Homelessness Reduction Bill

Colleen Fletcher Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Friday 28th October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Colleen Fletcher (Coventry North East) (Lab)]

I support this Bill, and I will set out the reasons why over the next couple of minutes. It is shameful that the national trend in homelessness is upwards, and has been so for the past six years. That is true in my area of Coventry, where the number of households accepted as statutorily homeless has increased year on year, with the city’s rate of statutory homelessness above both the regional and national averages.

We know that people can become homeless for a variety of complex and overlapping reasons. In Coventry, the most common reason for homelessness is the ending of a tenancy in the private rented sector, which has increased significantly over the past five years and now accounts for 34% of statutorily homeless households in the city. The next most common reason is family or friends no longer being willing or able to accommodate a person, and after that it is the breakdown of a relationship.

Although existing homelessness legislation offers much needed support to the extremely vulnerable, its limited scope and restrictive nature means there are still too many people who receive little, if any, meaningful help from local authorities. This is particularly true for the single homeless or those who are found to have made themselves intentionally homeless. For those groups current legislation neither prevents them from losing their homes nor acts as a safety net to protect them.

The Bill seeks to address those limitations and to modernise current legislation. Together, the provisions in the Bill will ensure the introduction of stronger and more robust statutory prevention and relief duties, as well as extending the reach of those duties to include people who would currently be refused help because they are not considered a priority. That is an extremely welcome step in the right direction and will make a positive difference in the fight to address the scourge of homelessness.

With any such extension of legal duties on local government comes new costs and requirements, which must, in turn, be accompanied by the extension of adequate funding and appropriate powers from central Government. It is imperative that the necessary means be provided to enable local authorities to implement the new duties successfully.

I have never been homeless. I have always had a safe and secure home, which is fundamental for everybody’s wellbeing, but I know only too well some of the factors that may cause a person to end up on the downward spiral towards homelessness. We have heard many such examples today.

This Bill forms only part of the wider solution needed to end homelessness. If the country is to have an effective and sustainable housing policy, we must adopt an overarching strategy that combines these legislative changes with structural housing, welfare and employment reforms that not only ensure an increase in the supply of affordable homes but address the ever-increasing gap between household incomes and rents.