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Poverty rarely comes in a single form. A family struggling to pay rent may also be dealing with rising energy bills, poor health, insecure employment or difficulties accessing support. Yet public policies and services are often organised separately, requiring people to navigate multiple systems to find help.

“Everything is connected and we need to strengthen our response. We need to address the causes and create opportunities with everyone.”

That message from Haris Doukas, Mayor of Athens, captured the central theme of the Eurocities Social Innovation Lab 2026, where city representatives, practitioners and partners came together to discuss solutions to some of Europe’s most pressing social challenges.

Cities are increasingly recognising that poverty cannot be tackled through isolated interventions. Housing, health, employment, energy, education and social inclusion are closely linked, and effective responses need to reflect that reality.

Poverty is complex and interconnected

Cities are witnessing the growing overlap between different forms of disadvantage. Housing insecurity, rising living costs, energy poverty, unemployment and health challenges can reinforce one another and push households into increasingly vulnerable situations.

Manchester, a thriving city with strong investment in culture, sport and innovation, still remains one of England’s most deprived local authorities. This is the so-called ‘urban paradox’: economic growth and opportunity can exist alongside growing poverty and inequality.

Looking at poverty through a life-course perspective reveals even broader connections. Financial hardship in old age is often linked to experiences much earlier in life, from educational opportunities and employment patterns to housing conditions and caring responsibilities.

But poverty is not only a financial condition. It can shape how people relate to institutions, opportunities and even their own place in society. Experiences of discrimination, stigma or repeated financial hardship can undermine trust and confidence, leading people to miss out on support they are entitled to.

Parents facing poverty may work hard to create different opportunities for their children, yet financial pressures and unequal access to services can still contribute to poorer educational outcomes and school dropout. The effects can also be seen in health, where people facing persistent disadvantage are less likely to seek support early and more likely to experience poorer outcomes later in life. Poverty therefore becomes self-reinforcing, creating cycles of exclusion that can be passed from one generation to the next.

Putting people before systems

Many cities are redesigning support systems to reflect how people actually seek help.

In Mechelen, the local social welfare system has been reorganised around a simple idea: one person should not have to tell their story to multiple services. Residents are assigned a single social worker who acts as their main point of contact, helping them navigate housing, employment, debt support and other services. Back-office specialists remain available, but the burden of coordinating support no longer falls entirely on the resident.

In Amsterdam, while many services have become more integrated through neighbourhood teams, significant barriers remain between different administrative systems. Often, residents become trapped between institutional boundaries that make sense to services but not to the people using them.

The Hague’s social innovation platform framed this challenge with a simple question: what would public services look like if they were designed around the whole of a person’s life rather than around organisational responsibilities? The city’s work on financial insecurity has brought together housing providers, employers, creditors, social organisations and municipal departments to create more coordinated support systems.

Integrated responses require more than better coordination within city administrations. They depend on partnerships that cut across sectors and institutions, bringing together public authorities, community organisations, businesses, residents, and people with lived experience around shared objectives.

“We get integrated responses not by putting rules first, but by putting people first,” said Rutger Schoenmakers, Strategic Policy Advisor from the Hague.

Building solutions with communities

Even the best support systems are ineffective if people do not know about them, trust them or feel able to access them.

Manchester’s Anti-Poverty Communities network demonstrates how cities can work with local organisations rather than acting alone. The city has brought together community groups, voluntary organisations, faith leaders, health services and local authorities to identify priorities and co-create solutions. “All the stakeholders in the city [need] to be part of that plan. Making sure that all levels are working towards the same goal,” said Siobhan Pollitt, Anti-Poverty Strategy Lead from Manchester.

Rather than designing policies from city hall and delivering them to neighbourhoods, the approach focuses on building ongoing channels between communities and decision-makers.

Another strong example is Athens’ Energy Poverty Alleviation Office. Reaching households experiencing energy poverty is not simply a matter of providing information. Barriers such as low awareness, limited trust in institutions, language challenges and complex support systems can prevent people from accessing available help. Trusted intermediaries, including schools, community leaders, NGOs and previous programme beneficiaries, can play a crucial role in connecting residents with support.

“Working together is a strength. Being close to the people is necessary to really understand what exactly is happening,” said Niels Tobbing, Senior Advisor European Social Affairs, from Amsterdam.

Lodz’s Housing First approach provides people experiencing homelessness with stable housing as a starting point rather than something to be earned through a series of conditions. The approach recognises that secure housing creates the foundation for addressing other challenges, including health, employment and social inclusion. As Aleksandra Trzcinska, Acting Head of the Department of Housing Programmes for Lodz put it, “Housing first means giving back dignity to people no matter what.”

Cities highlight that effective policies depend not only on the support available, but also on whether people trust the institutions, organisations and individuals offering it. Building that trust takes time, consistent engagement and strong partnerships between public services, community organisations and local leaders.

Prevention is more effective than crisis management

Many city initiatives are shifting their focus upstream, aiming to identify risks before they become emergencies.

In Turku, rising housing costs and changing patterns of homelessness have prompted the development of a Housing Affordability Index. Using existing municipal and national data, the tool aims to identify areas where residents face increasing financial pressure and a growing risk of housing insecurity. The goal is not simply to respond once a crisis occurs, but to identify warning signs earlier and target support more effectively.

The importance of prevention is also central when talking about old-age poverty. Poverty in later life is often shaped by events and decisions that occur decades earlier, including educational opportunities, employment pathways, housing choices and caring responsibilities. Child poverty today can become old-age poverty tomorrow.

Leipzig is focused on tackling child poverty through early prevention and reaching vulnerable families before difficulties become crises. Working with local communities is central to developing people-centred responses that reflect all families and children’ needs.

This life-course perspective encourages cities to think beyond immediate needs and consider how policies can influence wellbeing over the long term. Early interventions, strong social networks and accessible services were repeatedly identified as essential tools for reducing poverty risks before they escalate.

Cities and NGOs also stress the importance of combining data with lived experience. While tools and indicators can help identify emerging risks and target support more effectively, they work best when complemented by the knowledge of residents, frontline organisations and community networks that understand local realities.

Connected problems require connected solutions

Across Europe, cities are moving in a similar direction. They are breaking down silos, building stronger partnerships, investing in prevention and designing services around people’s lived realities rather than administrative structures.

They are also recognising that long-term progress depends on securing sustainable funding. With growing pressure on social budgets and increasing demand for support, cities are exploring new approaches, including public-private partnerships, blended financing models and cooperation with national and European institutions.

At the same time, many local social, health and employment services are operating at or beyond capacity, facing growing demand with limited staff and resources. Strengthening these frontline services is therefore as important as developing new policies or funding models.

The approaches differ from one city to another, but they share a common understanding: poverty is not simply about income. It is shaped by housing, health, employment, education, social networks and access to support.

What unites many of these initiatives is a commitment to putting people’s lived experiences at the centre of policy design. Rather than expecting residents to navigate fragmented systems, cities are looking for ways to organise services around the realities of everyday life.

The strongest lesson emerging from cities’ experiences is a simple one. Lasting progress comes not from addressing individual problems in isolation, but from recognising how deeply those problems are connected and responding in the same way.

Doing so requires collaboration, trust and the courage to challenge established ways of working. Whether developing integrated services, working alongside communities, testing new partnerships or investing in prevention, cities are showing that innovative responses become possible when people, organisations and institutions work together towards a shared purpose.

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All the pictures from the Eurocities Social Innovation Lab 20206 in Athens can be found here.