4.
Lack of Information on the Situation of the Homeless (232-234)
69. The definition of homelessness includes the persons living in the streets, the shelters
for the homeless, the facilities for vagabonds, unauthorized accommodating facilities,
prayer houses, single room occupancy hotels, boarding places for examinees, and inns
and motels and those with no known family members or friends living in other social
welfare institutions (including those for persons with disabilities, women's refuge,
nursing facilities). The number of homeless people depends on which definition is used.
In the narrowest definition, the homeless merely include those living in the streets and
the shelters for the homeless and are estimated to be about 5,000. If a broader definition
is used to include those living in the facilities for vagabonds, the number of the
homeless would increase to 12,000. Furthermore, in case the broadest definition is
applied as the "Presidential Commission on Social Inclusion" did in 2005, the homeless
people refer to the persons living in the streets, the shelters for the homeless, the
facilities for vagabonds, unauthorized accommodating facilities, prayer houses, single
room occupancy hotels, boarding places for examinees, and inns and motels and those
with no known family members or friends living in other social welfare institutions, and
the estimated number of the homeless is as many as 97,000. However, the research of
the homeless in this country is simply confined to measuring the size of this group and
there have been no significant research and studies to identify the features and the
changing trends of the group.
70. At present, the Government's support for the homeless is focused on the
institutionalized people, and there exist almost no measures to secure constant and
stable housing for those living in the streets or temporary shelters to facilitate their
social inclusion. Indeed, the temporary accommodations available to the homeless
people who are completely deprived of a basis for living activities do not allow them to
stay for long enough to help them secure a sound foundation for self-support. In fact, in
not a few cases, homeless persons, after having left the shelter, failed to get themselves
permanent housing and began to move one facility to another or chose to go back to a
street life.
21