News

A much criticised hostel for homeless people closed its doors in Glasgow last week.

The Great Eastern Hotel accommodated 120 long-term residents, many with chronic alcohol addiction and mental health problems. Conditions were spartan and the name Great Eastern became synonymous in the city with being homeless.

The closure marks a significant step in the strategy to rehouse all Glasgow's hostel dwellers in smaller units offering intensive social care and health support. Scottish Homes funded the £8 million decommissioning of the Great Eastern along with Glasgow Council, Loretto and Milnbank Housing Associations.

Project co-ordinator of the de-commissioning group, Rhona Murray, said: "It's a happy day when the worst hostel in Glasgow is closed."

The city-wide strategy of closing all of Glasgow's 1,100 hostel beds over the next four years has been bankrolled to the tune of £12 million by the Scottish executive.

Welcoming the closure of the Great Eastern Hotel, Jackie Baillie, social justice minister in the Scottish parliament, said: "It's clear that Glasgow's old, out-of-date hostels are part of the homeless problem and not part of the solution."

There are proposals to convert the five-storey Victorian hotel into luxury flats.