Council agrees £5m to spend on housing homeless

The council said more than 1,900 households were on the waiting list for social housing

A council is to spend about £5m buying and managing properties to house people at risk of homelessness over the next 18 months.

Herefordshire Council has confirmed the plan to spend £2.5m on the scheme in each of the current and upcoming financial year.

The money is in addition to a £1.5m government grant the local authority accepted in October, to house vulnerable young people.

The council said the funds would help it to meet the demand for social housing and would help reduce the amount spent on temporary accommodation.

In the year to April, Herefordshire Council spent more than £3.4m on temporary accommodation for vulnerable individuals and families, who it has a statutory duty to house, with around £3m spent on “budget hotel B&B-style accommodation”.

However the local authority said it was faced with “an ever increasing demand and relatively limited supply” as the costs of accommodation "continued to rise" and could be up to £120 per night.

It added the county faced “a critical shortage of social housing”, with 1,975 households on its housing waiting list, it added.

Despite the fact several homeless shelters are operating in the county, these were not directly available to the council as potential users must complete an application and go through an interview and referral process.

Having the £5m at its disposal would enable the council to "respond quickly to opportunities to acquire and develop further stock to meet this demand, and decrease costs spent on temporary accommodation”, it said.

This news was gathered by the Local Democracy Reporting Service which covers councils and other public service organisations.