Housing Benefit: Temporary Accommodation

Baroness Thornhill Excerpts

Wednesday 28th February 2024 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Thornhill]

To ask His Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the adequacy of the Housing Benefit subsidy for temporary accommodation; and whether they have plans to provide further support to local authorities in providing emergency and temporary accommodation.

[Baroness Thornhill (LD)]

I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper and declare my interest as a vice-president of the Local Government Association.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Viscount Younger of Leckie) (Con)]

My Lords, the Government recognise the challenges that local authorities face in responding to the increased demand for temporary housing. Our priority is to support claimants and keep people in their homes. From April, we are investing £1.2 billion to increase the local housing allowance, benefiting 1.6 million claimants and helping to prevent homelessness. In England, our £1.2 billion investment in the local authority housing fund provides capital funding directly to councils to build new homes. Additionally, our £2 billion investment over three years tackles homelessness and rough sleeping.

[Baroness Thornhill (LD)]

I thank the noble Viscount for his Answer. What my Question was really getting at was whether there has been an assessment of the adequacy of what is being allocated. Is it enough and is it going to the right places? Stark evidence from the Local Government Association, London Councils and the District Councils’ Network would say that clearly it is not. A survey by the DCN, which was published just today, shows that housing benefit subsidy covers just 38% of district councils’ temporary accommodation costs. Can the Minister explain why the housing benefit subsidy for families and councils using temporary accommodation has been frozen since 2011, despite rising costs and dwindling supply? Does he agree that much has changed in that time, and it is time that the rate changed too?

[Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)]

The subject that the noble Baroness has raised is to do with temporary housing, and we appreciate that these remain difficult times and that local authorities are subject to many pressures. We will continue to review the situation with housing benefit subsidy rates, but perhaps I can help the noble Baroness by saying that, following the Autumn Statement back in 2023, the Government announced additional funding of £120 million to help councils address in particular the Ukraine situation and homelessness pressures looking ahead to 2024-25. Today, I am pleased to say that it has been announced that England’s share of the £120 million is £109 million, which is to be paid via the homelessness prevention grant top-up for the year 2024-25.

Love Matters (Archbishops’ Commission on Families and Households Report)

Baroness Thornhill Excerpts

Friday 8th December 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Thornhill (LD)]

My Lords, I am pleased to rise broadly to support what I consider to be the main thrust of the report commissioned by the most reverend Primates. I am not a good sleeper. Last week, I was awake at 3.30 am and decided to grab the iPad and read Love Matters. My first thought, if I am being honest, is that it sounded like the title of a book your parents might hide in their bedroom. I also hoped it would be a cure for insomnia, but how wrong I was on both counts. I found it to be a lucid, challenging and compelling read—I was still there at 6 am. From the most reverend Primates’ foreword onwards, it was quietly explosive. It was not that it was saying things that we did not know; in fact, that was perhaps a disappointment. The facts and data in all the chapters are known to us. I am sure there are clearly some omissions, as noble Lords will point out, but the report made a readable narrative of those facts. It was not the interpretation of the facts because they too are also known to us—for example, that poor housing leads to poor outcomes, to name but one. It was the fact that we were challenged to look at the solutions to those known facts as problems through what I call the love lens.

The definition of love as explained by the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury within the biblical and religious context is used a lot in the report, which makes it very different from any normal public policy document. Its fundamental tenet is that families matter, relationships matter and love matters if individuals are to flourish, and I agree. It explains and expands the concept of “family-ness” support. It completely rewrites the definition of “family”, which some would and have taken issue with, and yet we would all surely recognise that love and meaningful relationships come in many different guises and that all are valid and valuable, but it is important to remember that it is still obviously pretty controversial.

Yet, when we actually know people in those many and varied relationships, we can see that they often work in spite of our prejudices. That is perhaps because of the presence of something that is difficult to define, which I have called “the something else”, and the report bravely attempts to do just that. It accepts the fact of diversity as the lived experience in the 21st century and goes beyond it to seek commonality and define that “something else”. The 12 independent commission members distilled down the essence of what makes those families work and what they need to flourish from what they saw and heard, rather than judging and proselytising a set position of what a family is and how it should function.

From that point of view of the Church, it is a brave, bold and challenging report. Its messages have been hard for some Christians to hear, and probably those of other faiths too, because it is explicit that, while being part of a family is central to our existence as human beings, we should recognise and value the diversity of families and households and, much more significantly, reflect that more honestly in policy-making. We should seek to create solutions that build relationship capability and resilience. That is perhaps easier said than done, but the report tries to pin it down to practical and tangible recommendations.

I felt that the report reflected reality, pulling together the many threads that affect families and bind us together as a society. It exposed that in parts those threads are wearing thin and in others they are snapping —indeed, that there are many holes in the social fabric of life. There are many sensible, proactive recommendations, such as more support for couples getting married or partnered, or making decisions about having children or separation. These are crucial life decisions that are often traumatic for children, but all too often support is missing; it is just not there. It is patchy at best and certainly is not being promoted as “what you do”. The report lays bare the inadequacy of the support given to families as they make these big life decisions, which have such an impact on many lives and, ultimately, on society as a whole. There is a huge cost to failure.

The blueprint for success in relationships is not in a formula such as “one man plus one woman plus marriage—preferably in church—plus children equals happily ever after”. We know that, for many, that formula is not an end in itself. For me, it is what makes loving and stable relationships that is more important. I agree with Philip Larkin, from personal experience.

The report takes us on a journey and challenges us that if we use the family lens test to view policy then it might just produce better outcomes, because it is certain that if we do what we always do then we will get what we always get. For me, the real challenge that was missing from the report is: how do you start to demonstrate that family is at the heart of policy? What does that look and feel like, whether you are sitting in a council chamber, in here or in a Select Committee? How do you start to make policy in that way? It certainly feels a long way from how we do things now, although the report is helpfully peppered with good practice from different parts of the country.

To me, it seems that faith can sometimes be very harsh and judgmental about how people live their lives, and that banishes them from churches, mosques, synagogues, and temples because they know they cannot live up to those ideals. This just is not real life to them; it is excluding and judgmental. Worse still, it is responsible for mountains of guilt that individuals feel, which is damaging to their mental health and well-being. Perhaps the real challenge for us all is how to demonstrate that love matters in a world where the word is overused and trivialised to the extent where it is devoid of meaning. It strikes me that the report holds challenges for all of us but also for the Church itself, which the report does not shy away from.

I end on a lighter and more hopeful note—as, indeed, the report ends, with “Reimagining the Future”. The report references the Australian soap “Neighbours” as an example of what happens when neighbours become good friends. I suggest that we have an equally good British example in “Coronation Street”. I challenge noble Lords to watch the episode from Wednesday 6 December, where they will see everything that the report evidences as a snapshot of modern life, albeit condensed into one street. In fact, I vouch that we could use that episode alone to conduct a meaningful session on building relationship capacity, community resilience and that “something else” that is gently at work in the actions of its many characters—but, being a northerner, I would say that, wouldn’t I?

Cost of Living Support

Baroness Thornhill Excerpts

Thursday 22nd June 2023 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)]

I think the noble Lord made three points altogether. I can only reiterate that I am aware of the impact on households, particularly those at the vulnerable end of society. I have already mentioned a number of initiatives and points that are being made outside government, particularly what the supermarkets are doing. At the end of the day, it is the basics that count. That includes, as the noble Lord alluded to, where the next meal is going to come from.

The noble Lord made a good point about the generational aspect, which ought to be in all of our minds. Whatever is happening now, we need to think about the next generation and generations after that, helping children and looking at the educational side and the health aspects of children. Of course, I understand that the current situation does not particularly help.

Finally, on the noble Lord’s point about tax cuts, we have made it clear that we on this side wish to make tax cuts but are not in a position to do so. It is important to make the point again that tackling inflation is by far the biggest challenge. Although there are some signs that it will come down—we have the predictions and forecasts—there is a lot more work to do. But that is the most important point, and No. 10 made it as well.

[Baroness Thornhill (LD)]

My Lords, the Minister mentioned homelessness, and the best model currently available for that predicts 300,000 more homeless people over the next year. The group in that category that I believe is most vulnerable is low-income earners in the private rented sector. Of course, evictions in the private rented sector have more than doubled in the last year. As rents have risen, their benefit, based on the local housing allowance, has been frozen at 2018 levels—we all know that a lot has happened since then. So have the Government given any thought to unfreezing the local housing allowance, even if only temporarily?

[Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)]

We keep it under review, but we are not looking at that at the moment. I understand the point that the noble Baroness makes about the LHA, but she will know that we have the discretionary housing payments, which are currently being delivered through local authorities to the most vulnerable. I reassure the noble Baroness that we keep a close eye on that to be sure, and to get the feedback, that these payments are being given and are helping those at the vulnerable end of society. Echoing the noble Baroness’s point, I am very aware that rents are very high—far too high—in the private rented sector, and seeing what more can be done is certainly very high among the Government’s priorities.

Universal Credit

Baroness Thornhill Excerpts

Tuesday 18th April 2023 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Baroness Thornhill]

To ask His Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the report by the Trussell Trust and Joseph Rowntree Foundation An Essentials Guarantee: Reforming Universal Credit to ensure we can all afford the essentials in hard times, published on 27 February; and in particular, the recommendation to introduce an ‘Essentials Guarantee’ to support those living in relative poverty.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Work and Pensions (Viscount Younger of Leckie) (Con)]

My Lords, the department is aware of the report, but no formal assessment has been made. We have a long-term approach to tackling poverty and supporting people on lower incomes. The Government are increasing support for low-income and vulnerable households, with welfare expenditure forecast to rise from £251.8 billion in 2022-23 to £275.6 billion in 2023-24. As the Spring Statement made clear, the focus is on supporting workforce participation, helping people move into work and higher earnings.

[Baroness Thornhill (LD)]

I thank the Minister for his Answer. Of course, all increases will be welcome after years of freezes and below-inflation rises. However, the key issue is that universal credit levels today are based simply on the result of historical precedent and subsequent political assessments of what the Government can afford. Does the Minister agree that it is time for an objective, independent assessment based on evidence of real need and actual costs? Does he agree with the Rowntree analysis that the universal credit standard rate falls well below what is needed to afford basic essentials?

[Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)]

We are certainly aware of the severe difficulties in some cases that households are experiencing. Our way of dealing with this—we are aware of the report, as I said earlier—is that, following the Autumn Statement announcement, measures directly aimed at helping households with cost of living pressures in the coming year 2023-24 are now better targeted to low-income households. Support provided from the £3,000 EPG and cost of living payment is on average more generous for households in the bottom four income deciles than our £2,500 cap alone.

Local Housing Allowance Rates

Baroness Thornhill Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd February 2023 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)]

I absolutely hear the noble Baroness, because we recognise that rents are increasing—there is certainly lots of anecdotal evidence of that in the press. However, the challenging fiscal environment means that difficult decisions were necessary to ensure that support is targeted effectively. That is why the Chancellor announced at the Autumn Statement a substantial package of cost of living support to target the most vulnerable households. As I mentioned earlier, one of the initiatives for those who require additional support is the discretionary housing payments available from local authorities, which are best able to target those funds.

[Baroness Thornhill (LD)]

My Lords, the overall level of housing benefit indeed remains a difficult political decision. However, does the Minister agree that it is the way the current local housing allowance system is structured that produces such an arbitrary and unfair system, particularly for private sector renters in high-rent areas? In the face of such overwhelming IFS evidence to prove this, are the Government giving any consideration to reframing the way that housing benefit is calculated in order to remove this growing unfairness?

[Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)]

Again, I note the comments made by the noble Baroness. We are very aware of this, and we are aware of the juxtaposition of what central government can do and the role of local authorities. As I said earlier to the noble Baroness, Lady Lister, local authorities are best placed to understand exactly where the funds that we give them are best targeted. However, there is more than that; I mentioned the discretionary housing payments, but we also have the household support fund. There are a number of other initiatives which are important to mention as regards helping people, particularly to stay in their homes.