Supported Housing
Debate between Helen Hayes and Marcus Jones
Mr Jones
My hon. Friend makes a good point, and that is one of the reasons for reform. There are some appalling examples of supported housing, but because there are no checks and balances in the housing benefit system, people get away with providing that appalling housing and get paid the same as another provider who provides a good-quality service. We will work with the Local Government Association and the sector to put in place strong conditions to make sure that best practice is followed everywhere.
Helen Hayes (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab)
Will the Minister clarify how funding domestic violence refuge provision at the same level as today will address the shortfall in provision throughout the country? Between 2010 and 2014, 17% of refuges closed, and every day around 90 women and their children are being turned away from refuge provision throughout the country. Without an increase in the funding for refuge provision and the establishment of a national network, the Government will fail to guarantee that every woman and child fleeing domestic abuse can be kept safe in a refuge.
Mr Jones
The hon. Lady makes a good point. Every woman should be protected and have a safe place to go. There are more bed spaces than there were in 2010, but she has a good point, and early next year we will do a full audit to see what provision is like throughout the country. That will allow us to see where the gaps and challenges are, because we want to make sure that women are safe.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Helen Hayes and Marcus Jones
Mr Jones
I can reassure my hon. Friend that that will not be the case. We will continue the funding at exactly the same level as currently. There will be a dedicated grant for local authorities that will be ring-fenced in the long term, and we will also make sure that vulnerable people will not need to deal with the payment of rent at a very difficult time in their lives.
Helen Hayes (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab)
The recent joint Select Committees’ inquiry on supported housing recommended that the Government should establish a national network of women’s refuges to avoid a postcode lottery and to ensure that there is even coverage across the country. Why did the Government reject that recommendation? What will they do to ensure that there is even coverage and that refuges reopen in those areas of the country where they have closed?
Mr Jones
We believe that it is right to have a locally led approach in this regard, but we have confirmed that we are committed to reviewing this policy in 2018 under the violence against women and girls strategy. We are looking at all the options, and we have not ruled out nationally commissioning refuges and refuge beds if that is found to be a better solution.
Temporary Accommodation
Debate between Helen Hayes and Marcus Jones
Mr Jones
I will certainly do what I can on that. I expect that a decision should not be too far away on the issue the hon. Lady mentions. She also mentioned rogue landlords. We have to be clear that they form a small part of the private rented sector, but wherever they exist we must work to drive them out of the system. That is why in the Housing and Planning Act 2016 we introduced further measures, such as the power to levy civil penalties of up to £30,000 on a rogue landlord, with the money then going back to the local authority to invest in respect of further enforcement powers. We have also introduced banning orders, so rogue landlords can be banned from renting property to people or from being a property agent.
The hon. Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Helen Hayes) mentioned the situation in Southwark. I was delighted to go there several weeks ago to visit its housing options team, who are an early adopter of the Homelessness Reduction Act. I was struck by the progress being made in Southwark and the positivity of the team there. They seem to be doing a fantastic job and have embraced the principles of the new legislation. It was obvious that they were helping more people earlier to stay in their home, and I was extremely pleased with what I saw during that visit.
Helen Hayes
The Minister is right to commend the excellent work that Southwark Council is doing as a trailblazer to implement the 2017 Act early. I hope that officers and members at Southwark also shared with him their grave concern that the Government’s commitment to funding for that Act extends for only two years, and that without a commitment to fund at the extent that is needed all that good work will quickly be lost.
Mr Jones
As the hon. Lady knows, we have invested £72 million in funding for the 2017 Act. The Act is coming into force in April, but we are putting a significant amount of that funding into councils earlier, so that they can gear up for the new Act. She will know, from being heavily involved in the Bill Committee and through the process of the legislation—I commend her for that—that the Government have committed to reviewing the new burdens funding that is being provided within two years of the Act’s implementation.
Time is moving on, so if I may, Madam Deputy Speaker, I will mention a point that the right hon. Member for Wentworth and Dearne made about that Act. I assure him that we were looking carefully at the legislation that was introduced in Wales, but while we were considering it, an excellent opportunity arose when my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow East came forward and the Government embraced his proposals.
It would be remiss of me not to offer on behalf of the Government my condolences following the death of Carl Sargeant, the Welsh Assembly Member who has regrettably passed away. I want to put it on record that the work he did on homelessness reduction in Wales has made a significant difference to the lives of people there, and the House should remember that.
The right hon. Member for Wentworth and Dearne mentioned Labour’s action in 2003. When we look at what happened at that time, we should not forget that a lot of people were moved from their own areas during that period. A lot of people were moved out to places such as seaside resorts, where there was often little by way of job prospects or opportunities for people to make decent lives for themselves. In some of those areas, there are still social challenges caused by the decisions made at that time. The Government are committed to tackling homelessness, but also to an approach in which we try to do the best thing by people. Several Members mentioned people being moved out of areas; people should not be moved out of their area by compulsion. There should be a discussion between the local authority and the individual, based on the individual’s circumstances at the time.
The right hon. Gentleman also mentioned the rough sleeping data, which we have improved since 2010. I should point out to him that in 2010 councils were not even compelled to provide rough sleeper data to the Department. They are now, but we want to go further and to obtain more data, because we know that if we do, we will be able to work out exactly what the challenges are and why people become homeless, and we will be far more effective at dealing with it. He also mentioned rent controls, which I certainly do not think are a way to help the situation, as I said earlier. They would compound the situation and make it worse.
I thank the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden again for allowing me to set out the Government’s position on this extremely important issue. There is still a considerable amount of work to do. The Government are making progress, but we now need to accelerate it, and I think we will, particularly through the Homelessness Reduction Act, the additional funding that we have provided to local authorities, and the homelessness reduction taskforce that the Government are going to convene shortly.