Councils advised to step up on providing refugees permanent homes
The government have warned local authorities they need to provide stable homes for Afghan refugees as they have been served notices to leave temporary accommodation.
Last week minister’s warned local authorities across England they need to step up their game in providing more permanent homes for people who have fled war-riddled Afghanistan.
However, despite victims wanting to find safety, England may not have been the best place to do so as councils across the country have raised concerns families would be made homeless ahead of the first notices that have been served to people still living in temporary accommodation such as hotels.
The government have decided to evict refugees out of temporary accommodation in a bid to reduce costs.
Veterans’ affairs minister, Johnny Mercer, has written to all local authorities ‘strongly encouraging them’ them to ‘support and match as many households as possible into settled accommodation’. He added that £7,100 in funding has been made available for deposits, furniture and rent.
Despite the government enforcing plans to remove refugees from temporary accommodation, they have not been received well. Earlier this month more than 130 organisations signed an open later signposted for Michael Gove and Suella Braverman which outlined ‘extreme concerns about regulations being considered by parliament to remove licensing requirements for asylum accommodation.’
The letter, which was co-authored by the Chartered Institute of Housing (CIH), the Refugee and Migrant Forum of Essex and London (RAMFEL) and the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants (JCWI), calls for ministers to abandon plans that would see refugees housed in unsafe accommodation with inadequate protections against fire and overcrowding.
Plans proposed by the government, are designed to move tens of thousands of people out of hotels and into the private rented sector. But the changes would exempt landlords from a number of regulations, including electrical safety and minimum room sizes.
In addition, the number of affordable homes that refugees could be moved into are few and far between. Ever since the cost-of-living began to squeeze people’s budgets the demand for affordable homes went through the roof.
According to research from NationalWorld, the government needs to build 128,000 more affordable homes each year than it is currently doing to meet demand in England.
With the lack of homes being available, homelessness levels are skyrocketing. Today, John Glenton, executive director of Riverside Care and Support, reported that there are now 104,510 homelessness households living in temporary accommodation – the highest number of households living in temporary accommodation since records began 25 years ago.
This statistic is particularly concerning as so many families are living in temporary accommodation, refugees who have been served notices to vacate these properties will be forced to sleep on the streets if councils cannot find a home for them.
‘The last time the number of households in temporary accommodation breached the 100,000 barrier was in 2004 when a series of reforms was introduced which managed to more than halve the number of people in temporary accommodation in six years,’ John said. ‘These reforms included more investment in homeless hostels, supported housing and move-on accommodation with a focus on rehabilitation and resettlement of people affected by homelessness into long-term housing.’
John added: ‘While some of these services are being offered by some providers now, the implementation of it is patchy and inconsistent and limited by short term commissioning.
‘We believe there is a clear need for a national plan for housing which also tackles homelessness and for government to ring-fence and increase long-term revenue funding for supported housing to ensure spending at least matches the £1.6bn per year allocated to local authorities in England in 2010.’
Image: Julie Ricard