division_name: Homelessness
motion: <p class="indent" pid="a858.1/2" pwmotiontext="yes">That this House notes that the number of homeless households rose by 44 per cent between 2009-10 and 2015-16 to almost 60,000; further notes that the number of people sleeping rough doubled between 2010 and 2015; notes with concern that across the UK 120,000 children will be homeless this Christmas; recognises that between 1997 and 2010 there was an unprecedented fall in homelessness; and calls on the Government to end rough sleeping and take action to address the root causes of rising homelessness.</p>
  
  <p class="indent" pid="a860.0/6" pwmotiontext="yes">&#8220;to boost their offer to the increasing numbers of rough sleepers.&#8221;</p>
  
  <p class="indent" pid="a860.0/8" pwmotiontext="yes">&#8220;We strongly welcome this commitment to ending rough sleeping and the call for a national rough sleeping strategy.&#8221;</p>
  
  <p class="indent" pid="a860.1/2" pwmotiontext="yes">&#8220;notes that homelessness is lower now than its peak in 2003-04; further notes that England has a strong safety net, and that the  provision of temporary accommodation means no family with a child ever has to be without a roof over their heads; notes that the Government is going further with legislative protection by supporting the hon. Member for Harrow East&#8217;s Homelessness Reduction Bill to ensure that everyone gets the help they need to prevent or relieve their homelessness; welcomes the Government's protection of &#163;315 million homelessness prevention funding for local authorities and &#163;149 million in central funding; notes in particular the recently launched &#163;50 million homelessness prevention programme, helping areas all over the country to tackle homelessness and rough sleeping; and notes that one of the best ways to tackle homelessness is by increasing the housing supply, which the measures contained in the forthcoming Housing White Paper will address.&#8221;</p>
  
  <p class="indent" pid="a867.9/3" pwmotiontext="yes">&#8220;This is the largest sum of money ever secured by City Hall to deliver affordable housing.&#8221;</p>
  
  <p class="indent" pid="a869.2/6" pwmotiontext="yes">&#8220;the best homelessness law in Europe.&#8221;</p>
  
  <p class="indent" pid="a869.2/9" pwmotiontext="yes">&#8220;as the decades passed, it became clear that the impact of right-to-buy was to create more losers than winners in our housing system, significantly undermining wider efforts to improve social justice in Scotland&#8230;The initiative saw three social homes being sold for every new one built, representing poor value for increasingly limited public money&#8230;During the right-to-buy era, homelessness numbers soared and today still remain at levels far beyond those in 1980.&#8221;</p>
  
  <p class="indent" pid="a869.2/18" pwmotiontext="yes">&#8220;We know from our own research that benefit sanctions are a cause of homelessness and have a significant impact on vulnerable people &#8211; including those who are already homeless, care leavers and people with mental ill health&#8221;.</p>
  
  <p class="indent" pid="a873.0/4" pwmotiontext="yes">&#8220;extreme forms of homelessness and other support needs,&#8221;</p>
  
  <p class="indent" pid="a873.0/6" pwmotiontext="yes">&#8220;nearly half of service users reporting experience of institutional care, substance misuse, and street activities (such as begging), as well as homelessness.&#8221;</p>
  
  <p class="indent" pid="a884.2/8" pwmotiontext="yes">&#8220;it doesn&#8217;t bear thinking about&#8212;and that&#8217;s the problem.&#8221;</p>
  
  <p class="indent" pid="a892.0/2" pwmotiontext="yes">&#8220;The word &#8216;homeless&#8217; seems to present the condition as a single lack, but homelessness is actually many individual deficiencies combined. The worst of them are emotional; but to mention the physical challenges first: the single worst bodily aspect of homelessness is exhaustion. It is caused by several factors, including sleep-deprivation, hunger and a constant need to remain on the move.&#8221;</p>
  
  <p class="indent" pid="a898.0/7" pwmotiontext="yes">&#8220;The numbers of households living in temporary accommodation and the numbers of people found sleeping rough on a given night have risen for the last five years. The number of households coming to their council and being found to be homeless and in priority need is over a quarter higher than five years ago. The number of households accepted as homeless started to rise in 2010. Even more striking is that this followed a period of six years when the level of homelessness appeared to drop sharply. The sharp turn that the homelessness statistics made after 2009 is a striking trend&#8221;.</p>
  
  <p class="italic" pid="a905.3/3" pwmotiontext="yes">The House divided:</p>
  
  <p pid="a905.3/4" pwmotiontext="yes">Ayes 230, Noes 289.</p>