In 2007, the President of the Republic set the objective to reduce poverty by one third in five years. Structural measures aiming at deeply reforming our social system have been implemented. The refounding of the homeless people or poorly housed care services forms part of the global policy to fight exclusion and poverty. As other European countries, such as the UK, Finland or Denmark did, France, through its Prime Minister, declared the policy was a National priority for the 2008-2012 period and as from November 2009, it has included an overall strategy for the homeless or poorly housed people care services.
The aim of refounding is to concretely reduce the number of homeless people in France and to make it possible that no one is forced to live in an unfit housing or sleep rough. The goal is to radically transform the existing system, which was broken up, not enough regulated, unable to control the entrance flows or to ensure people found a housing solution, despite growing funding. The situation was that of emergency crisis management and poorly matched the reasserted principles of continuous and unreserved service provision.