Shropshire funding boost to house homeless refugees

The new homes will be bought for families who have fled Afghanistan

More housing is to be made available to refugees in Shropshire thanks to a boost of nearly £3m.

Shropshire Council says it plans to use the fund to buy 10 new properties for families who have fled Afghanistan.

The homes will range from two to four bedrooms and are expected to be ready by March.

They will be offered to those in the Afghan Citizens Resettlement Scheme or Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy.

It comes after councillors agreed to spend £7.6m on up to 30 homes for Ukrainian and Afghan refugees at a meeting in March, which included £3.2m from the government's first allocation from the Local Authority Housing Fund.

A report to councillors said the authority was allocated £1.2m in round two of the fund.

Alleviate wider homelessness

It intends to match fund this with £450,000 from money collected from housing developers and £970,000 from borrowing.

Nine of the additional homes will be offered to households currently being put up in bridging hotels in the West Midlands, while the 10th will be used as temporary accommodation.

All 40 homes from both rounds of the programme are expected to be used to alleviate wider homelessness pressures once the immediate need to house refugee families has eased.

Councillors will be asked to back the plan at a meeting next week.

Mark Barrow, director of place, said, while Shropshire does not have any bridging hotels for Afghan refugees, families are currently being accommodated elsewhere in the West Midlands and "it is important for the council to assist where possible in providing settled accommodation".