Prisoners freed early face sleeping rough as housing runs dry, staff warn

The next wave of early releases lands on 10 November, and probation staff say the housing simply isn't there to catch them. Tania Bassett of Napo, the probation staff union, said most accommodation options were already full after October's releases, and her members are bracing for the same again. Her warning comes as Andy Burnham pushes to end rough sleeping in England by Christmas, backed by £874m in funding.

One man already knows what that looks like. James, 37, left prison in August and was placed in temporary probation accommodation in Somerset — a placement that runs out in four days. He has epilepsy and PTSD, was turned down for temporary housing by Somerset council and rejected by probation housing, and says he has written to MPs, solicitors, probation and the council without luck. He even floated getting himself recalled to prison because it is November and cold. Everyone he met in the probation hostel, he said, was released without an address, with many sleeping in cars or on benches.

The scale is getting worse fast. Analysis by the Prison Advice and Care Trust (Pact) found the number of prisoners released into rough sleeping jumped 130% in three years — 6,040 in 2022-23, now 14,360 in 2025-26. Rough sleeping shows up in roughly one in seven prison releases, compared with about one in 10 three years ago. Releases logged as having no fixed abode, which combines homelessness and rough sleeping, rose by 4.6 percentage points over the period, now at 15.9%.

Pact chief executive Andy Keen-Downs said people keep coming back to prison for missing probation appointments because they were sleeping on cardboard — and called the shortage of post-prison support money a fatal flaw in the rough sleeping plan. Enver Solomon, CEO of the charity Nacro, described visiting a prison aiming to house 84% of leavers, effectively accepting that 16% would be homeless. He said ministers recognise housing is a critical piece of the puzzle, but the clock is running.

Tagging is making the squeeze sharper. The government has introduced a presumption of electronic tagging for offenders released early, but Bassett warned that cannot work when people have nowhere to sleep — and nowhere to plug in a charger. James is juggling two devices: a GPS tracker that needs daily charging and an alcohol monitoring tag that must stay connected to a communication device. He asked who is supposed to comply with that on the street. Bassett said Napo will press the chancellor to ringfence money for prison leavers.

Somerset council said it cannot discuss individual cases but has a statutory duty to assess anyone homeless or at risk and explore all suitable options, adding it is committed to ending rough sleeping in the county. A government spokesperson said it is working with councils and charities on prison leaver homelessness, with record probation investment and a push to offer everyone sleeping rough a route off the streets or wider support by Christmas. The spokesperson also pointed to work training prisoners and partnerships with hundreds of employers to move leavers into jobs.