Prince William charity and Salesforce set up data lab to tackle homelessness

Prince William’s homelessness programme, Homewards, is teaming up with Salesforce and LandAid, a property industry charity, to set up a Homelessness Data Lab.

The Homewards charity, launched in 2023, works in six locations: Aberdeen, Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole, Lambeth, Newport, Northern Ireland and Sheffield. It is supported by The Royal Foundation.

The Homelessness Data Lab is described in a joint statement by Homewards, LandAid and Salesforce as a first-of-its-kind national collaboration, designed to use data and technology to prevent homelessness.

Zahra Bahrololoumi, CEO of Salesforce UK and Ireland, will join William on the AI Arena stage at London TechWeek today to launch the initiative and talk about how IT can put an end to homelessness.

In the statement, she said: “Our work with Prince William’s Homewards programme and the launch of the Homelessness Data Lab represents a definitive shift in how society can tackle its most complex challenges. Over 430,000 people across the UK are currently facing homelessness – but this isn’t inevitable.

“Homelessness is rarely random. It can be predictable, which means with the right tools and support, it can be preventable. At Salesforce, we are proud to contribute our technology and expertise to frontline services, identify risk earlier, and help make homelessness rare, brief and unrepeated.” 

The project involves more than 25 organisations drawn from business, technology, government, local authorities and frontline services. The lab will explore practical homelessness prevention schemes in the six Homewards locations.

Bloomberg, VodafoneThree, Accenture and NatWest Group are involved in the venture and will develop projects whose aim is to show that homelessness can be predictable and preventable. The projects are intended to focus on improving coordination between frontline services, developing a better understanding of why people become homeless, and getting support to them at the first signs of difficulty.

This will be the first time that homelessness has been discussed at London Tech Week. The panel the Prince of Wales is participating in will also include business leaders and feature a “pitch” session where five entrepreneurs will present uses of data and technology aimed at preventing homelessness.

At an open data conference in London in 2024, a researcher at national youth homeless charity Centrepoint related how it had to send freedom of information requests to more than 300 local authorities in England to access information about the scale of homelessness among the young, which is also a hidden problem, in that they might be sofa surfing with friends.

“The immediate idea we have [of homelessness] is someone sleeping rough,” the researcher said. “However, there are many more that can actually be considered homeless while not sleeping rough in the streets.”

Homelessness is rarely random. It can be predictable, which means with the right tools and support, it can be preventable

The conference, OpenUK’s State of Open Con 24, shone a spotlight on the bureaucracy that prevents opening up datasets to tackle the homelessness crisis.

The Homelessness Data Lab also involves housing sector organisations Centrepoint, Crisis, the Centre for Homelessness Impact, Community Action Network and Homeless Link, as well as the Ministry of Housing, communities and local government, local authorities, and local organisations in the six locations.

Dan Hughes, a trustee at LandAid, said: “The property industry has a real role to play in tackling youth homelessness, and this collaboration is a brilliant example of what’s possible when businesses, government and the sector come together around shared data and a shared goal. By using data to identify warning signs earlier, we can move from responding to crisis to preventing it.”

Hazel Detsiny, executive director of homelessness at The Royal Foundation, added: “The Royal Foundation has a proud track record in harnessing brilliant collaboration and the latest technology as a force for change, and this is the time to bring homelessness into such conversations.

“We’re proud to be working with LandAid and Salesforce to launch the UK’s first Homelessness Data Lab, where partners are developing and testing practical projects across our locations to use data more effectively.”