Shelters and Housing

• Legal duties of care upon municipalities in relation to destitution and homelessness, the need to protect the fundamental rights of all, including rights to housing, and respect for the human dignity of individuals often require local authorities to take action to ensure that all, irrespective of migration status, can access a shelter.
• Providing a shelter is often – especially during the cold winters of Northern Europe – necessary to ensure the life and health of homeless individuals, irrespective of their migration status.
• Cities can fight homelessness, irregular settlements and squatting by providing alternative accommodation or otherwise supporting irregular migrants’ housing needs.
• Reducing the homeless population of a city is an issue of public order, health and safety, irrespective of the migration statuses of the homeless. Other negative consequences of homelessness include street prostitution, substance abuse, crime, and the physical dangers associated with sleeping in the street or in derelict premises.
• A reduction in the homeless population, including irregular migrants, reassures the local population in relation to their security concerns.
• Municipalities aiming to reduce crime and violence in their territory can allow vulnerable individuals in need, including women and children with irregular status and no other accommodation alternatives, to escape situations of crime, including domestic violence, trafficking and sexual exploitation, by providing them with a safe shelter.
• Local authorities may act because they are concerned about the impact homelessness has on the image of their city and the consequences of the visibility of homelessness for tourism.
• Supporting vulnerable migrants’ housing needs helps reduce exploitation by abusive landlords.
• Stable accommodation, with counselling and support, is often the first step toward ending a situation of irregularity. It allows migrants to concentrate on their regularisation paths or prospects of returning and also makes it easier for legal staff to follow up on the immigration cases of shelter residents.

• The right to housing for all persons regardless of nationality or migration status is recognised by a wide range of international human rights treaties as one of the facets of the right to an ‘adequate standard of living’, including Article 25(1) of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and Article 11(1) of the International Covenant of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.
• The European Committee of Social Rights (ECSR) of the Council of Europe has found that the European Social Charter (ESC) recognises the right to shelter of migrants with irregular status. In its (non-binding) decisions, the ECSR held that ‘States Parties are required [...] to provide adequate shelter to children unlawfully present in their territory’  and that ‘shelter must be provided also to adult migrants in an irregular situation, even when they are requested to leave the country and even though they may not require that long-term accommodation in a more permanent housing be offered to them’. On the other hand, the European Court of Human Rights stated that this right is not covered by the European Convention of Human Rights, and that the Convention (Art. 3) does not impose a positive obligation on State Parties to provide emergency social assistance and shelter to unsuccessful asylum seekers if they are not prevented from returning to their country of origin and the hosting state offers accommodation under the condition that the individual cooperates with their return.
• National legislation in the majority of EU countries imposes penalties on landlords renting properties to irregular migrants, including fines and imprisonment. Renting to irregular migrants may be explicitly punishable in the law, or a general rule on facilitation of irregular stay may be interpreted to include renting housing to irregular migrants.

Mainstreaming irregular migrants’ access to municipal shelters and adopting admission procedures that facilitate their access

Where national legislation does not prohibit offering migrants with irregular status access to public shelters, municipalities managing the facility (or the organisations to whom the management is delegated) may nevertheless formally restrict access to the facility to regular migrants only. Alternatively, they may impose admission requirements such as presenting documentation that irregular migrants often lack (a residence permit, an identification document, or a social security number). Adjusting rules to ensure that admission procedures facilitate rather than exclude access is the first step to including irregular migrants in admission to shelters or other municipal accommodation facilities.

The most straightforward solution is not to require a residence permit as a requirement to access municipal shelters and to refrain from carrying out immigration checks within shelters. This is already being implemented in some cities such as Ghent.

• As Irish national law does not regulate the issue, the City of Dublin allows homeless irregular migrants in immediate need access to the city’s emergency shelters by avoiding questions about immigration status. Immigration checks may be carried out at a later stage, in part to refer the person towards other services to tackle their condition of homelessness for which they may be eligible.
• The City of Liverpool decided to allow access to its night and day shelters to any street sleepers, including unsuccessful asylum seekers and other migrants with no right to access services. This was part of the national COVID-19 response ‘everyone in’ mentioned above. In addition, the municipality started an outreach campaign named ‘Always Room Inside’ to make sure that any street sleeper, as well as the wider population, is aware of the possibility of accessing the shelter, regardless of immigration status.
• In Frankfurt, migrants with precarious status are generally excluded from both social housing and homelessness assistance. Only persons who can prove permanent residence in Germany or have a valid residence permit and have been registered in Frankfurt for at least one year are entitled to social housing. This means that precarious migrants cannot access large parts of the services offered by the homelessness assistance system. However, under the federal state of Hesse’s security and public order law, the municipality has the duty to prevent acute risks, such as homelessness, irrespective of the person’s residence status. The local authority is thereby obliged to provide shelter to involuntarily homeless persons.
• Helsinki and Espoo adopted local practices to provide the possibility for all irregular migrants to receive necessary social assistance, in line with their legal obligations under the Social Welfare Act, and going beyond the social assistance for former asylum seekers that is reimbursed by the national government. Both cities have created specific ‘immigration units’ within the department of social services. The units consist of social workers, social counsellors, and financial advisors that work with irregular migrants. Both units offer services deemed necessary, based on a needs assessment by a social worker. Available services may include shelter, an income allowance, a transportation card, and social and legal guidance. Single persons are offered a space in a shelter, while families or people with specific medical needs may be offered apartments. In Helsinki, shelter is provided in a local night shelter run by a civil society organization. In this shelter, undocumented migrants have floors designated for them specifically. In Espoo, shelter is offered in a 24-hour municipal shelter.

