Council and democracy

Agenda item

Homelessness Prevention Strategy

Minutes:

The Strategic Lead Housing introduced the report which set out the plan for the prevention of homelessness and for securing sufficient accommodation and support for homeless residents or those at risk of becoming so. In introducing the report the following key points were highlighted:

 

·         That there were four main causes of homelessness in Thurrock, which were  eviction by parents, family or friend; the ending of an assured short hold tenancy; violence or harassment and mortgage and rent arrears.

·         That over the past five years exclusion by parents, family or friends had been the most common cause for homelessness, which was a trend that was beginning to change as increasingly more residents were being made homeless through the termination of an assured short hold tenancy.

·         That the impact of welfare reform and the introduction of Universal Credit had attributed to the changing trend as private landlords were concerned regarding the non-payment of rent.

·         That it was expected that further welfare reform would have an impact on young people under the age of 25 years.

 

Officers recommended that a further period of consultation be undertaken and a final action plan be referred back to the Housing Overview and Scrutiny Committee for consideration.

 

Councillor MacPherson questioned if the Right to Buy Scheme would reduce the number of houses available, to which it was explained that this may be the case but future housing development was essential.

 

A number of Members were concerned with the perception that people could intentionally make themselves homeless in order to be allocated a council property.

 

A discussion took place regarding the steps that were taken by the service in order to minimise those taking advantage of the service who were not most in need, during which the following key points were highlighted:

 

·         That detailed investigations were undertaken when a resident declared themselves as homeless to identify whether homelessness had been caused intentionally, this included checks with previous landlords.

·         That the local authority was duty bound to provide temporary accommodation to those homeless households with children whilst an investigation was ongoing.  Temporary accommodation primarily comprises of two council run hostels based in the borough or council owned properties. The service limits the use of Bed and Breakfast provision which is not suitable for families with children and is very costly to the local authority.

 

The Director of Housing emphasised that process of declaring homelessness and the ensuing investigation was very thorough and that this discouraged those from intentionally doing so undertaking such action lightly.

 

Members were assured that people who arrived in Thurrock without a local connection under the Allocations Scheme were not eligible for homelessness support or Council housing.

 

Councillor Ojetola commended the Council’s tough approach so that people could not act deceptively, but felt that genuine cases needed to be treated with sympathy and concern, to which officers explained that good case management was essential.

 

Councillor MacPherson noted that the report did not detail the support provided for armed forces service personnel through the Veterans Charter and a motion that had been proposed by Councillor Gledhill and agreed at full Council.

 

The Committee were advised that additional priority was already given to armed forces service personnel through the Veterans Charter and Local Allocations Policy which had ensured that to date no ex-service personnel had been declared homeless. It was further reported that a dedicated Veteran’s house was not required in Thurrock to home ex-service personnel as homelessness was prevented through the Council’s Allocation Policy.

 

The Director of Housing agreed to report on Homeless Armed Forces Service Personnel in future reports.

 

The Chair asked for clarification on the number of London Boroughs who had purchased or rented property in Thurrock, to which officers explained that they were working with private sector landlords to introduce an incentive scheme to benefit residents in Thurrock and reduce the number of properties let to other local authorities.

 

RESOLVED:

 

1.         That the outcomes of the initial review and draft action plan be noted (outlined in Appendix 1).

 

2.         That a further period of consultation will be undertaken and that a final action plan will be referred back to the Housing Overview and Scrutiny Committee.

Supporting documents: