Meet the inspirational 15-year-old girl with a plan to house homeless families: 'I wanted to help'

Local councils are struggling to keep up with the record number of homeless families living in temporary accommodation across the UK – but one inspirational teenager is offering a helping hand.

Scarlett Chapman, 15, from Hove, has launched grassroots campaign Mission: HOME to help her local council identify new sites where they can house the almost 3,000 parents and children living in temporary accommodation in Brighton and Hove.

Mission:HOME is working with the local council to identify small unused plots of council-owned land, known as microsites, in which to build new homes to address the crisis.

A planning application for the first site the group has identified is currently underway to build four homes in Woodingdean. 

Chapman is urging people to show their support for the campaign before the consultation ends on 3 February as part of her mission to tackle homelessness.

“I think across Brighton and Hove there are quite a few unused plots of land everywhere, particularly small ones. I think this is because the council tends to build on larger plots of land for efficiency,” said Chapman. 

“When I was thinking about families trapped in temporary accommodation, I was trying to think: We need more of it so how can we go about doing that? That’s where the idea stemmed from.”

Despite her tender years, tackling homelessness has been a lifelong pursuit for Chapman.

The aspiring singer-songwriter first noticed homeless people on streets across Brighton and Hove when she was eight years old and that switched her on to the cause.

“I noticed that there were homeless people and I couldn’t really understand why,” said Chapman. “So I began asking about it and raising money for different homelessness charities across Brighton and Hove. Doing that, I raised over £10,000 and by the time I was 12 I had found out about the hidden homelessness.

“I had spoken to a mother who is currently and has been in temporary accommodation for the past 15 years. I think it was when she told me that she had to hoover mould off of her daughter’s bedroom walls to stop her from being sick. I knew I wanted to help. That’s how Mission: HOME started.” 

It was Anna and David’s story that touched Chapman’s heartstrings. The couple and their four children have lived in temporary accommodation for so long that their youngest son has never known any different.

The family have moved through three different temporary homes, often at short notice, and some have been in a poor condition. In one home the damp was so bad that one child’s daughter began to “disintegrate” while another would wake up with “white flecks” over their bedding.

“It makes you feel like you’re not human,” said Anna, who works part-time while caring for her children while her partner David is self-employed. “Sometimes the only thing keeping me here is my children.”

She added: “We’re not asking for anything special. We just have a housing need. I don’t want a house ‘given’ to us. Social housing should be for people who need it until they don’t.”

It’s a story that has become all too familiar both locally and across the UK.

Simon Gale, chief executive of Justlife, a Brighton-based charity that supports people living in temporary accommodation, said:  “Across Brighton and Hove we’re seeing record numbers of people trapped in temporary accommodation.

“The reality is that the only way to bring those numbers down is to build more social housing, including on sites like in Woodingdean, which are currently lying empty. This crisis won’t be solved by the private rented sector or by short-term fixes. It will only be solved by giving people the secure, permanent homes they need.”

Mission: HOME’s plan also has the backing of Jacob Allen, Labour councillor for Woodingdean at Brighton & Hove City Council, who urged locals to get behind it. 

Read more:

• More than 380,000 people will spend Christmas homeless – what does Labour’s strategy mean for them?
• Homelessness stagnated in Labour’s first year – but ministers warned not to mistake it for progress
• Homeless people were given £2,000, no strings attached. Here’s what they spent the money on

As for Chapman, she hopes that the plan can be the first step on a larger mission to turnaround the country’s homeless crisis.

With a big future ahead, Chapman is optimistic that a Britain without homelessness can one day exist.

“Yeah definitely. I think with Mission: HOME on the site in Woodingdean that we’re working on at the moment, I think this is a starting point for us. This is the first project that we’ve taken on,” she said.

“But hopefully once the planning application does get approved, this will show the council that the public are actually open to having more social housing in the community. So I think there will be many more projects to come, and hopefully it will spread nationally.

“I think it’s amazing how much of a difference that people can make when they work together.”

As for Chapman herself, she harbours dreams of becoming a music icon and has even released a couple of songs on Spotify as a teenager.

But she is adamant that tackling homelessness will factor in her plans whether on stage or off.

“I think that everyone’s got their passion, something they’re passionate about. For me, that is definitely helping to end the homelessness crisis that we’ve got,” she said.

“I’ve always had a dream of becoming a performer, so singing and songwriting. I hope one day I’ll have, potentially, some influence if I’m performing on stage. I think that homelessness is a challenge that we all have a role to play to overcome it. If I ever did become big in performing then I would try and use my voice to raise awareness.”

Chapman is urging people to back Mission: HOME’s plan. Head to missionhome.org.uk for a guide on how to submit a comment on Brighton & Hove City Council’s planning portal. 

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