Agenda item

RESOLVED: That

·         the Committee’s concerns about moving young children to a distance where they couldn’t continue at the same school be noted, as this had an impact on the mental health of the young children, although the committee recognised the significant pressures on the housing service;

·         the location priority policy be shared with the Committee;

·         information be provided to the Committee on which London Local Authorities were members of Capital Letters;

·         the report be noted.

Fenella Beckman (Director of Housing Services) introduced the report. The following key points were noted:

7.1.    The Accommodation Procurement Strategy had been refreshed in light of significant changes in demand since the last Procurement Strategy and Location Priority Policy refresh in 2015. Since 2015, there were now an additional 1000 households in Temporary Accommodation (TA).

7.2.    The cost of the private rented sector rent coupled with the reduced supply of accommodation meant that the Council faced significant challenges in moving people out of TA at the same rate that they were moving them in. This was one of the reasons why the number of households in TA had increased. By end of October 2022, the Council had around 2740 households in TA.

7.3.    The increase in number of households in TA and the increase in lengths of stay meant increasing costs. Provision of TA was the highest spend of the council’s housing division and was now a budget pressure for the council. The council’s housing division was forecast to spend £50 million on TA this financial year which was an increase of £18 million to what was spent 2 years ago.

7.4.    To achieve a reduction in the TA procurement costs, the council would need to access more affordable accommodation. Therefore, one of the main changes in this strategy was a proposal to increase procurement of affordable accommodation outside of where the council currently procures from.

7.5.    It was recognised by officers that there were challenges around resettling households into new areas, so the proposal was to pilot this approach with new applicants who did not have a location priority. It would be ensured that no one was forced to move outside of Lewisham if they had an overriding need to live in Lewisham. All relevant factors such as size of family, number of children, children who were in key school years and so on would be considered while making every offer of accommodation.

Fenella Beckman and Ellie Eghtedar (Head of Housing Needs & Refugee Services) responded to questions from the Committee – the following key points were noted:

7.6.    Assessment for determining the location of accommodation for families/households was based on the location priority policy which had 3 categories, households that had to be placed within Lewisham, households that had to be placed within Greater London or households that had no location priority.

7.7.    Households that had a location priority to be in Lewisham usually had an overriding need to stay within the borough. There were a lot of factors that were considered to determine the overriding need such as- families who had children at a critical school age, exceptional circumstances such as support needs, long standing arrangements to provide or receive care in the borough, specialist treatment that could not be transferred to other hospitals and so on.

7.8.    Location of employment was not considered to be an overriding need to be within the borough, but exceptional circumstances were considered on a case by cases basis. For example, a case where an out-of-borough placement would result in working unsociable hours or in the loss of employment.

7.9.    The Committee asked to see the location priority policy in detail.

7.10. Since the strategy recommended to increase the procurement of properties outside of London, the committee enquired as to how many households would be placed into TAs outside of London. Drawing from the fact that the council accepted roughly 200 households into TAs every year, the rough estimate was that this would mean around 45 households would be placed in TAs outside of London.

7.11. It was noted that there was a shortage of accessible and adapted properties across London. Officers in the council’s housing team were working with colleagues in the planning & social care team to ensure that the proper process was followed for residents who needed adapted properties.

7.12. For the assessment of whether a family had an overriding need to live in the borough, the critical school years for children were considered to be- GCSEs or A-levels or a year below those two exam levels.

7.13. A member of the public was invited to address the Committee who queried whether the figures on temporary accommodation placements within relevant priority bands could be shared, along with the plans for the eventual resettlement of those households in TA.

7.14. Out of the total TA placements, 59% (that was 1643 households) were placed within Lewisham, 38% (that was 1037 households) were placed within Greater London and 3% (that was 94 households) were placed outside of London. Out of the 38% households placed within Greater London, majority of households were placed in Croydon, Bromley, and Greenwich. Out of the 3% households placed outside of London, majority of households were placed in Harlow (Essex), Bracknell, and Medway (Kent).

7.15. The Council had been an active member of Capital Letters, but less property offers had been received from them over the last year than expected.

RESOLVED: That

·         the Committee’s concerns about moving young children to a distance where they couldn’t continue at the same school be noted, as this had an impact on the mental health of the young children, although the committee recognised the significant pressures on the housing service;

·         the location priority policy be shared with the Committee;

·         information be provided to the Committee on which London Local Authorities were members of Capital Letters;

·         the report be noted.