ABSTRACT
Inadequate housing provision, including, most importantly, the lack of affordable accommodation available for rent in both urban and rural areas, remains the fundamental cause of all homelessness. This is also the underlying cause of many of the adverse consequences upon the health of single homeless people. These truths, we have seen, are found to apply equally both here and in the USA. It is also evident that the ‘shape’ and scale of the ‘problem’ of homelessness are largely a consequence of social policy in housing, social welfare, benefit and health care systems.
