The number of children living in temporary accommodation this Christmas, including in bed and breakfasts, has risen by more than 10% since last year to 124,000, according to the latest government figures.


In the world's 5th largest economy, what on earth is going on?

A Tory government is what's going on.

The housing crisis, not just for those classified as homeless but also the estimated 300,000 disabled people who cannot get safe, adapted housing, is something that should be treated as a priority IMO. Sadly, it never will be by this cruel government, as it (as with the crisis in social care) is never going to have a significant effect on the lives of the overwhelming majority of their MP's. I doubt that Labour would be much better, although what they would do is likely to be irrelevant anyway as I can't see them getting in any time soon.

With a third of a million people migrating to the country each year this was bound to happen.

Where are all these people who have been housed in temporary accommodation?

So who was responsible for the peak in numbers in 2004? Where are all the new EU residents living?

Labour did no better in the past. The problem is ongoing and will get worse with unrestricted migration and people who flock to already overcrowded places.

In ever decreasing in size multiple occupancy residences, B&B's & hostels.

In big cities or rural areas?

Not sure it's the fault of "the immigrants" other people keep voting Tory.

Population proportionate one would expect, but I can only go by that which I have read or seen via the usual media sources, which tend to be city centric.

The FM didn't say it was, as is so often the case when people jump on the 'immigrants are being blamed' bandwagon. Maybe, just maybe the FM (and most others) are making commentry and criticism of the "open door" policy, or the general 'numbers game' being played with regard to net migration. Everything (housing, health, infrastructure etc...) all needs a breather to catch up. Can you see the difference in the argument rather than your assumption?

Thank you.

From the mid 70's the two Labour Governments did nothing to add to council housing stock. The last Labour Government did nothing to replace the stock lost from the sale of council houses or stop any more being sold off. Plus both left the usual record breaking amounts of debt in their wake to be dealt with.
Grossly insufficient allowances have been made by all Governments for housing and increased services costs for decades because of the increasing indigenous population and immigration needs.
The only solution now is increased taxation to a realistic level to cover the shortfall in current services costs and stop all council house and housing association sales with a determined and realistic on-going building strategy.
If it could be achieved in post war Britain it can certainly be achieved now.

124K children living in temporary accommodation at Christmas sounds shocking..

But we need to look at the details & reasons behind this

Is it because their families have been evicted (Rent arrears ASB issues or tenancy ended)
Are they in priority need for housing or intentionally homeless
Is their case under going investigation (reasons why they became homeless)
Are they homeless due to emergency (fire flood etc)

Temporary accommodation is never ideal but surely its better than sleeping on the streets

Total number of homeless children in temporary accommodation in England 117,520
Of which
In Private Sector Housing paid for by Local Authority or Housing Association 20,470
In Nightly paid self contained accommodation 15,750
In Local Authority or Housing Association Housing 10,880
Duty owed no accommodation secured 5,610
In Other Accommodation including Private Landlord 4,780
In Hostels including women's refuges 3,940
In Bed and Breakfast accommodation including annexes 3,390 Of which 1,900 in bed and breakfast more than 6 week.

https://www.gov.uk/government/statis...n-homelessness

That's what annoyed me during and after the refererendum.
Hints or blatantly labelling Brexiters as xenophobic at best, racist at worst. You'll always get people thinking like that, yet I feel most underneath were simply concerned with net migration vs. the effect on infrastructure. Personally, most immigrants I've met are friendly and with a excellent work ethic. In an ideal world I'd prefer they came and the chavs I meet left!

Anybody but perhaps a staunch party loyalist knows Labour and the Conservatives failed time and time again to respond to housing issues in light of a higher population. Hell, they even screwed up when it came to allowing the open borders on such a level.

That's relatively simple.
Successive governments since Margret Thatcher have sold off loads of the council houses and they're not being replaced because we keep voting in governments on a manifesto of cuts but that's democracy and we should all be very proud because even if the result is bad, democracy is intrinsically good.

What a chilling statistic and condemation of Tory governments. It is even sadder to think that there is only worse to come.

This problem has been years in the making and the last Labour party is just as responsible as the Tories. You can't add nearly half a million people a year competing for housing to the population indefinitely, but membership of the EU prevented us from controlling the numbers until our infrastructure could accommodate them. You can't blame the immigrants themselves, they come for a better life.

That said Theresa May as home Secretary didn't control the numbers from outside the EU, and the Home office can't or won't reveal the numbers of illegal immigrants, they let them stay.

We also have a benefits system that does nothing to discourage irresponsible people from creating children who they can't support. And they dish out housing benefit direct to claimants who don't use it to pay their rent and end up being evicted. It should be benefit fraud to claim housing benefit and not use it to pay rent. The law makes it so expensive to evict tenants who don't pay their rents and forces landlords to wait months to get them out that they are not prepared to rent to high risk tenants on housIng benefits. It suits the government to demonize the private rental sector but who else provides homes to rent, not successive governments. There is no easy solution, our population is growing faster than homes can be built, the people in hostels are not working and won't be buying the new homes being built, we need more social housing and discourage people deliberately producing kids they can't support as a way of getting housing and extra benefits, paying housing benefit direct to landlords might cut down the evictions.

I'll assume you are one of the people that want to bring over as many refugee children as possible and still slate the tories

While fecklessly having children and expecting the state to provide does happen its not typical. Its the exception not the rule.

Only 3% of those accepted as homeless in Q2 2016 with a local authority duty to house became homeless due to rent arrears.

Housing benefit is often less than private rented rent. The average short fall for private rented is more than £20 a week. On top of that depending on local authority area there can also be as short fall between council tax and council tax reduction. Should providing benefits that do not cover what they were originally designed to and so are no longer fit for purpose be described as fraud by the government.

England 2016 Q2 Households accepted as homeless with local authority duty to house in the quarter.
Reason for loss of last settled home.
32% End of assured short hold tenancy
19% Relatives/friends no longer willing or able to provide accommodation
16% Relationship breakdown with partner
15% Other reasons (for example left state care, left armed forces, left prison, left hospital inpatient care or residential care home, left border agency provided asylum seeker housing, returned to UK from abroad, homeless rough sleeper or hostel, had to move due to harassment or violence from a non partner for example racially motived, housing unfit for human habitation, etc)
6% Loss of other rented or tied housing (tied housing is provided as part of their job, employment ends lose housing)
3% Rent arrears (Note for those on benefits there is often a short-fall between rent and housing benefit, that short-fall can be substantial)
1% Mortgage arrears (repossession or other loss of home) (Note for those on benefits there is typically a substantial short-fall between mortgage payments and support for mortgage interest)

That's the sad part really, there are also Tory voters around that don't care about the disabled.

This, plus a lot of irresponsible parents.

Councils tend not to have a duty where there is rent arrears, so they won't be included in the first place, The reason they were staying with relatives/friends could be because of rent arrears.

Strange that the official figures by number of households shows a peak of around 100,000 in 2004/5, with it being 73,120 in Q2 2016.