I am grateful to the Backbench Business Committee for allocating time for this important statement. This week, the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee published our fifth report as part of our inquiry into housing conditions across England. The subject of the report is housing conditions of temporary accommodation provided to households facing homelessness. We also published a report on social housing in February, and we hope to report on conditions in the private rented sector in the coming months.
Members may remember our report on children in temporary accommodation last year. We found that accommodation provided to households was often in a poor state, with families left living with serious hazards. A year on, we wanted to look at the quality of accommodation provided to homeless households.
The quality of this accommodation matters. Temporary accommodation is anything but temporary; people can spend years in it before they move to a more settled home. During that time, they can be forced to move—sometimes with little or no notice—away from their family and friends, away from their children’s schools, away from their community and away from the local services on which they depend. That creates a situation in which they feel forced to accept whatever housing they are given, regardless of how unsatisfactory it may be. If they complain, they sometimes fear that they may be moved again, or even worse, be deemed intentionally homeless.
The quality of temporary accommodation matters because of the serious consequences that poor conditions can have on people’s health and wellbeing. Yesterday, the all-party parliamentary group for households in temporary accommodation reported that temporary accommodation has been listed as a contributing factor in the deaths of 104 children in England between 2019 and 2025. That figure includes 76 children under the age of one. Let that sink in: 76 children under one have died because of the conditions linked to their homes.
The information we have on the prevalence of hazards and disrepair in temporary accommodation is limited. We are spending more than ever on temporary accommodation, yet we have limited information on the quality of accommodation provided to households. During our inquiry, we heard about the most shockingly poor conditions. We heard of mould so extensive that it had spread not only to the walls, but to people’s clothes, bedding and other belongings. There is a growing problem with infestation of mice, rats and other pests; we heard of a child who was bitten on the toe by a rat during the night, and another child who could not sleep properly after waking up covered in ants. We also heard about broken facilities, leaking sewage and exposed electrical wires. The list of poor conditions goes on.
There is little space, with families sometimes housed in just one room. We heard about a family of six who shared one room with a double bed, a set of bunk beds, a small kitchenette and a toilet between them. Households with children can be placed in bed and breakfasts, hostels and other accommodation where they need to share facilities with other residents. The behaviour of the other residents can leave people feeling unsafe. We heard of situations where women and children fleeing domestic abuse were housed with single male adults. Sometimes, the condition of the property compounds this problem. For example, we heard of people living in shared accommodation without even basic functioning locks on their rooms.