The Hoarding Taskforce was established as a multidisciplinary working group in 2024 in Scotland. It aims to explore and develop a more joined-up multi-agency approach to improve support for people with problematic hoarding behaviours, recognising this as a hidden, and often misunderstood mental health issue.
The Taskforce’s ambition is to better manage risk, keep people safe and make more effective use of limited resources, adopting a life-span approach. It recognises that: problematic hoarding behaviour isn’t an adult only issue; that practitioners need help in building skills and confidence; that we need to listen and learn from experts by experience and tackle stigma
Taskforce members include a mix of different strategic partners, people who hoard, and three local area partnerships:
A full list of membership and the Terms of Reference can be found in the Hoarding Taskforce introductory PDF.
In our first year (2024-5) we have:
Looking forward, we will:
In 2025-6 we will:
This is our first story of innovation addressing some of the challenges around supporting people who hoard. We hope that these inspire you, and that by going under the hood,you can see what key steps or ingredients are needed and what might translate for you!
We are especially interested in teams/services who have managed to address some of the key challenges we are aware of - whether these are small or large!
One current estimate is that 2-5% of the population has issues with clutter/hoarding, but this is hard to estimate as there is so much shame for someone admitting they have a clutter or hoarding issue that has reached problematic levels. Even at 5% this may be a modest estimate, translating into 125,000 people in Scotland with hoarding issues - and that doesn’t include others in the household affected or family and community members outside the home.
2025 has started at a fast pace with Hoarding Taskforce activities. Iriss Development Leads Kerry and Louise have been out and about facilitating stakeholder events with the taskforce local partners - Pan Lanarkshire, Glasgow City and Clackmannanshire and Stirling. Over 200 people participated across the three events, representing a fantastic cross-section of agencies, groups and organisations that provide care, support and public protection at local and national levels.
