Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what assessment his Department has made of regional disparity in the number of households in temporary accommodation; and how many households are living in temporary accommodation in Blackburn.

There has been a rise in the number of households in temporary accommodation for a variety of complex reasons. The number of households in temporary accommodation varies across the country as there are different issues in different areas, e.g. affordability pressure in London and the South East.

England has a strong homelessness safety net, providing protection to the most vulnerable in our society. Time spent in temporary accommodation means people are getting help and it ensures no child or family is without a roof over their head.

Successful homelessness prevention and relief has risen by 30 per cent between 2009/10 and 2016/17. However, the Government remains clear that one person without a home is one too many. We are committed to doing more to prevent people becoming homeless in the first place.

That’s why we have implemented the most ambitious legislative reform in decades, the Homelessness Reduction Act.

We have also committed £1.2 billion to tackle homelessness and rough sleeping including:

· £316 million of core funding for local authorities to prevent homelessness.

· £617 million in Flexible Homelessness Support Grant which local authorities can use strategically to prevent and tackle homelessness in their area;

· £72.7 million to support the implementation of the Homelessness Reduction Act;

· £20m Access to the Private Rented Sector Fund to increase access and sustainment of tenancies for those who are, or at risk of becoming homeless; and

· our £50 million to support 84 projects delivering an end-to-end approach to homelessness prevention.

MHCLG publishes regular statistics on temporary accommodation, rough sleeping, statutory homelessness and homelessness prevention and relief in England. These are published at a local authority level. The latest statistics can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/homelessness-statistics