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

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what change there was in the number of homelessness acceptances arising from the end of a private sector tenancy in (a) Bury St Edmunds, (b) Suffolk and (c) England and Wales in each of the last five years.

To assist public scrutiny, a table showing homelessness acceptances due to loss of private sector tenancy, by local authority, in each year from 2003 to 2013 is available in the Library of the House,

Data is not collected by parliamentary constituency.

The dataset shows that under the last Administration, the average numbers were higher than under this Administration, especially when taking into account the changes in the overall size of the private rented sector.

I would note that the rental sector policies of HM Opposition would make the problem worse, by reducing availability of private rented accommodation, forcing up rents and discouraging investment in the private rented sector. By contrast, this Government is increasing house building, delivering £19.5 billion of investment in affordable housing, supporting billions of private investment in new private rented accommodation, providing £470 million to prevent and tackle all forms of homelessness, and avoiding the excessive regulation which would harm the interests of tenants.