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Research from Solace Women’s Aid and Single Homeless Project reveals that nine out of 10 homeless women are missing from official UK government figures. The charities report that gender-biased collection methods overlook women who avoid visible rough sleeping to escape gender-based violence, sheltering instead in cafes, hospitals, and on public transport.
The discrepancy between official counts and reality
The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government relies on rough sleeping snapshots that fail to capture the specific ways women experience homelessness. According to reporting by Yahoo News, the government counted 680 women across 296 local authorities who were rough sleeping in 2024. However, Census Local Insights meetings identified 1,777 women across only 37 local authorities during that same year. This gap suggests a systemic failure in how the state identifies vulnerable populations. Lucy Campbell, head of multiple disadvantage at Single Homeless Project, has characterized the current methodology as asystemic failure, arguing that the government must overhaul how it counts homeless women to ensure they are not erased from policy and funding decisions. The failure is largely numerical and spatial. Roughly 54% of homeless women are excluded from official statistics because they spend their nights in locations not classified as rough sleeping areas. These include:
- A&E departments
- Bank foyers
- Public transport (buses and trains)
- 24-hour cafes
Safety drivers and the choice of invisible shelter
Women are significantly less likely tobed downvisibly on the street compared to men, primarily due to the threat of gender-based violence. To survive, many seek out environments that offer a balance of seclusion and public visibility. “This is typically where you would find women, maybe more in the day, maybe in the night as well. It’s somewhere quite secluded, still tucked away in the corner. But also, you’re still in public. So if something happened and you felt like your safety was at risk, you could still make some noise.” Elise Godsal, specialist women’s navigator at Single Homeless Project The risks of visible homelessness are visceral. One woman, Nadia, told reporters she once slept outside a Santander bank and woke up being
kicked in the head. Her experience highlights a pattern of extreme vulnerability, as she recounted being
pissed onand forced to make a home out of a cardboard box in car parks or bin sheds. As Smitfc.org notes, this invisibility is often a survival strategy. Women may engage in sofa surfing, stay in exploitative relationships to avoid the street, or hide their substance use and abuse to avoid being judged or losing their children.
Systemic failures in homelessness accommodation
The lack of visibility is not merely a result of where women sleep, but a reflection of a support system that fails to protect them. The 2024 Women’s Rough Sleeping Census report found that 37% of women had been in some form of homelessness accommodation before they began sleeping rough. This suggests that existing shelters and temporary housing are not meeting women’s specific needs or preventing the slide into rough sleeping. The choice for many is not between a home and the street, but between two different types of danger. “Many women face a really stark choice between remaining in abusive environments and abusive homes, or risking entering a homelessness system that can sometimes be just as harmful, and where the very systems meant to protect them, often let them down, or, worse, expose them to further harm.” Source: Solace Women’s Aid and Single Homeless Project research For some, the only perceived safety is found in unconventional alliances. One survey respondent reported being raped while sleeping in a bank doorway and now ensures she is with a male rough sleeper at all times, noting that while it is thesafest option, it does not mean she is actually safe.
