Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what progress the Government is making on reducing homelessness in (a) coastal towns and (b) Southend-on-Sea.

Statutory homelessness acceptances are less than half the 2003-04 peak, and successful homelessness prevention and relief has risen by 29 per cent between 2009/10 and 2015/16.

But the Government remains clear that one person without a home is one too many. That is why we are embarking on an ambitious programme to fundamentally reform the response to homelessness – putting prevention at the heart of this approach.

Part of this is our £50 million Homelessness Prevention Programme which will deliver an end-to-end approach to prevention across 84 projects working in 205 district and unitary local authorities in England.

Coastal areas – such as Cornwall, Middlesbrough, Brighton, Blackpool, Kent and others – will benefit from funding to ensure that more people have tailored support to avoid becoming homeless in the first place, and receive the rapid support they need to make a sustainable recovery from homelessness.

In addition, we will be ensuring all areas, including Southend-on-Sea and other coastal towns, have access to best practice, and the learning that is being gathered from the projects in successful areas. We will also be providing support through a network of specialist advisors, to work in-depth with areas on the challenges they face.