Lewisham households in temporary accomodation

Continuing the discussion from Bampton Estate, the possibility of a new building next to Standlake Point:

I’m also curious. Who are these 10,000 people who we taxpayers are paying to house in Lewisham?

Don’t think this is true. The numbers quoted here look wrong. There are about 9500 households on the whole of the Lewisham Housing List and about 1000 properties become available for let each year. Waiting lists for all but the highest priority households are very long.

Turning to temporary accommodation, across London there are about 54,000 households in temporary accommodation. Seems this is not just about Lewisham getting everything wrong. The figure has risen steadily since 2011.

Of the 9500 on the Lewisham Housing List, about 1800 are in the Band 1 or Emergency Priority category. Most of these 1800 will be the households listed as in temporary accommodation – all Councils have to prioritise and do this because of statutory requirements.

Because, unless they are rehoused :-

• Their life will be in danger
• They will suffer from a severe physical or mental illness
• The welfare of any child within a household will be severely prejudiced or
• Public safety will be severely endangered
  …as a result of their present housing circumstances.
  Pretty desperate circumstances I hope we would agree.

I am grateful that we live in a country willing and able to support our most vulnerable neighbours in this way, with temporary accommodation when it is most acutely needed.

And even homeless households in temporary accommodation, economically active or not, pay some tax.

Hi @anon5422159
Last week this report was prepared on the subject.

As these reports go they inevitably use Council jargon. I am happy to try and translate if needed.
Commonly used terms:
LA- local authority
TA- temporary accommodation
Nightly paid accommodation (most likely B&B type)
PRS- private rented sector
DCLG-Department for Communities and Local Government

LHA- local housing allowance

Thanks for sharing, @MajaHilton

Thanks for sharing these shocking statistics about our local housing crisis. Surely the only answer to this is a massive flat building scheme by the council in all areas of the borough.

This borough is full of wasteland and run down buildings which could easily be used for new-home-building if only the will was there.

If we build taxpayer-funded free/subsidised housing for everyone that wants to live in Lewisham (except net taxpayers), what kind of incentives does this create in society? What effect would this have on employment, and on good life-decision-making?

Prices are too high in the real housing market.

Building houses in a special side-market reserved for certain people - this will not address the house price crisis. Surely this incentivises people to join the “special” group that has access to the subsidised side-market. And if more people meet the criteria for the side-market, is that good for society overall? What happens if their children feel entitled to remain in the side market? Are we not looking at a self-perpetuating cycle here? Shouldn’t we try to break the cycle?

This borough also suffers grinding road congestion, illegal levels of pollution, train services at the limit of capacity, a critical shortage of hospital beds and school places, and no money at all to fund any more of the above. It’s not about a lack of “will” to increase the population of Lewisham, it’s a pragmatic choice on every level, in my opinion.

Hi @HOPcrossbun

It is not easy for Local authorities to build more. Apart from looking at where (they own the land) & planning process there is a significant barrier of funding. Unlike private landlords Housing Associations and Council can not borrow as much as they can prove they will have the income for. Local Government Association is campaigning the government to remove this cap. More explanation in the article below.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2017/11/14/let-us-borrow-build-homes-head-local-government-association/

leaving aside national house building policy for a moment, the temp accommodation referred to in this thread is largely not available to new Lewisham residents - there are some exceptions but I believe you’d need to be resident for 5 years to be even considered for The Housing Register. The very worrying increases in temp accommodation have happened since the change of national govt in 2011. Before then year on year decreases were the norm.

Thanks for the clarification. That is some consolation.

I think you will find that what you have just quoted is happening in every borough across London.

Its not as simple as building more housing. It’s unsustainable in Central London.

While we have a social contract to put a roof over everyone’s head. To cloth and feed them. What we didn’t sign up for is to house people in Central London at all costs. To the point where the net contributors can barely afford to live in the area and have to put up with sub par public services.

Either you have a national strategy or none at all.

I believe some countries practice population restrictions in thier megacities for the simple reasons listed above. 500 built houses may double the demand for housing in the future (estimste based on if one household has 2 children on avarage who, when they grow up, will require a house each, a car each, increasing the amount of consumption, waste, polution and so on ).

‘Live births to Lewisham residents have risen annually in the last few years, and this is expected to continue, though at a slower rate. The following table shows the live births registered[1] and the annual figures to 2018 as estimated by the Greater London Authority’.

http://www.lewishamjsna.org.uk/a-profile-of-lewisham/demography/births

To top all the said above:

"Lewisham named ‘least peaceful’ place in the UK

As Lewisham is named the most unsafe place in the country, a local councillor and friend of Stephen Lawrence says we need to focus on the young to beat crime."

Well that article is a little misleading. The murder rate in most London Boroughs is double the national average.

…and it was published by C4 on 24 April 2013.

Over four and a half years ago - crime rates do alter substantially on a year by year basis.

Crime levels in this area between November 2016 and October 2017

https://www.police.uk/metropolitan/00AZ03N/crime/stats/#crime_trend

It is crawling up

Interesting -

Anti-social behaviour counts for 19.8% with 510 offences
and
Violence and sexual offences 29.08% with 749 offences

The other 12 categories all show relatively low levels of between 1% and 10% each.

and in Perry Vale area it has gone down over the.

Don’t really see what this has to do with homelessness/people in temp accommodation though. Although pragmatically speaking social housing has been said to reduce overall crime rates (as does demand on health services)for those that are fortunate to benefit…

I agree.
I did feel slightly guilty for continuing the off-topic discussion.
Sorry

Are we in Lewisham Central?

I agree with you! North London especially seem to have had their fair share of stabbing & shootings this year. I do wonder where these figures are obtained & based on other boroughs figures.

It’s in a lot of housing estates though that crimes such as stabbing & shootings seem to stem from. Housing estates such as the Aylesbury have been pulled down because of crime & the Broadwater Farm was a no go Estate at one time!

I lived right next to Broadwater Farm for several years and it was actually quite a nice area, quite neighbourly - the actual estate had some issues obviously but it was never as bad as it was made out - outside that night of complete madness of course. For the most part it was over hyped by the media and fed on it’s own notoriety. It may have been no go for a very short period of time in the 80s but mostly it was quite civilized…
However I do take your point but I don’t believe anyone would build that sort of housing these days.

No they don’t as a lesson has been learnt from the past.