Homelessness and Temporary Accommodation

Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd December 2020 Westminster Hall

[Mr Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Slough) (Lab)]

The Government’s current policy on homelessness and temporary accommodation is strangely perverse. In spring, Ministers marshalled all the resources at their disposal to all but end rough sleeping and to protect public health. As Dame Louise Casey, then head of the rough sleeping taskforce, said:

“We just went for it”

with the Everybody In programme. That proves what can be done when there is the political will. Now, with the harsh winter approaching and the virus still at large, the Government’s policy seems to be “everybody out”. Thousands of people have been forced back on to the street or into hostels—why?

There has been a 78% increase in the number of homeless children since 2010. I can only imagine the fear, misery and sense of danger felt by someone facing life on the streets for the first time. No wonder Crisis, Shelter, St Mungo’s, council leaders, the Royal College of Physicians, the Royal College of General Practitioners and others have spoken with one voice: “We need everybody in too.” I know from working closely with groups such as SHOC—Slough Homeless Our Concern—the London and Slough Run, Slough Outreach and the many local gurdwaras, mosques, temples and churches, and from seeing the increase in homelessness casework in my office, that the crisis is getting worse. I have been contacted by an increasing number of constituents concerned about keeping a roof over their heads—some with no recourse to public funds, others unaware of the complexities of housing legislation and parents concerned about living in cramped conditions with their growing children.

Some 218 households approached Slough Borough Council for homelessness assistance between April and June 2020. On 30 June, the number of households in temporary accommodation in Slough was 379. That amounts to 314 children living in temporary accommodation. The recession will undoubtedly force many people in Slough who are already living precariously over the edge.

I ask the Minister this afternoon to address my two key concerns. Will she provide an emergency programme to get rough sleepers into covid-safe accommodation and will she commit to a major programme of housebuilding for people on low and medium incomes, such as nurses, teachers and care workers—the true heroes of the pandemic?