AUTHORITIES will spend £6m next year to provide a place to sleep for all those living on the street.

Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham has revealed he plans to scale up public involvement in the ‘A Bed Every Night’ scheme, which launched last year.

The project, which includes £2m of investment from the NHS, will aim to offer 400 beds each night - an increase of 100 from the previous year.

This will be provided by a range of public and voluntary groups and will include more women-only spaces, more options to house people with dogs and more involvement from health services.

In Bolton, A Bed Every Night has allowed services to provide somewhere to sleep for 160 people.

Council cabinet member Cllr Adele Warren said: “A Bed Every Night provision in Bolton has greatly assisted in our collective efforts to help people off the street and towards more positive lives.

“We continue to work with our partners, through the Bolton Homeless Alliance, to help rough sleepers to a life permanently off the streets.

“Rough sleeping is a significant issue and there are a lot of reasons why people sleep on the streets.

“We undertake proactive outreach work with partner organisations to identify, engage and offer assistance as soon as practicable to move people off the streets and to build trust in order to help those people with longer term issues.

“Some individuals have complex needs and sometimes refuse assistance but we continue to try and engage with them.”

Mr Burnham says working more closely with the NHS will be one of the major changes to the scheme and even praised projects in Bolton for inspiring parts of the project.

He said: “In many ways we’re drawing on what’s been going on in Bolton for many years because Bolton’s always had a more health-oriented approach to rough sleeping.

“It’s that partnership I think between councils and health that will really drive the improvement because it’s not just a bed it’s what you can provide in terms of extra support while people are in that accommodation.

Since its launch in November 2018, A Bed Every Night has provided a space for more than 2,000 people, with 680 then moved to permanent accommodation.

Dr Tom Tasker, co-chair of the Greater Manchester Joint Commissioning Team, is a GP who will be heavily involved in the scheme.

He pointed to the health problems which can cause someone to turn to rough sleeping and can then be magnified by living on the street.

“Rough sleeping is a dangerous and isolating experience”, Dr Tasker said. “As a GP, we see that there is a considerable impact on a person’s physical and mental health caused by homelessness and rough sleeping. In many cases, people experiencing homelessness are already facing multiple complexities, which are compounded further by spending even one night sleeping on the street.”

A Bed Every Night Phase 2 will be launched on Tuesday, October 1.