Some municipalities also prioritise the provision of emergency shelter during the winter period.

• In Vienna, The Viennese Assistance for the Homeless (WWH) offers a wide range of services to people affected or threatened by homelessness and is considered innovative in a European comparative perspective. The WWH is organised by the Vienna Social Fund (FSW), a public company owned by the municipality. The FSW has additional criteria of eligibility to receive support from the homelessness assistance, from which migrants with precarious status are usually also excluded. Although there is no legal entitlement to homeless assistance, temporary accommodation options are available for irregular migrants, which are partially funded by the municipality, particularly in the winter months. This is justified on the one hand by the humanitarian obligation to prevent people from dying of cold, and on the other by the fact that the city and its residents benefit from less street homelessness. The FSW funds around 900 beds during the winter in various NGO-run emergency shelters across the city. These beds are available regardless of status and entitlements, and are therefore very often used by migrants with precarious status, mainly from EU-countries. Usually several people share rooms and have access to hygiene products and food there. Additionally, a number of day centres operate in the winter months.
• In Geneva, there are night shelters run by the city that accept everyone, including irregular migrants, to try to avoid people dying of cold when sleeping on the street. There are also some emergency shelters run by NGOs that receive some local government funding, where people can have their own room, usually with a maximum duration of stay of around three months. Such shelters will also accept undocumented people who have not received a negative decision on an application for international protection and deportation decision, and people do not risk deportation as a result of accessing services. However, the system is often over-subscribed and many people and families are not able to stabilise their situation and find alternative housing within the three months.

Where the national legal framework on this issue is unclear, municipalities can choose the most extensive interpretation of the law in relation to access to the service.

• In Italy, the City of Genoa backs the provision of shelter and food to vulnerable individuals with irregular migration status (including women, victims and children), by taking advantage of competing frameworks in the national legislation and thus prioritising the implementation of legal duties to assist vulnerable people over limitations imposed by immigration legislation.

Funding or reimbursing NGOs for the provision of shelter to irregular migrants

Municipalities may fund the activities of NGOs to provide shelters to people in need, regardless of migration status.

• In Oslo, NGOs run shelters for people needing a place to sleep, regardless of their residence status. In 2018, the City of Oslo provided €600,000 to the shelters. On a regular basis there are 133 beds for overnight stay and legal and medical assistance is provided. During cold winter periods the capacity is increased. The City of Stockholm has a similar model.
• In Ghent, the city funds a local NGO project Shelter & Orientation for undocumented women. They also started a Shelter & Orientation project for men that is run by the General Welfare Organisation.

This practice is used in particular in countries where restrictive national legislation prevents direct municipal provision of housing services to irregular migrants, or limits the possibility of accessing national funds to cover the costs of providing shelter. The mediation of an NGO allows indirect provision of shelters. In particular, in national contexts where public officials are bound to report irregular migrants requesting services, the mediation of an NGO can offer a ‘firewall’. 

Support may take the form of funds provided upfront to manage a facility with the specific goal of providing accommodation for those who cannot access municipal shelters.

• In the Netherlands, where national law strictly limits the provision of services to irregular migrants, the City of Utrecht provides funding to NGOs to manage three shelters hosting irregular migrants. Beyond accommodation, NGOs also provide financial, legal and medical assistance in the shelters.
• The City of Stockholm has a partnership with a local NGO to offer shelter in family homes to young irregular unaccompanied migrants.

Support may also take the form of reimbursements for organisations that cannot access funds from national governments for the costs of providing shelter to irregular migrants.

• In Sweden, where administrative barriers hinder access to state-funded emergency shelters for people with irregular status, the Cities of Gothenburg and Stockholm reimburse non-profit shelters for the costs of providing accommodation to women with irregular status escaping situations of violence.

Initiatives supporting irregular migrants’ access to the private housing market

Local authorities may implement initiatives supporting irregular migrants’ access to rented accommodation and protect them from exploitative renting conditions. This often happens through an NGO.

The mediation by NGOs between landlords and tenants may facilitate access to rented housing for irregular migrants.

• The Autonomous Community of Madrid has been supporting an NGO to mediate between prospective tenants and home owners and check housing conditions. The NGO keeps tenants’ identities anonymous to the landlord before the conclusion of the leasing agreement in order to prevent discrimination and avoid landlords asking for documents that migrants cannot produce (such as payslips).

Municipalities may financially support destitute migrants for accommodation purposes.

• The City of Amsterdam has been funding an NGO that provides monthly allowances for living expenses and if needed additional accommodation allowances, to migrants with irregular status and no other means to sustain themselves. The city keeps control over the use of funds through a requirement that officials authorise each case before funds are released.

Providing accommodation for irregular migrants cooperating in their return

• In contexts of restrictive national policies, the local need to ensure accommodation for homeless migrants with irregular status can be reconciled with immigration rules on migrants’ removal by limiting access to accommodation facilities to migrants agreeing to cooperate in their return. This is the case, for instance, at Rotterdam’s ‘bed-bath-food shelter’.
• The limitations of this approach can include leaving other irregular migrants without shelter, as well as not addressing the situation of non-removable migrants. In Utrecht, rather than requiring migrants’ agreement on their return, migrants receive legal counselling while in the shelter, which may convince them to participate in programs of voluntary return.