Overview
- The Museum of Homelessness recorded a 9% year-on-year rise, compiling its Dying Homeless count through FOI requests, coroners’ records, media reports and family testimonies.
- Forty-four percent of fatalities were linked to drugs or alcohol, with reports of increasingly lethal substances such as spice and synthetic opioids, and over half of all cases classed as deaths of despair.
- An increasing share of deaths occurred in temporary or supported accommodation, as England logged record levels of households (131,140) and children (169,050) in temporary housing at the end of March 2025.
- Nationwide totals were 1,142 in England and 211 in Northern Ireland, with declines to 168 in Scotland and 90 in Wales, and sharp rises reported in regions including the South West, East Midlands and East of England; Nottingham’s deaths doubled to 22.
- Homelessness minister Alison McGovern called the figures heartbreaking and said efforts are being accelerated, while charities urged immediate measures such as building more social housing and unfreezing housing benefit; a vigil was held outside Downing Street on 9 October.