This study examined how the housing support grant (HSG) had been implemented in England for individuals who use drug and alcohol services. Findings show that the grant was generally implemented as planned and appeared to fill gaps in service provision. Early trends among grant recipients indicated improved access to housing support services, reduced housing-related barriers and positive impacts on health and wellbeing outcomes.

Implementation and early impacts of the Housing Support Grant in England

Kayleigh Sharp, Jennifer Bousfield, Avery Adams, Jessica Dawney, Alessandro Grosso, William D. Phillips, Lucy Strang, Katherine I. Morley, Jennifer Bostock, Andrew Jones, et al.

ResearchPublished Apr 22, 2026

Cover: Implementation and early impacts of the Housing Support Grant in England
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Includes Annex A. Menu of Interventions; Annex B. Implementation research logic model for the Housing Support Grant; Annex C. SSMTRG Housing Support Grant – Menu of Interventions; and more

Dame Carol Black's 2019–2021 independent review of drugs highlighted the importance of safe, suitable and stable housing in the treatment and recovery journey. In 2022, through the Housing Support Grant (HSG), the former UK government provided up to £53m across three years to help local authorities (LAs) address the housing needs of people who use alcohol and/or other drugs. During this period 28 LAs received the HSG as a pilot to gather learning from the programme for future policy development. This funding aligns with the ongoing implementation of the former UK government's ten-year drug strategy From Harm to Hope, which included ambitions to improve access to safe and suitable housing for people who use alcohol and/or other drugs. The HSG was designed to support people who use alcohol and/or other drugs, irrespective of whether they were receiving structured drug or alcohol treatment.

This evaluation aimed to understand how the HSG has been implemented by reviewing 28 plans and examining three case study sites in England. The research focused on whether the HSG was implemented as intended, the barriers and facilitators encountered in its implementation, and the influence of wider and local context on delivery. It also aimed to explore what intervention types within the HSG worked well, for whom and why, as well as the impact on health outcomes for individuals in treatment and recovery services and any unexpected outcomes.

Key Findings

Implementation and approach

  • The HSG pilot was generally implemented as planned as an intensive, person-centred approach to address the challenges of housing insecurity for people who use alcohol and/or other drugs. Support was often delivered through a combination of interventions, taking a holistic approach to individual needs. Although components, such as financial interventions and housing support workers, are not new, they appear fill important gaps in service provision.

Service provision and workforce

  • The HSG funding provided targeted support for people who use alcohol and/or other drugs at greatest risk of losing their homes. This included improved wrap-around support through increasing the number of venues, such as community centres, offering more home visits, and enabling longer-term support through reducing caseloads in the new housing support worker roles.

Partnerships and local adaptation

  • There was variability in local contexts in the three case study sites, including experiences of previous funding cuts and challenges around staffing levels and expertise, as well as existing partnership working between treatment and recovery and housing services. These were described as influencing implementation by acting as facilitators or barriers.

Outcomes and impacts

  • Our mixed-methods findings show early positive trends among HSG recipients, indicating that the HSG appears to have worked as intended, improving access to housing support services, reducing barriers and positively impacting health and wellbeing outcomes. Given study’s limitations, however, no causal attribution to the HSG can be made.

Demand and sustainability

  • In some LAs, the demand for HSG funding exceeded supply, creating capacity limits for new worker roles and leaving some people unable to access support. This highlights a tension between programme goals and what can be achieved within existing resources when needs require sustained, intensive input.

Recommendations

  • Central government should continue to fund housing support for those who use alcohol and/or other drugs.
  • Central government should continue to support LAs to tailor housing interventions to the needs of their population and allow LAs to manage financial interventions.
  • Central government should examine the variation in LAs' interpretation of eligibility for HSG support across the pilot sites, including differing requirements related to abstinence or engagement with treatment.
  • Central government should develop clear guidelines outlining the purpose of reducing caseload sizes for staff providing intensive support. This should include strategies for coping with the potential impacts on caseload management of longer-term support, including processes for discharge back to a 'non-housing-support'-specific case worker.
  • HSG monitoring data and NDTMS should be aligned as closely as possible, to enable comparable information to be collected for all HSG recipients and allow for meaningful comparison with the broader treatment population in NDTMS as a control group.

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Sharp, Kayleigh, Jennifer Bousfield, Avery Adams, Jessica Dawney, Alessandro Grosso, William D. Phillips, Lucy Strang, Katherine I. Morley, Jennifer Bostock, Andrew Jones, Nicola Kalk, Tom Ling, Tim Millar, Joanne Neale, John Strang, Jon Sussex, and Jennifer Newbould, Implementation and early impacts of the Housing Support Grant in England. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2026. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA4735-2.html.
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