during stays in temporary accommodation, aimed at both national and local governments. You can read the report here.There is no official data on how many children living in temporary accommodation are neurodivergent; however, the report estimates that between 25,000 and 120,000 such children are affected in England. Despite this, neurodivergent children in temporary accommodation have been omitted from Government strategies and policy decisions. It is apparent within the report that every aspect of homelessness provides a new challenge for neurodivergent children. They rely on routine, predictability, and secure environments with a reasonable amount of space to regulate. Temporary accommodation offers the antithesis of this, with families being moved to different accommodations with short/no notice, away from support networks, that may be unsuitable and of a poor standard. It becomes impossible for children to be able to regulate in such an environment, having significant impacts on their physical and emotional wellbeing, to the extent that the report refers to these impacts as “child cruelty”.This report has been released as part of a wider research project, called the Sensory Lives Project, that aims to generate a better understanding of how homeless families experience living with a neurodivergent child in temporary accommodation. This call for evidence is a first of its kind, with this specific aspect of family homelessness being a significantly under-researched area. Tied with this, Impact on Urban Health has published guidance for families, legal professionals, local authorities, and other services that may be working with households in temporary accommodation with neurodivergent children. See the guidance here.