According to the latest official figures, the number of people living in temporary accommodation in England has hit a 25-year high.
Almost 105,000 households were in temporary accommodation, including more than 131,000 children, on 31st March this year. This figure is 10% up on the same day last year, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities data shows. The figures also show almost 14,000 households were in hotels or bed and breakfasts in the three months to March.
One member of Plymouth Council said of the problem in his town: “The whole system’s broken; we need more affordable housing for people who need it. So, our waiting list has gone from 8,000 to 12,500 in the last three years.
“That means that when people are in temporary accommodation, there’s nowhere for them to move to, which means that there’s nowhere for people in bed and breakfast to move to.”
Local authority sources say the root of the problem is a decision by the government to freeze regional housing allowances, essentially tying the hands of councils to rent properties off private landlords.
The rental sector is doomed for the private landlord and tenants alike. The landlords, up until a few years ago, could claim their mortgage payments as an expense, but not anymore, with the interest rates increasing almost every month. A landlord paying £400 a month for a mortgage in 2020 and claiming every penny as an expense is now paying double with no tax relief.
On the other hand, we have tenants who can’t afford to buy the house they live in from the landlord who can barely pay the mortgage.
As has been mentioned in a previous article, the government, unlike the councils whose money they’ve frozen, can rent properties and guess who they put in them.
That’s right: economic migrants, who Westminster have decided are far more deserving of housing than its own citizens.
We don’t have enough homes to house our own, yet our birth rates are going down, so where are all the houses going?
Why are we allowing more people in if we can’t house our own? We are told that immigration is essential; they are the fuel that drives the economy, the oil that keeps the wheels turning.
Well, it appears this vehicle we call our country needs a service and perhaps an engine rebuild.
Even an idiot knows your car will eventually pack up if it isn’t adequately maintained.
The Homeland Party advocates for a more humane society that does not treat humans as mere cogs in an economic machine created solely to enrich the already wealthy. Rather than serving the economy, it is time for the economy to serve us. One way to achieve this is by implementing stricter regulations on housing speculators, as homes should be viewed as just that – homes, not commodities.
