UK highest for homelessness in developed world.

It can vary such as a house with shared kitchen, rental properties that are over crowded, hotel rooms with no cooking or laundry facilities. Families can live like this for years because of the shortage of social housing and private rentals.

Casdon

Cabowich

No good blaming the government for all of it, either. Where was homelessness and housing in Starmer's recent 6-point plan?

‘Labour has said the six steps are "not the sum total" of the party's election offer and insisted the party also stood by its other policy commitments, such as housing and workers' rights.’ BBC News.
That was said in the announcement about the Six Point Plan, a policy commitment had already been made about housing.

They can't commit to much if there's no money in the pot. It's not going to be easy for any government to take on.

the rot set in long ago with Margaret Thatchers selling off council properties and not providing any new ones. Her attitude of "grab what you can and dont think of anyone else" encouraged a very selfish attitude. There will always be some people who have put themselves in a difficult situation but many more who have done their best to pay their way etc but with the way things are now you do not know when you might be out of work through no fault of your own.

Poppyred

What happened to Prince William’s plan to end homelessness??

Poor Prince William. His father's got cancer, his wife's got cancer......I'm sure he's doing his best but life has got in the way for him.

MissAdventure

She is having preventative chemo.
I wouldn't call that very ill, though I'm sure it makes her feel terrible.

Not that it's anything to do with council housing.

What a harsh comment about Catherine. She said herself that "Cancer was found". You wouldn't call that "very ill" MissA ??

ronib

Oreo my thoughts exactly. So why the sensational headline? Surely it should read along the lines of UK has lowest number of homeless people sleeping on the streets despite overwhelming demand from unprecedented increase in population density! So well done UK!!

Yes Well Done UK! One of the richest countries in the world and people are living in cardboard boxes.

Lets wave a little flag to celebrate.

Iam64

It’s part of our housing crisis. We have expensive housing, rented or on mortgage. Thatcher’s refusal to allow councils to use the money from the sale of its housing stock compounded the shortage the policy caused.
I recognise the pressures on private landlords when tenants don’t pay rent or maintain their accommodation.
And - we have huge problems with drug/alcohol/anti social behaviour/mental health.
We need a holistic approach to the many ills in our apciety.

👏👏👏👏👏

meadowgran

It can vary such as a house with shared kitchen, rental properties that are over crowded, hotel rooms with no cooking or laundry facilities. Families can live like this for years because of the shortage of social housing and private rentals.

Indeed they can and temp accommodation also includes social housing which has been condemned (happening in two different areas in Essex alone!)

Four to five years is the average.

According to the NHBC, 133,213 new homes were built in 2023. Assuming an average occupancy of 2 people per home, that means 266 thousand new occupancies.

I can't find a directly comparable figure, but in the year to June 2023, the UK had net immigration of 672,000, and I can't believe that Jan-Dec 2023 will be hugely different.

So there is an excess of some 400,000 people looking for accommodation. The actions of private landlords in selling their properties will have no impact on rent levels given the extraordinary increase in demand for housing.

Pantglas2

The reason I ask Cossy is that only a caravan would have cooking facilities so not a bad temporary solution. The others would need to be last ditch short term I.e. a couple of weeks rather than months or years.

We had a large site near us in Essex which was used for temp and perm accommodation. Great in the summer, appalling in the winter, very old stock badly insulated and very expensive to heat and prevent damp. In addition, a very large amount of prison leavers were also housed here, alongside addicts and young mums, it wasn’t a great solution and has since stopped taking short term unemployed homeless people due to the in fighting on site.

pen50

According to the NHBC, 133,213 new homes were built in 2023. Assuming an average occupancy of 2 people per home, that means 266 thousand new occupancies.

I can't find a directly comparable figure, but in the year to June 2023, the UK had net immigration of 672,000, and I can't believe that Jan-Dec 2023 will be hugely different.

So there is an excess of some 400,000 people looking for accommodation. The actions of private landlords in selling their properties will have no impact on rent levels given the extraordinary increase in demand for housing.

The other issue is that only a very small percentage of new homes built are affordable or suitable for first time buyers.

The more urgent need is affordable housing (to buy or rent) for families. I would dispute pen’s assumed average occupancy of new homes of two per dwelling. Most which are built are family homes, which many seeking to downsize know.

Actually there are many empty homes but people can’t afford the rent/deposit. The average take home pay for most people in my area is £1,800 but ready for a one-bedroom flat is £1200 to £1500. That’s where the problem lies. Overseas investment companies funding the building of new housing simply for profit. It’s a serious problem which politicians ignore because their donors are involved in the building industry

If a government can’t make a good effort at eradicating homelessness almost completely then something is awry. I know there are plenty of things a government has to weigh up but this is a moral imperative and we should not keep making excuses. It’s not really fair to blame private landlords-I’ve been one and it’s no picnic. Thatcher sold off the council houses, which was a crazy thing to do in my opinion so maybe we should start by replacing them. It’s not a simple problem but if we don’t at least accept this has GOT to be fixed then the poor souls in shop doorways will increase. I would like to believe Labour will do better but part of me says ‘dream on’

Which overseas investment companies are building new housing? All house builders build purely for profit. When they build houses for housing associations they are paid for them by the HAs. Show me a builder who can work for no profit, or a landowner who will give away land for development.

Temporary accommodation is used by local councils to house homeless people. Could be in hotels (some of them are awful), hostels, flats or rooms. Demand far exceeds supply hence lots of unfortunate people sleeping rough.

‘Because no one in their right minds would let out a property with no reasonable get out clause. Higher interest rates, increasing red tape, tax changes, section 24, ie removes right to deduct costs, mortgage interest etc, before calculating tax so gross income taxable, so I understand. Not profitable for landlords.’

For many single property landlords, it’ll be a matter of it being a sustainable just-about-worth-the-aggro.

As an aside, Angela Raynor may be thanking her lucky stars that election purdah starts so soon & she is far less likely to be deposed as Deputy Leader. I almost feel sorry for Starmer.

Iam64, well, Labour had 13 years in which to repeal or adjust those laws, only they didn’t.

It’s also worth remembering that buy to let first started soaring under Labour, after Gordon Brown abolished mortgage interest relief for landlords, while retaining it for owner occupiers. Plus his raid on pension funds made a lot of people think they’d prefer to put their money into a tangible asset under their own control.

Please don’t assume from this that I’ll be voting Tory -I certainly won’t. But let’s acknowledge that there’s blame on both sides.

Many rental properties have been taken out of the equation after landlords have been left with trashed properties, failure to pay rent and the high costs involved in getting out bad tenants. Owning and renting out is certainly not something I would ever contemplate.

Germanshepherdsmum

The more urgent need is affordable housing (to buy or rent) for families. I would dispute pen’s assumed average occupancy of new homes of two per dwelling. Most which are built are family homes, which many seeking to downsize know.

If we assume an average of three people per new home there's still a shortfall of 270,000 spaces. And if you factor in the purchase of high end property by overseas investors, an awful lot of which is either not occupied at all, or at best used as holiday accommodation, it is not surprising that UK housing is in crisis.

The population growth in the UK is actually slowing down and may decline over the next few years as people have smaller families - we have a vast population of people over 80 many of whom could move to residential homes if there were enough suitable ones. My experience of letting property has been a nightmare. A very nice mobile home that my late husband bought to house an employee for a few months was completely trashed and had to be destroyed afterwards and a cottage that I let cost me over £5000 to put right after the last tenant left - carpet stained from dog who also scratched through a door and ripped up lino. House stank of cigarettes. Electrical fittings had been ripped out. Cooker broken. Garden shed destroyed. Never again!!!

The only way is to increase the number of housing association properties being built, the advantages they have over private landlords is enormous.
This should be one of Labour’s priorities, in this area we are fairly well served, my son was only on the waiting list for a few months and got a new build semi, however they are both working which helps the HA balance the books and build more

Never again same here Daisy. After having to spend £1000's completely gutting what was a lovely one bedroom flat, we'll never let it out again.

It's an investment so we're keeping hold of it for now occasionally using it ourselves.

meddijess

Temporary accommodation is used by local councils to house homeless people. Could be in hotels (some of them are awful), hostels, flats or rooms. Demand far exceeds supply hence lots of unfortunate people sleeping rough.

A lot of them don’t meet the council criteria due to being found “internally homeless”

ps Despite having photographic evidence, it took just short of a year to be awarded the tenant's deposit because she refused to accept any responsibility for the condition it was left in.