Welfare reforms ‘will drive out low-paid from rented homes’

FAMILIES on low incomes face “economic cleansing” because of welfare reforms which will make parts of the East Riding too expensive in which to live, it has been claimed.

Almost 8,000 people will be affected by changes to Local Housing Allowance, which will see tenants get on average £700 less a year towards their private rented accommodation.

Chairman of the Beverley and Holderness Labour Party George McManus said working families could face “economic cleansing” by being forced to move to cheaper areas like Hull.

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Mr McManus said: “Many of us believed that families being forced into bed and breakfast was consigned to history. It is a spectre that is now coming back to haunt us.”

Mr McManus said many of those affected were working families on low wages who could not afford a mortgage or rent: “We warned the electors of this during the recent elections. What is needed is a massive council house building programme. This is the legacy of the failure both by Labour and the new Tory Government to take steps to address the imbalance in the housing market.

“The vast majority are in low- paid jobs – it comes back to the philosophy, “we are all in this together”. Low-paid people are much more affected by inflationary pressures, fuel prices and frozen salaries.

“We call on East Riding Council to take immediate measures to prevent our community becoming dangerously unstable.”

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A report being discussed by East Riding councillors today says the changes “may have the impact of concentrating low income households into the most social and economically deprived areas and in the poorest and most overcrowded accommodation.”

It warns it could lead to more older children being asked to leave home by their parents, tenants being less willing to care for their elderly parents in their own home and a cut in the number of landlords willing to let to families on benefits.

East Riding Council says the average loss to households will be £13 a week, although for some residents it could be more.

Because of high demand for rented property, it is believed landlords will simply prefer to let property to young professionals or first-time buyers.

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The council’s commercial services manager Elaine Whittaker said the authority was expecting more homelessness. Last year the number of people placed in bed and breakfast accommodation more than doubled, from 59 to 129.

She said: “We know people are going to be affected and we know roughly how much people are going to be affected by.

“What we don’t know is whether households will be able to manage their finances, whether they will be able to find the extra money or not. Moving can create issues – for example children moving to different schools.”

The changes came in April, but people on existing housing benefit were given another nine months to enable them to prepare for the changes.

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Miss Whittaker said: “We have tried to be pro-active and make contact with people. We have written to everybody, but inevitably unless you feel it in your pocket you think, “I’ll just wait.”

She added: “We have paid out more money in Discretionary Housing Payments this year (intended as a short-term financial assistance to people who have a gap between the rent they are charged and the benefits they receive) but to less applicants, suggesting people are already struggling to pay their rent.

“We are expecting from January onwards to be the most difficult period when people start to receive their benefit payments and find they haven’t enough to cover the rent.”

East Riding Council put in a bid to the Government along with Hull, North East Lincolnshire and North Lincolnshire, for transitional funding of nearly £500,000 but was not successful.

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