Emmanuel House’s Winter Story – how we’re tackling homelessness in Nottingham

Supporting homeless people through prevention, intervention and recovery

You are ‘homeless’ if you have nowhere to stay and are living on the streets, but you can be homeless even if you have a roof over your head – ‘homeless people’ aren’t simply the people you see in doorways. There are people sofa surfing and living in sheds, garages or tents. There are also people who are at risk of homelessness – those staying in temporary accommodation, hostels or shelters and those living in unacceptable housing situations that are dangerous, cold, damp or overcrowded.

Emmanuel House supports people in all these sorts of situations, but we need help to do so.

Covid-19’s impact on homelessness

The Covid-19 pandemic has reminded us of the importance of home and hope, family and connection, but there are many people in Nottingham who will spend this winter without a safe place to call home. At the last count, every month there are over 100 individual people seen sleeping rough in Nottingham. Most of them are experiencing homelessness for the first time. Emmanuel House’s beneficiaries are suffering the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic, with an increase in demand for housing, social isolation, complications with mental and physical health, worsening financial pressures, the end of furlough, cuts to Universal Credit and an increase in unemployment, domestic violence and evictions.

Many of the people we support are in crisis and need intervention and support so we can prevent them from becoming homeless or help them recover from their experiences of homelessness.


Help Emmanuel House tackle homelessness this winter

Everything we do contributes to our work of getting people out of homelessness but a number of our key services receive no statutory funding, which means we have to fundraise to keep them going: the emergency Winter Shelter, our culturally-specific support work, a warm and safe support centre with an Access Team that offers basic services, and a Wellbeing Support Team, offering mental health support to people that are homeless or vulnerable. By donating to Emmanuel House’s Winter Appeal, you can help us tackle homelessness and be part of our winter story..


Support homeless people through fashion, film and fundraising

This winter, we’ll be shining a light on these four services and showing our supporters how their donations will make a difference to people who are homeless or are at risk of homelessness.

We’ll be revealing how Emmanuel House tackles homelessness on a day-to-day basis by sharing stories, challenging perceptions and myths, going behind the scenes and answering any questions you might have about homelessness.

  • Chapter 1 – short stories from the newly reopened Winter Shelter – intervention with people who are rough sleeping and the prevention of vulnerable people becoming street homeless.
  • Chapter 2 – A ‘tackling homelessness’ clothes campaign to raise funds for and awareness of our Access Team’s provision of meeting people’s basic needs.
  • Chapter 3 – a short film telling a story about homelessness prevention and the support we provide within Black and Minority Ethnic communities.
  • Chapter 4 – community and corporate fundraising campaign to show how sport can help tackle homelessness and help with people’s mental health, by highlighting the vital services of our Wellbeing Support Team and its work to help people recover from homelessness.

How you can help this winter

Donate money to our Winter Appeal

  • £10 enables us to meet a homeless person for the first time, assess their needs and make a plan for support.
  • £50 provides three meals a day for the 22 guests in the Winter Shelter
  • £100 provides a package of support for someone in crisis, including showers, clean clothes, hot food, care of address and specialist advice.
  • £250 provides a package of support to get someone off the streets, helping us to meet their basic human needs, liaising with other agencies and supporting them into accommodation.
  • £350 provides all the meals served in the Winter Shelter for one week.
  • It costs £1000 a night to run our Winter Shelter for 24 hours.

Fundraise for our Winter Appeal


Donate food to Emmanuel House

We’re currently serving lunch to people who are homeless from our support centre every Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday. We’re also serving breakfast, lunch and dinner everyday for up to 22 guests in our Winter Shelter.

If you’d like to buy ingredients for us to cook these meals, please visit the link below.


Volunteer for Emmanuel House

We rely on our army of volunteers to help support people out of homelessness. We currently have a variety of roles that you can apply for at the Support Centre, Winter Shelter and our Charity Shop.


Donate to Emmanuel House using Amazon Smile for your Christmas shopping

Amazon Smile automatically donates 0.5% of the purchase price of eligible products to your chosen charity when you shop on smile.amazon.co.uk. It’s a quick, simple and free way of supporting Emmanuel House whilst you’re doing your online shopping.


Keep your eyes peeled as our story unfolds over the next few weeks. Thank you for supporting us this winter.