Ending Homelessness

Bob Blackman Excerpts

Tuesday 21st October 2025 Westminster Hall

[Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered progress on ending homelessness.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Efford. I thank the Backbench Business Committee, which I chair, for granting this debate—I am not surprised that it took that very sensible decision. I begin by welcoming the new Minister to her place and congratulating her on her appointment and the recent funding announcement to support local authorities in addressing homelessness. Her prompt action and proven commitment to tackling child poverty gives me, and I am sure the whole House, confidence that we can look forward to a constructive and purposeful debate today. I am grateful to the many Members who have attended.

The Minister needs no persuasion that homelessness is one of the great injustices in our society and an affront to human dignity that we have a moral duty to end. I think we share that belief across this House. We see every day the human cost of homelessness. We see it far too frequently in the constituent letters we receive, in the stories we hear at our surgeries, and even outside the parliamentary estate on the streets of Westminster as we walk to work each day. But behind every statistic and every person is a unique story. This morning at least 4,600 people woke up on our streets, uncertain where they would sleep tonight. More than 132,000 households live in temporary accommodation, facing constant instability, and more than 172,000 children went to school today knowing that when they return it will not be to a home, but to a mouldy bed and breakfast, a run-down hotel or a short-term let that they could be asked to leave at any moment. They are not just numbers on a page; they are lives in limbo.

Homelessness is a moral crisis, but also a practical one. Local authorities in London—I know colleagues will refer to their own areas—are now spending almost £5 million every single day on temporary accommodation that is often of such poor quality that it damages health and education and hinders opportunity. It is difficult to imagine another area of public spending where we would tolerate so much money being spent to achieve so little outcome. As winter approaches and the nights grow colder, the urgency deepens. This is the moment for decisive, co-ordinated action, so I ask the Minister when we can expect the Government to publish and deliver the promised cross-Government strategy for homelessness. Can she confirm that the interministerial group will continue to meet regularly under the chairmanship of the Secretary of State to drive that strategy forward? If she needs a vehicle to make that happen, my private Member’s Homelessness Prevention Bill, which received an unopposed Second Reading, could go into Committee with a money resolution and we could help get a legal position to support the work that she is going to do.

[Mr Gregory Campbell (East Londonderry) (DUP)]

I congratulate the hon. Member on securing the debate. Does he agree with me that, difficult as it might be, the key to the problem that he has correctly outlined is the availability of lower-cost, good quality social housing? We must aim to expand that as quickly and successfully as possible in the next few years.

[Bob Blackman]

Clearly, the hon. Member anticipates something I will say later in my speech. I have long advocated that we need to build 90,000 affordable homes for social rent each year to meet the demand.

As co-chairman of the all-party parliamentary group for ending homelessness, I want to draw the Minister’s attention to our new report, “Homes, Support, Prevention—Our Foundations For Ending Homelessness”. The report brings together evidence from across the country, from local and combined authorities, charities, service providers, academics and, crucially, people who have lived experience of homelessness themselves. The report distils a complex problem into three simple but essential pillars that any effective strategy must deliver: first, preventing homelessness wherever possible; secondly, rapidly rehousing people who still need help; and thirdly, improving support for those experiencing the most severe forms of homelessness.

The best way to end homelessness is to prevent it happening in the first place. Almost everyone with lived experience who contributed to our APPG’s work identified a point at which their homelessness could have been prevented. That is a missed opportunity where timely help could have made all the difference. Prevention should not be a political issue; it is simply common sense and morally right, socially responsible and economically wise. Research by Shelter found that one in 10 people in temporary accommodation had to give up work due to their housing situation. That statistic alone should galvanise us to act earlier, before people lose not only their homes but their jobs, stability and self-confidence in a downward spiral.

Through my private Members’ Bills, I have worked to put prevention at the heart of our response. The Homelessness Reduction Act 2017 focused on preventing people becoming homeless and presented the largest and most comprehensive changes to the rights of homeless people for more than 39 years. Fundamentally, its purpose is to ensure that everyone at risk of being homeless or who is currently homeless is legally entitled to meaningful help from their local authority, regardless of their current status.

