The charity, which has voluntary organisations, local authorities and registered social landlords as part of its membership, said an urgent update is needed to the last national audit of rough sleeping which was completed almost 15 years ago.

The call, ahead of the first meeting of the Scottish Government’s Homelessness and Rough Sleeping Action Group aims to ensure a strong evidence base for the scale of the problem.

Homeless Action Scotland chief executive, Gavin Yates, said: “We welcome the new focus on homelessness and rough sleeping and hope to see real progress made over the coming weeks and months. However, we contend it is essential that we get a real idea of the scale of the issue.

“For too long the narrative was that rough sleeping and homelessness was diminishing, when organisations on the ground have been telling us the opposite. The First Minister made it clear in her Programme for Government that she saw that the numbers were going the wrong way. We welcome this but now call to go forward and get an accurate count of rough sleepers in Scotland based upon a solid methodology.

“Without knowing where we are it is difficult to assess how long a journey we are embarking upon.

“Our briefing also makes a number of other key recommendations around health and multiple exclusion homelessness including a new HEAT target specifically aimed at reducing known triggers for homelessness around mental health provision.

“The aim of ending rough sleeping is shared by everyone in Scotland but simply moving people from the streets to night shelters or B&B’s or other unsuitable temporary accommodation is not going to be a sufficient response to this problem for a proud, modern nation like ours.”

From its evidence, Homeless Action Scotland also asks for a renewed focus on eradicating rough sleeping from Scotland’s streets with an aim that all rough sleeping is ended by 2022.

The charity has also called for: