Council funds have been poured into ‘outrageous’ housing solutions, says Shelter
New research has found local authorities have spent £1.7bn on temporary accommodation despite the ongoing homelessness crisis.
Experts uncovered spending on temporary accommodation – which includes B&B’s, hostels, and hotels – rose to more than £1.7bn in the year to March 2023, with bed and breakfasts costs up by a third.
Following this discovering, leading homelessness charity Shelter have called the situation ‘outrageous’ and ‘illogical’ and have accused central government of throwing money at worthless services instead of working to provide stable homes for families.
A grand total of £1.74bn was spent on temporary housing solutions, which is up by an estimated 9% on the previous year’s figure of £1.59bn. However, it should be noted that these are the gross figures, so do not consider sales, fees and charges and other council income.
Once these figures are taken into account, the net expenditure on overall temporary accommodation to March this year was £657m up from £585m the previous year.
Against this backdrop, government statistics released in July showed the numbers of households and children in temporary accommodation in England are at record highs. 104,510 households were in temporary accommodation by the end of March – a 25-year high.
In a more harrowing example, the total number of children in this tragic situation is also at the highest level since records began in 2004 – with over 100,000 living in temporary accommodation at the end of March this year.
‘We simply can’t keep throwing money at grim B&Bs and hostels instead of focusing on helping families into a home,’ said Polly Neate, Shelter’s chief executive. ‘With a general election on the horizon, no one can afford to continue to ignore a crisis of this magnitude.’
She added: ‘Housing benefit should cover the bottom third of local rents but the Government has kept it frozen since 2020 while private rents have skyrocketed.
‘This decision combined with the decades of failure to build enough social homes has meant that families can’t find anywhere affordable to live and as a result are forced into homelessness in cramped and unsuitable temporary accommodation, often miles away from their children’s schools and support networks.
‘As an immediate solution, it’s vital the Government uses the autumn statement to unfreeze housing benefit, so it does what it’s meant to do: stop people on low incomes from becoming homeless. However, the only lasting solution to the housing emergency is to invest in genuinely affordable social homes with rents tied to local incomes.’
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