Previously, local authorities had been entitled to assist only those who were deemed a priority and at crisis point. That excluded the majority of people, including almost all of those who were single. The Act also addressed the significant lack of meaningful advice and assistance, which more often than not in the majority of cases was not tailored to the individual’s needs and requirements.

The Act implemented a duty on specified public bodies to refer any person whom they believed was at risk of homelessness within the next 56 days to the relevant housing department. That helps to direct appropriate and efficient support and resources to those in need and prevent them from sleeping rough before it is too late. The 56 days marks a significant extension; previously only those at risk of homelessness in the first 28 days would potentially receive some help. The extension to 56 means that people have a longer opportunity to relieve their situation.

I am pleased to say that, in the first year of implementation, the Homelessness Reduction Act prevented 37,000 people from becoming homeless. It continues to be just as effective today, some six years later. In the first year alone, an additional 60,000 people who were previously ineligible for homeless support were assisted in getting off the streets and into appropriate accommodation. That is a rise of almost 50% on the previous year to the Act’s implementation. Today, I am proud to say that the Homelessness Reduction Act has prevented more than 1.7 million people from becoming homeless, with more than 777,000 now in stable and secure long-term housing.

I am pleased that the Act has helped thousands avoid the trauma of homelessness, but the truth is that we can and must go further. Across our APPG’s evidence sessions, we repeatedly heard of cases where other public services missed crucial opportunities to step in: hospitals discharging patients on to the street; jobcentres overlooking signs of distress; prisons releasing people with no plan for where they would go next. Those are not isolated incidents; they are systemic failures. Recent analysis from the Institute for Government found that discharges from public institutions now account for almost half the recent rise in homelessness applications. If we are serious about tackling homelessness we cannot leave the burden solely on housing departments. It must be a whole-system effort, covering health, justice, education, welfare and local government. We must all work together to stop people falling through the cracks.

Prevention is not only compassionate; it is cost-effective. When someone keeps their home, they recover faster after illness, they are half as likely to reoffend and they find it easier to get back into work. Will the Minister meet me and colleagues to discuss how she intends to embed prevention firmly at the centre of the Government’s homelessness strategy?

Even with the best prevention measures, there will always be times when homelessness cannot be avoided. When that happens, our goal must be to get people back into stable, affordable homes as quickly as possible. That requires a clear, long-term commitment to increasing the supply of social and affordable housing. I have long argued that if we are serious about ending homelessness we must build more homes that people can actually afford.

The Secretary of State’s recent commitment to delivering more social and affordable homes is welcome, but words must now turn into action, and that delivery must be targeted where the need is greatest. Too often, affordable homes are built in the wrong places or at rent levels that are out of reach for those most in need. I ask the Minister to confirm that she will work closely with the Housing Minister to ensure that the long-term plan for housing delivers social homes where they are most needed, and that people experiencing homelessness are given fair and equal access to them, because rapid rehousing works only when the homes are there for people to move into.

We must also ensure that temporary accommodation truly is temporary—a stepping-stone, not a dead end. I have met families who have spent years moving between short-term lets, B&Bs and converted offices, never knowing where they will be next. It is impossible to rebuild their lives under those conditions. A genuine rapid rehousing model backed by adequate social housing can break this cycle. It restores stability, improves health and education outcomes and reduces long-term costs. We owe it to those families, and to the taxpayers footing the bill, to make that a reality.

The third and final pillar of the APPG’s framework is support for those whose homelessness could not be prevented, and who need more than housing alone to rebuild their lives. Supported housing plays a crucial role in that effort. I introduced the Supported Housing (Regulatory Oversight) Act 2023 after receiving extensive evidence of rogue landlords exploiting vulnerable people and the taxpayer. Rogue unscrupulous landlords were setting up supported housing schemes and claiming public money through housing benefit, while providing little or no care whatsoever. Devastatingly, those abuses were not just financial ones; they destroyed lives. Through the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee I saw how deeply that issue runs.

