Scottish charities urge Chancellor to end homelessness in budget

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A coalition of 38 Scottish charities, convened by Homelessness Network Scotland (HNS), has written to Chancellor John Healey urging him to ditch the “damaging” measures in Wednesday’s Budget.

They also called for the end of the freeze on Local Housing Allowance (LHA).

HNS chief executive Maggie Brunjes said: “Andy Burnham has spoken strongly about his determination to end homelessness across all of the UK, while the Chancellor has previously described policies like the bedroom tax as ‘callous, reckless and heartless.’

“Housing policy is devolved to the Scottish Parliament but the reality is that the benefit cap, the bedroom tax and the local housing allowance freeze are UK-wide policies which increase the risk of homelessness and which only ministers in Westminster have the power to end.

“They now both have the chance next week to show that there is real intent behind the rhetoric and scrap these damaging measures.”

The benefit cap restricts the total welfare support some households can receive, while the bedroom tax reduces housing support for social housing tenants deemed to have spare bedrooms.

Meanwhile the freezing of LHA support at 2024 levels means financial support for private renters has failed to keep pace with rising rents.

Earlier this year the Scottish government announced £115 million in discretionary housing payments, including funding to mitigate the UK restrictions.

The coalition said it makes “little financial sense” to spend public money simply on mitigating the effect of the policies, and that this would be better spent on preventing homelessness in the first place.

It has pointed to the success of a £1 million prevention fund in Scotland, which prevented homelessness for 662 households over one year and is estimated to have saved almost £10m in costs.

Last week, Scottish Social Justice Secretary Shirley-Anne Somerville and Welsh Deputy First Minister Sioned Williams sent a joint letter to the UK government calling for action to end poverty in Wednesday’s Budget.

The call comes after annual figures released last month showed homelessness and rough sleeping continuing to rise across Scotland, with record numbers of children living in temporary accommodation.

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