Rutland County Council looks likely to overspend on temporary housing for homeless families

The number of homeless being housed in temporary accommodation by a county council is on the rise.

Rutland County Council has spent about 40 per cent of what it budgeted for the entire financial year in the first quarter, as 18 households are now being temporarily housed by the authority.

It says the main reason for their homelessness has been due to a private tenancy ending.

So far the authority has spent more than £35,000 on accommodation, which is mostly self-contained flats and bed and breakfast. A third of households being helped by the council have children.

Fourteen of the 18 households are in accommodation outside Rutland due to the lack of property available to the authority.

Rutland County Council set aside £89,047 for the year to pay for homeless accommodation and looks set to bust that.

Last year it spent £221,616. The local democracy reporting service has asked the authority why it set its budget well under what it spent the year before, and awaits a response.

The numbers have risen from 15 in June when the council produced an update on its performance. The update said that there is an “ongoing problem with lack of affordable and social housing in Rutland to enable the council to prevent, relieve or discharge duty during the homeless application. Numbers are increasing again due to also more customers needing emergency accommodation due to homelessness”.

The council said: “We are addressing housing needs and have already approved planning and allocated £1 million in funding into two new developments. This includes 40 affordable homes in Brooke Road and nine units for social rent in South Street, which support increased energy efficiency performance.”

However these new homes will not be ringfenced for temporary accommodation and will also be allocated to people on the housing register.

Sites the authority has said are under construction with affordable homes within them are: land south off Braunston Road, Oakham (19 affordable homes); Uppingham Road, Oakham, (25 affordable homes); land south of Stapleford Road, Whissendine (20 affordable homes); Allotment Gardens, Brooke Road, Oakham (40 affordable homes), land to the south of Leicester Road, Uppingham (6 affordable homes); The Crescent, Ketton (21 affordable homes).

The council’s most recent Housing, Homelessness and Rough Sleeping Strategy was produced seven years ago and should have run until 2022. The council says the cabinet will be asked to approve a consultation draft on strategy in November and to approve a final one in March next year.

A spokesperson for the council said: “Temporary accommodation is difficult to predict because it is very much demand-led.

“Housing needs can also vary considerably from case to case, depending on the makeup of families.

“The council sets its budget for temporary accommodation based on available data and trends that can help give some indication of how many clients we are likely to house, but this is never exact.

“The budget for 2023/24 was only £85,000, with the final costs against this budget being the £200,000. Although the costs have increased, the council also receives income in the form of housing benefit to contribute to the costs of the accommodation.

“This increase in income when the council set the budget around November/December was offsetting the additional cost – effectively the council had mitigated the cost increase with additional income, hence why there was no change to the budget.

“At the end of the financial year, although the council had spent significantly more (about £120,000) than the temporary accommodation budget the net effect after the additional income reduced this to around £50,000.”