Under-occupancy Penalty (Wales)

Nia Griffith Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd January 2013 Westminster Hall

[Jessica Morden]

I agree with my hon. Friend and I will come on to make those points. Again, the study by Bron Afon in Torfaen highlights such cases.

Faced with no social housing and the need to stay in a community, it is hardly surprising, but none the less shocking, that one of the findings of a survey of social housing tenants by Bron Afon was that some tenants had concluded that the only possible solution for them was to eat two meals fewer a week to make up the shortfall. They felt that that was the only area on which they could economise.

[Nia Griffith (Llanelli) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend not think that realistically many families are going to fall behind with their rent, with the result that they will find themselves moved into smaller properties or, at the end of the day, homeless? What does she think that our local authorities can possibly do with their limited resources to deal with a sea of people who will have nowhere to go?

[Jessica Morden]

I thank my hon. Friend for that point. It is true that housing associations, local authorities and the Welsh Assembly will be under stress because they will not be able to mitigate the effects of this policy.

With a chronic shortage of available housing, many tenants appear to feel that there is no alternative but to be forced into arrears or to resort to desperate measures such as payday loans or loan sharks. Families will be forced into financial difficulty and rent arrears. Steve Clarke, chief executive of the Welsh Tenants Federation, estimates that 10% of tenants who will be affected are already indebted to their landlords who are seeking repossession orders. The double whammy of rent arrears and the increases could mean that 4,000 present themselves as homeless. This is against a backdrop of food banks in Newport giving out hundreds more parcels a month and food crime up 26% over the past two years. We are talking about people stealing washing powder.

The Government appear to think that people will find it easy to get extra hours of work or to find an elusive job. They think that lone parents with small children should go out and seek lodgers. In fact, the findings of the hotline of Community Housing Cymru— “Your benefits are changing”—found that 13% of people who rang would consider downsizing and 8% might consider a lodger. However, 79% said that taking on a lodger or moving were not suitable options and that they would apply for discretionary housing payments.

I believe that £7 million has been allocated to Wales, which faces a potential loss of £25 million. That is the Government’s answer to those who cannot move. There is a limited amount of money from the Government towards those payments, but once it has been used, no other payments can be made. I take the point that was made earlier about the fact that there has been no clarification of how the money will be spent. The deserving might miss out if they happen to be in need when the fund has been exhausted. There has been no compelling analysis of the impact that the changes will have on individuals, and the Government’s response of setting a finite budget without knowing whether it will be sufficient is as callous as the bedroom tax itself.