An unprecedented 140,000 households are occupying temporary accommodation across Britian. What can be done to reduce use of temporary accommodation, and improve the standard of it for those who have to occupy it?
On 31st March 2024, an all-time high of 117,450 in England households were living in temporary accommodation in England, a record 16,330 households in Scotland, and a peak of 6,447 households in Wales.
English local authorities are spending a record amount on administering temporary accommodation duties, £2.2bn during 2023-2024.
Concerns about temporary accommodation have prompted a committee of cross-party Westminster MPs to commence an inquiry into experiences about of families living in temporary accommodation. Concurrently, MSPs at Holyrood currently scrutinising new proposed legislation for Scotland to prevent homelessness are concerned about a lack of clarity on a new duty to ‘ask and act. Last year, AMs at the Senedd completed an inquiry in to how homelessness was being tacked in Wales, making 24 recommendations. Meanwhile, the Local Government Ombudsman is dealing with ever more complaints about the suitability of temporary accommodation prompting the publication of good practice advice.
I was part of a team of specialist advisors that helped the UK government between 2005 and 2010, to achieve a target of reducing temporary accommodation usage by 50%, numbers fell to record low of 48,010. Key to this success was (a) preventing households needing temporary accommodation in the first place, along with (b) move households out of temporary accommodation more quickly. To achieve a similar reduction, national and local governments need to act on the evidence of what works, as well as understand what doesn’t.
Key challenges to reducing temporary accommodation and improving conditions, include:
- Loss of existing social rented housing through the right to buy and low levels of new social rented build completions
- Local Housing Allowance (LHA) rates being frozen and remaining at the 30th percentile of market rates
- Temporary accommodation housing benefit subsidy being fixed at 90% of January 2011 LHA rates.
The Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government (MHCLG) recently announced, investment of £5bn to build new social rented housing, along with an intention to reform right to buy rules. This really positive, but the benefits of these polices will take several years to make any impact towards reducing the usage of temporary accommodation. Similar steps to increase housing supply and reform right to buy rules have already been taken by the Scottish and Welsh governments, but still temporary accommodation usage remains stubbornly high in these nations, with criticism that from Scottish Federation of Housing Associations not enough is being spent on building more social rented housing in Scotland and concern from Audit Wales that housebuilding targets will be missed in Wales.
What could have a more immediate effect, is to unfreeze LHA rates and return them to original 50th percentile. Crucial to previous success in reducing temporary accommodation by 50%, was being able to make an offer of private rented sector (PRS) accommodation, to prevent or relieve homelessness. During this period of time, people had to acquiesce to an offer PRS housing, there was no legal means to make it a final offer, and yet. as many people at risk of homelessness were helped to obtain accommodation in the PRS as they were in social rented sector. Being able to pay PRS landlords average market rates (sometimes alongside other incentives, such as guaranteed support for tenants) was vital to the success of achieving the 2010 temporary accommodation target. It’s within the gift of the DWP to return LHA rates to the 50th percentile, and doing so would help prevent people having to move into temporary accommodation, as well as help those occupying temporary accommodation to move out more quickly. This would deliver better outcomes for households at risk of homelessness and be better value for money compared to current temporary accommodation expenditure.
Likewise, the DWP could also update the housing benefit temporary accommodation subsidy rules, as they already have done for single occupiers, to the current rates, rather than relying of rates that are more than a decade out-of-date. This would help the many local authorities who have declared housing emergencies and have said they face the threat of bankruptcy due to ever higher costs associated with temporary accommodation administration. Updated subsidy rates would improve local authorities’ chances of procuring better quality temporary accommodation, as they’d be able to offer landlords a deal that better reflected the market rates. This in turn would reduce reliance on use of types of temporary accommodation that is more likely to be of an unsuitable standard.
National governments continue to take forward homelessness policy initiatives. MHCLG has recently pledged to spend more than £1bn during 2025-26 to take forward plans to tackle homelessness. The Scottish government continue to drive forward new legislation to prevent homelessness, which will make it the responsibility of a wide range of bodies to prevent homelessness at the earliest stage possible. The Welsh government recently announced they’re setting up an affordable homes task force is part of efforts to end homelessness affordable homes task force is part of efforts to end homelessness.
Until (if) housing supply catches-up with demand, and while we wait for the DWP to take action on LHA rates and temporary accommodation subsidy rules, there’s plenty that local authorities can do to reduce the usage of temporary accommodation and improve suitability of it for those who have to occupy it. The following action were key to local authorities previously reducing temporary accommodation usage:
- Adopt a temporary accommodation reduction strategy
- Review and where necessary improve the effectiveness and quality of homelessness prevention measures and housing advice
- Better manage placements in to temporary accommodation, so households aren’t out-of-borough and the temporary accommodation provided always satisfies suitability standards
- Create opportunities to cooperate with key stakeholders, especially adult social care and children services, to prevent children and young people from needing temporary accommodation.
- Respond to the diversity of the community so that all households have fair and equal access to temporary accommodation
- Publish a temporary accommodation procurement policy, so that the right type of temporary accommodation can be procured in the right locations
- Reduce the length of stay in temporary accommodation, by improving access to the whole range of housing options, especially through adoption of common housing allocation schemes
- Increase, consolidate, or reconfigure temporary accommodation, to better reflect the types households that need temporary accommodation
- Improve value for money from temporary accommodation, by comparing costs and working in partnership to better procure and manage temporary accommodation.
Reducing the use of temporary accommodation and improving the standard of it, is better for the public purse and better for the people at risk of homelessness. Temporary accommodation usage fell from a record high to record low before, learning from the previous success, can ensure this success is repeated.
This article is a version of a presentation delivered by Neil Morland at the MRI Software housing options user event, which took place on Thursday, 07th November 2024
