Industry News


A third of claimants left


‘with only £100 a month to live on’


The freeze on welfare benefits has left more than a third of claimants with less than £100 a month to live on after they have paid rent and essential bills for food, gas and electricity, according to the Citizens Advice service. Rates for benefits such as Universal Credit,


tax credits and local housing allowance have been frozen since April 2016. This has saved the Government many billions of pounds, but it has inflicted a six per cent cut on claimants’ incomes. Universal Credit claimants have been


particularly badly affected, with more than half reporting they had gone without essentials such as food and toiletries. Almost the same proportion say they had lost sleep over their dire finances. Disabled people and those with children


were most likely to have gone without essentials, with nearly half of both groups reporting that this had happened to them at least once in the past 12 months. Citizens Advice called on the Government to


end the freeze on benefit rates and reduce the five-week wait for a first Universal Credit payment. Although the freeze is scheduled to end next April, this has not yet been confirmed. Gillian Guy, the chief executive of Citizens


Advice, said: “The benefits system is designed to help people with their finances in times of need, but too often our frontline staff and volunteers see a different story. “We’ve found people are losing sleep and


unable to afford essential things like food and housing while receiving universal credit. It is totally unacceptable that our benefits system is not providing the financial safety net that people need.” The average low-income couple with


children would be £200 a year worse off this year as a result of the benefit freeze and poorer single parents £250 a year worse off, the Resolution Foundation has estimated. A Government spokesperson said: “Tackling


poverty will always be a priority for this government. There are no current plans to extend or maintain the benefit freeze after March 2020. Income inequality and absolute poverty are lower than in 2010, but we know some families need more support, which is why we continue to spend £95bn a year on working- age benefits. “Universal credit is supporting more than


two million people and it’s working for the vast majority. Advance payments provide money urgently for people if they need it and there are measures in place to ensure repayments are affordable.”


Number of empty homes rises by 11,000 properties nationally


nearly 11,000 long-term empty homes were added to the total. The rate of increase was double the rise in 2017.


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All regions experienced rising numbers of empty homes in 2018, except the North East where the number fell by one per cent. Despite this the highest regional percentage of empty homes is still in the North East where one in every 72 homes is long- term empty. There are now more than 216,000 long-term


empty homes in the whole of England. The largest regional number of empty homes, at 39,769, is in the North West. Properties which have been empty for more than six months are included in these figures. Will McMahon, the director of Action on Empty


Homes, said: “With homeless numbers at their highest levels in over a decade, it makes no sense to leave hundreds of thousands of homes standing long-term empty.” Two thirds of England’s local authorities saw


numbers rise - in half of these the rise was over 10 per cent and in more than one in ten authorities the rise was 30 per cent or more. Empty homes are found in all council tax bands


but are particularly prevalent in the lowest (band A). Nationally, nearly 90,000 long-term empty homes are in the bottom council tax band, while


18 | HMM October/November 2019 | www.housingmmonline.co.uk


he number of empty homes across the country rose significantly last year, increasing by more than five per cent as


There are now more than 216,000 long-term empty homes in the whole of England. The largest regional number of empty homes, at 39,769, is in the North West


only 1,933 are in the top council tax band, which is less than one per cent of the total. The top two Council Tax bands account for less


than four per cent of empties, whereas the bottom two bands are 60 per cent. This underlines that long-term empties are more likely to be smaller and lower value properties. Where these are concentrated, local housing markets can become distorted. In addition there are also 252,000 second or


holiday homes with no permanent resident. There are 54 areas where at least one home in 50 is a second home. Council officers report that many ‘second homes’


are unused, some approaching dereliction; and many are owned by absentee owners who hold multiple second homes unused.


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