The challenge now is to strike the right balance: driving out the rogue providers while protecting the good ones, and ensuring that vulnerable residents are not made homeless again as a result of reform. That is why I agreed that the powers within the 2023 Act should be subject to consultation so that we can get this right; but we are two years on from Royal Assent and those powers have yet to see the light of day. I ask the Minister to provide an update on three points.

When will the Government publish detailed guidance and timescales for implementing that, including funding for councils, strategic needs assessments and licence fees? What steps are being taken to ensure that local authorities are not misusing their powers to close providers down through housing benefit reviews without proper care for the residents’ welfare? Will the Government confirm that domestic abuse refuges and dispersal providers will not be required to register every individual property separately? That is an administrative burden that would put vital services at risk.

Beyond regulation, however, lies a deeper issue: the collapse of support capacity. Across all our APPG evidence sessions we heard from charities, councils and service providers struggling to meet the growing complexity of people’s needs. The cuts to local support services over the past decade have hollowed out the safety net, leaving too many people without help at the moment they need it most. I have long been a champion of Housing First, a model that provides stable housing alongside intensive wraparound support. The evidence for its effectiveness is overwhelming, yet too many areas lack the funding to deliver it at scale.

When I worked on the supported housing Act, it became clear that rogue operators had thrived precisely because legitimate, well-regulated support had been stripped back. If we want to eliminate exploitation and end homelessness we must rebuild the foundations of proper support. I ask the Minister: what discussions is she having with colleagues across Government about addressing the chronic underfunding of support services? Will the forthcoming homelessness strategy include clear measures to ensure that everyone, regardless of their needs, can access the right help to rebuild their lives?

Homelessness is not inevitable. It is not a natural part of modern life. It is the product of policy choices, systems that fail to intervene soon enough and services that are no longer adequately resourced to meet the need. We have an opportunity and a duty to end that. This is a moment to bring together not only Government Departments, but local authorities, charities, faith groups and communities to deliver on our shared ambition that everyone should have a safe and secure place to call home.

At oral questions last week, the Minister said she never knowingly misses an opportunity to meet an APPG. In that spirit, I warmly invite her to join us at the APPG for ending homelessness annual general meeting, which will take place between 1 pm and 2 pm on 11 November, where she can discuss these issues further—and of course we will benefit from her words at the meeting. I place on record my sincere thanks to the APPG secretariat—Rosie, Matt, Jasmine and all the team at Crisis—for their outstanding work in co-ordinating our efforts, and to the 47 parliamentarians and 27 sector organisations serving on the steering group. Their commitment, expertise and compassion drives this agenda forward every single day.

This debate is not just an opportunity to restate our concern; it must be a catalyst for action. Homelessness is not inevitable. It is solvable. The test of any Government and any Parliament is whether we have the courage and compassion to solve it. Let us make sure that no child grows up without a place to call home, and that no person has to face another winter on the streets. Let us act together to end homelessness once and for all.

[Clive Efford (in the Chair)]

Order. There is a lot of interest in this debate. If a Member is intending to speak, please stand so that we have a chance to make sure everyone can make a contribution.

--- Later in debate ---

[Bob Blackman]

I thank the Minister for her response, and I thank Members for, by my reckoning,18 speeches and four interventions, which demonstrate the importance of this debate. Through the Everyone In programme, we proved during covid that it is possible to solve homelessness and rough sleeping. Unfortunately, that programme was not built on afterwards to end rough sleeping.

Given some of the things that Members have added to the debate, I point out that the law exists to prevent local authorities from pushing homeless people far away from their homes, particularly if they have children or jobs. The law is in place; what is needed now is a coherent cross-Government strategy to combat homelessness, so that we can end it once and for all.

I thank you, Mr Efford, for your chairmanship, and I apologise to colleagues who were short-changed in terms of time. That demonstrates the importance of this debate, and how we need to have another debate on the issue in the near future.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered progress on ending homelessness.