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

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, how (a) temporary accommodation use and (b) all forms of homelessness were factored into assessments of levels of need in the Fair Funding review of local authority needs.

The government has set out our proposal for consolidating funding across all forms of homelessness, through the first multi-year settlement in a decade, in the Fair Funding Review 2.0 consultation on gov.uk here.

The Fair Funding Review 2.0 includes proposals to roll funding for Temporary Accommodation, currently part of Homelessness Prevention Grant, into the Local Government Finance Settlement Revenue Support Grant and the creation of a consolidated Homelessness & Rough Sleeping Grant thematic pot.

Taking this approach of separating out temporary accommodation funding will end the current tension that forces local authorities to choose between investment in prevention and meeting current temporary accommodation costs, creating dedicated ringfenced funds for the prevention of homelessness and rough sleeping.

This follows the government’s consultation on the Homelessness Prevention Grant. You can read the response to this consultation on gov.uk here.