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

To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what cross-boundary housing support is available for veterans in local authorities with low numbers of veterans.

The Government is committed to ensuring veterans are provided with all the support they need to successfully adjust back into civilian life.

Delivering on the Armed Forces Covenant, in 2012 we introduced regulations which ensure that serving personnel and those within 5 years of having left the forces cannot be disqualified from social housing because of a local connection or residency requirement.

At the same time we changed the law to ensure that ‘additional preference’, high priority, is given to serving members of the Armed Forces suffering from a serious injury or disability, and veterans with urgent housing needs.

Both provisions also apply to seriously injured and disabled Reservists and bereaved spouses of Service personnel. In June 2020 we published new statutory guidance for local authorities to further improve access to social housing for members of the Armed Forces, veterans, and their families. This guidance makes clear that local authorities are expected to disapply any local connection requirement from divorced or separated spouses or civil partners of Service personnel who are required to move out of accommodation provided by the Ministry of Defence.