Asked by: Lord Browne of Belmont (Democratic Unionist Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to promote social cohesion and understanding between the devolved administrations.
Answered by Baroness Penn - Minister on Leave (Parliamentary Under Secretary of State)
This Government is committed to a vision of British society where people – whatever their background – live, work, learn and socialise together, based on shared rights, responsibilities, and opportunities. A more cohesive society leads to lower levels of prejudice and hate crime, and greater opportunities for all, creating socially and economically stronger and more confident communities.
While the policy area and many of the policy functions related to community cohesion are essentially a devolved matter, there is a clear need for engagement with the devolved administrations on this topic. We therefore regularly seek opportunities to have discussions on our understanding of shared problems and the actions we can take to address them, including through forums such as the British Irish Council, the next of which is taking place in Dublin this week.
Asked by: Lord Browne of Belmont (Democratic Unionist Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask His Majesty's Government what funding they have allocated to end veteran rough sleeping before 2025.
Answered by Baroness Scott of Bybrook - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities)
Data on households who are homeless or at risk of homelessness for England are collected on a quarterly basis and show levels of veteran homelessness are currently low. For January to March 2022, 510 households owed a homelessness duty included a member with a support need due to service in the Armed Forces, which represents less than 1% of all households owed a homelessness duty.
All data returns via the Homelessness Case Level Information Collection submitted by local authorities are validated and cross checked and late returns are chased to ensure overall response is as complete and accurate as possible. The department works closely with local authorities to review the quality of submitted data to drive continued improvements.
In September 2022 we published our 'Ending Rough Sleeping for Good' Strategy, backed by significant funding. This includes extending our flagship Rough Sleeping Initiative to 2025, so that local areas can provide the tailored support needed to end rough sleeping, including veteran rough sleeping, over the next three years.
We are also helping people, including veterans, into longer-term settled accommodation through the Rough Sleeping Accommodation Programme.
Asked by: Lord Browne of Belmont (Democratic Unionist Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask His Majesty's Government what recent steps they have taken to improve the quality of data-gathering on the number of veterans who are (1) homeless, or (2) at risk of homelessness.
Answered by Baroness Scott of Bybrook - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities)
Data on households who are homeless or at risk of homelessness for England are collected on a quarterly basis and show levels of veteran homelessness are low.
All data returns via the Homelessness Case Level Information Collection submitted by local authorities are validated and cross checked and late returns are chased to ensure overall response is as complete and accurate as possible. The department works closely with local authorities each quarter to review the quality of submitted data to drive continued improvements.
Asked by: Lord Browne of Belmont (Democratic Unionist Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have to support infrastructure projects in Northern Ireland through the Levelling Up Fund.
Answered by Lord Greenhalgh
The £4.8 billion Levelling Up Fund will invest in infrastructure that improves everyday life across the UK, including regenerating town centres and high streets, upgrading local transport, and investing in cultural and heritage assets.
The Fund will operate UK-wide, extending the benefits of funding for priority local infrastructure across all regions and nations.
In Northern Ireland, the UK Government will accept bids at the most local level, from a range of local applicants, including but not limited to businesses, voluntary and community sector organisations, district councils, the Northern Ireland Executive and other public sector bodies.
Asked by: Lord Browne of Belmont (Democratic Unionist Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the success of their strategy to address homelessness between January 2019 and January 2020.
Answered by Earl of Courtown - Captain of the Queen's Bodyguard of the Yeomen of the Guard (HM Household) (Deputy Chief Whip, House of Lords)
Because housing is a devolved issue, we would advise you to contact the Northern Ireland authorities for information about temporary accommodation in Northern Ireland.
The Government is clear that no one should be without a roof over their head. That is why we have now committed to end rough sleeping within this Parliament and to fully enforce the Homelessness Reduction Act (HRA).
The latest published statutory homelessness data (April-June 2019) offers promising signs regarding the impact of the HRA:
Under the HRA more households are being offered statutory support, with more single people receiving help than ever before. 65 per cent of households owed a duty were single households, compared to 30 per cent prior to the introduction of the HRA.
