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

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, with reference to paragraph 3.14 of the Autumn Statement 2015, when the Government plans to make additional funding available to local authorities to replace the removed management fee previously paid for each homeless household in temporary accommodation.

My Department's new grant, which is replacing the Department of Work and Pensions' (DWP) Temporary Accommodation Management Fee, will give councils more control and flexibility over homelessness budgets.

We expect the funding under the new grant to be made available in April, and we will be announcing allocations very shortly. We have already provided local authorities with the assurance that we would aim that no authority will receive less in 2017/18 than we estimate they would have received under the DWP fee (assuming increasing demand in line with recent national trends). I can confirm that this will be the case.