New housing initiative shows how we can end homelessness, says Prince of Wales

The Prince of Wales has hailed an “inspirational” new youth housing project that he hopes will act as a model to eventually prevent youth homelessness.

On Tuesday, Prince William, 40, the patron of charity Centrepoint, attended the opening of Reuben House, a development in Peckham, south London, designed to help get young lives back on track.

The Prince appeared impressed with the modern units, each of which contains a bed, a small kitchen area and a bathroom, describing them as “seriously smart”.

As he sat down with three young people, two of them residents, in one of the flats, he said: “It’s just about that first step and then you move from there. You can replicate it anywhere.”

He said they were “exactly what we need more of” and described the development as a “really good best practice model” that he hoped other local authorities would replicate.

“Scaling it up … that’s the aim,” he said.

William, who is due to announce a major project on homelessness later this month, suggested that if local councils were on board, Centrepoint would be able to “energise” such projects and then provide wrap-around services to residents.

Seyi Obakin, the chief executive of Centrepoint, said Reuben House was a “pilot” but that they were aiming to have 300 such units available in London and Manchester within the coming years.

However, he acknowledged that to expand, developers would need access to capital grants in order to be able to offer such low rents.

One of the biggest problems they face is that such accommodation, bridging supported housing with the private rental sector, does not fit into any current planning framework.

“If they created the exemption for us, how do they then ensure that others don’t exploit it and build small units like this and then charge a King’s ransom for it?” he said.

“The reality is that this has been funded by donations.

“If you want it to be built by others, like a registered provider, you would need to create a situation in which they could access capital grants, and then they can borrow.

“A mix of capital grants or borrowing means you can make the financial model work to charge a rent at a third of income. So it’s really critical that we get that philosophy.”

Michael Gove, the Housing Secretary, has visited Reuben House, and is said to have “loved it.”

“He wants to go away and have a roundtable with us and developers and policymakers just to work out whether there are any unintended consequences of creating this kind of framework,” Mr Obakin said. “So I’m optimistic, but we need to keep pushing.”

The Prince has met both Mr Gove and Sir Keir Starmer, the Labour leader, in recent weeks to discuss his forthcoming project.

Before leaving Peckham, the Prince thanked all those who had helped the project become a reality, including donors Julia and Hans Rausing and the Reuben Foundation.

“It really is inspirational and it starts to show everyone how we really can prevent homelessness,” he said.

“It’s a really amazing solution, a practical solution, a tangible solution … to help young people get back on track.”