The reconnection of rough sleepers within the UK : an evaluation

The increased strategic emphasis on reconnection has largely occurred in the absence of robust evidence regarding the impacts on rough sleepers, however. This study aimed to begin to redress this gap in evidence, by documenting the rationale underpinning the utilisation of reconnection, examining the ways it is articulated ‘on the ground’, and assessing its impact on rough sleepers. Both ‘indigenous’ and migrant rough sleepers are affected by reconnection, but this study restricted focus to the former, that is, British nationals reconnected within the UK. ‘Reconnection’, defined in policy terms as “the process by which people sleeping rough, who have a connection to another area where they can access accommodation and/or social, family and support networks, are supported to return to this area in a planned way”