United Kingdom - Homelessness

http://www.poverty.org.uk/81/index.shtml

Newly recognised homeless households

·         All the statistics below relate to England only.  This is because the data for England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland is not comparable.  See the Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland indicators for the equivalent analyses for each of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

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·         61,000 households (excluding the intentionally homeless) in England were officially recognised as newly homeless by their local authorities in 2010.

·         The number of newly homeless households has fallen sharply each year since 2003 and the 2010 figure of 61,000 households is only a third of the 2003 number (202,000).

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·         Just over half of the households officially recognised as newly homeless do not contain dependent children.  The distinction between with, and without children, is important because many of the latter do not qualify for accommodation (i.e. they are considered 'not to be in priority need').

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·         Although most prevalent in the West Midlands and in London, homelessness is to be found throughout the country.

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·         The most common reason for becoming homeless is loss of accommodation provided by relatives or friends (a third of those deemed 'in priority need'), with a further fifth being due to relationship breakdown.

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·         A quarter of those accepted as homeless and in priority need by English local authorities are from ethnic minorities.  This means that ethnic minority households are, overall, around three times as likely to become homeless as the majority White population.

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·         Many of those who are effectively homeless live in concealed households - households which neither own nor rent the property that they are living in.  Most of these people do not have dependent children.

In temporary accommodation

·         The number of homeless households in temporary accommodation can be seen as a measure of the capacity of local authorities to meet the needs of those homeless households whom they have a duty to accommodate.  In the first quarter of 2011, there were around 60,000 homeless households in temporary accommodation in Great Britain.  Whilst this number is similar to that in the late 1990s, it is well below the peak of 110,000 in 2005.

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·         The number of households in temporary accommodation is an order of magnitude greater in London than elsewhere: at more than 1% of all households, it is around ten times the level in the rest of the south of England and more than twenty times the level in the North and Midlands.  As a result, London has three-quarters of all households in temporary accommodation.

·          A third of households leaving temporary accommodation in 2010 had stayed there for a year or more, and the majority of these had been there for two years or more.  It is a moot point whether stays of such a long duration can properly be described as 'temporary', or indeed whether 'temporary accommodation' is appropriate for such long stays.