Most households at risk of homelessness are having it successfully prevented. 57 per cent of the households whose prevention duty ended in this period secured their existing accommodation or were helped to find alternative accommodation.?40 per cent of the households whose relief duty ended in this period were helped to find accommodation.
Local authorities will now receive an additional £63 million in 2020/21 through the Homelessness Reduction Grant to carry out these duties. This is part of a £437 million package to tackle homelessness and rough sleeping over 2020/21.
In addition, the most recent national figures from the Official 2019 Rough Sleeping Snapshot, showed that the?number of people sleeping on our streets on a single night fell for the second year in a row.?The number of those sleeping rough on one night in 2019 was 9 per cent lower than the previous year.??This follows?year-on-year increases prior to 2018.
Asked by: Lord Browne of Belmont (Democratic Unionist Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask Her Majesty's Government how many ex-armed services personnel have been classified as (1) homeless, and (2) rough sleepers, in each year since 2013.
Answered by Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth
Annual England totals for the number of homeless or rough sleeping armed forces leavers from 2013 onward are not available.
In April 2018, MHCLG introduced a new homelessness data collection called Homelessness Case Level Information Collection (H-CLIC). H-CLIC captures information on all those who engage with local authority homelessness services, including those eligible for temporary accommodation and collects information on the support needs of a household, including support need resulting from being in the armed forces. These show that during October to December 2018, of the 61,410 households owed a homelessness duty in England, 440 required additional support because they formerly served in the armed forces. There are no plans to expand this collection to cover all former armed service personnel to include those who don’t require additional support.
The latest statistics are available here:
The annual single night snapshot of people sleeping rough across all local areas in England provides some basic demographic information (age, gender, nationality).
The latest statistics are available here:
https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/rough-sleeping-in-england-autumn-2018
The Combined Homelessness and Information Network (CHAIN) is a multi-agency database which records information about people seen rough sleeping by outreach teams in London across the year. Overall, 6 per cent of people seen sleeping rough by outreach workers across London during 2018/19 had served in the armed forces at some point in their lives. 2 per cent of these were UK nationals - around 115 people. The latest statistics are available here:
https://data.london.gov.uk/dataset/chain-reports
Asked by: Lord Browne of Belmont (Democratic Unionist Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what research, if any, they have commissioned into the effect of immigration on housing demand.
Answered by Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth
The Department has not directly commissioned research into the effect of immigration on housing demand. However, on 2 July 2018, the Secretary of State wrote to Professor Alan Manning, the Chair of the Migration Advisory Committee, encouraging the Committee to take account of the effects of immigration on the housing market in their analysis.
Asked by: Lord Browne of Belmont (Democratic Unionist Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what programmes are currently in place to help homeless veterans sleeping rough in the United Kingdom; and what plans they have (1) to help such individuals into permanent housing, and (2) to prevent veterans becoming homeless in the first instance.
Answered by Baroness Williams of Trafford - Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms (HM Household) (Chief Whip, House of Lords)
This Government is committed to preventing and tackling homelessness and protecting the most vulnerable in society, including veterans.
We have changed the law so that former service men and women with urgent housing needs are always given high priority for social housing, and cannot be disqualified from social housing because of a local connection requirement.
Since 2010, we have invested over £500 million to prevent homelessness among the most vulnerable. Our £20 million Homelessness Transition Fund has supported the roll-out of No Second Night Out across England ensuring more rough sleepers, including veterans, are found and helped quickly so that they do not spend more than one night on the street.
Asked by: Lord Browne of Belmont (Democratic Unionist Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps are being taken to protect Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty and Sites of Specific Scientific Interest from wind turbine development.
Answered by Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
The National Planning Policy Framework sets out strong protection for the natural environment and valued landscapes and is clear that planning applications for renewable energy should only be approved if the impact is, or can be made, acceptable. In addition our planning guidance makes clear that the need for renewable energy does not automatically override environmental protection and the planning concerns of local communities.
Under the National Planning Policy Framework Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty have the highest status of protection in relation to landscape and scenic beauty. Strong planning protection also applies to Sites of Special Scientific Interest. Development on land within or outside such sites which is likely to have an adverse effect on the site, either individually or in combination, should not normally be permitted.