Leicester's growing council housing crisis

Leicester’s housing waiting list is continuing to grow, with thousands of residents stuck in unsuitable homes for years, new data shows. For many, the delays can be expected to stretch to five or six years.

The pressure on homelessness services has also increased, with the number of individuals and families in temporary accommodation the “highest for decades” — including the most children since records began. The number of reported rough sleepers also increased.

Leicester City Council declared a housing crisis in 2022, but the problems are getting worse. There were 6,682 households waiting to be moved into more appropriate homes as of Monday, 1 April, this year.

This was an increase of 674 individuals and families compared to the start of April last year when there were 6,008 waiting. In the same period, 1,092 lettings were arranged for those on the list, meaning the actual number of households which joined the register over the year was 1,766.

Of those waiting, 1,570 were classed as band one — those most urgently needing to be found a new home — a 32 per cent increase on the year before.

This includes cases where tenants are suffering from any form of harassment, whose homes are “critically overcrowded” or which are having a “seriously adverse effect” on a resident's physical or mental health. “Critical overcrowding” is when the home meets the government’s definition of being overcrowded, Leicester City Council said — that is there are “so many people in a house such that any two or more of those persons, being 10 or more years old, and of opposite sexes, not being persons living together as husband and wife, have to sleep in the same room.”

Another 2,126 households were in band two — those in severely overcrowded homes (two bedrooms less than they need but not meeting the criteria above), who have children over three-years-old and live in a one-bed home, or whose living conditions are “unsanitary or unsatisfactory” or are having a negative impact on their physical or mental health.

Finally, band three applicants made up the remaining 2,986 applicants on the list — people who are one bedroom short of what they need, people who need to move closer to their jobs or training or who would be caused “hardship” if they did not move.

The vast majority of people on the housing waiting list can expect to wait more than a year for a suitable home. Of those seeking a “general needs” home — that is not adapted for disabilities — only those in band one who need a one-bed property will wait less than 12 months. This group will be offered a suitable home within six months on average.

Two-bed homes are most in demand, the council’s data shows. People can expect to wait 15 months in the most urgent cases, four years if they are in band two and six years for those in band three. In fact, band three residents can expect to wait six years for any general needs home besides one-beds, which have a two-year average wait.

The timeframe for accessible homes to be issued is a mixed bag. For a wheelchair accessible home, it stretches from 23 months to seven years. Ground floor homes are secured between seven months and seven years of application. Accessible homes with level access showers are offered on average between seven months and five years after applying.

Leicester City Council said it is also experiencing “high numbers of people” approaching its homelessness services — 5,385 in the 2023/24 financial year, up from 4,869 the year before. The number of families and individuals in temporary accommodation was the “highest for decades” at 1,072, the council said.

Additionally, for “the first time in many years”, families were staying in that accommodation for more than six weeks. The LDRS recently reported there were 1,035 children staying in temporary accommodation at the end of March 2023 — the most since records began in 2004.

The number of reported rough sleepers also increased. There were 464 individuals reported to be rough sleeping between in 2023/24 compared to 447 the previous year.

The city council previously put forwards plans to strip its rough sleeper support back to a bare minimum in a bid to save cash. It would have meant only so-called “entrenched rough sleepers” or those who have “indicators of complex needs” would get accommodation. The authority defines entrenched as those who have been seen rough sleeping three times in a three to four-week period. Currently, anyone presenting as homeless is offered accommodation.

However, the proposal was scrapped before it could be debated by councillors. Even so, officers warned the current offer “is very expensive” and it will be “subject to further review in due course in light of the council’s emerging financial position.”

In the latest homelessness report, officers again warned of the financial burden the current offer is putting on its finances, which are already on a “cliff’s edge,” according to city mayor Sir Peter Soulsby. The council has made an additional £10 million available for the service this financial year.

The root cause of the problem

The data paints a bleak picture for local people, so the LDRS sat down with Chris Burgin, director of housing at Leicester City Council, to ask what is causing the increases and what can be, and is being, done to improve the situation.

The root cause of the problem is simple, according to Burgin. He told the LDRS that there are just not enough homes in the city for its growing population — a difficulty which is exacerbated by an additional lack of land to build on.

Burgin said: “There’s just not sufficient housing to be able to to meet the needs of the city and the problem we have is as a city, we’ve got a distinct lack of land.”

The previous Conservative government set Leicester the target of building 39,400 homes by 2036. However, the city council said it probably only had room for around 18,700 of these. It asked the county’s districts and boroughs to pick up the excess. Those targets are now expected to be reduced under Labour’s new government.

However, the council does have several schemes in the pipeline to help increase housing stock locally. These include the conversion of the ZIP building in Rydal from student flats to 58 new homes, the 50-property Stocking Farm development, 38 homes being built off Saffron Lane, and the construction of 37 new homes off Lanesborough Road. They have also approved £45 million in borrowing earlier this year to acquire 225 homes.

Burgin said: “There are probably about 10 or 15 sites which are going to be quite important to the delivery [of council housing] over the next few years. The council’s commitment is that we will deliver 1,500 new units by 2027, and we’re on track to deliver just over that.

“We’re already looking at how we can facilitate more housing going into future years beyond that, so there’s an incredible amount of work being done,” he continued. “The problem is, with the lack of land, there is going to be an ongoing challenge to meet the growing demand.”

Among the council’s plans is the creation of new supported housing for vulnerable residents who need additional assistance to help them live more independently. Burgin said: “It might be a case of needing accommodation with wraparound, which provides just basic floating support. Others might be where they need support from a drug and alcohol perspective, and others might be around mental health or those sorts of elements.

“The intention is to have a number of different new units which facilitate support for people where maybe they don't need to have go and live in residential care or enhanced supported accommodation, but they do have a level of support, which maybe fits between the gap between general needs and the other housing provisions out there at the minute. So that’s quite exciting.”

Prevention is also part of the local authority’s approach, Burgin added. The council has historically performed well in that regard, he said, with 70 per cent of those who approach the authority for assistance never actually becoming homeless.

But that has become harder recently, he said, with that rate dropping to around 60 per cent. This is partly a result of the cost-of-living crisis, he believes, which has impacted on people’s ability to afford accommodation.

“We want to push that back up to 70 per cent. Obviously, the worst prospect is losing your home, isn’t it? It’s horrific, the thought that anybody might lose a home.

“If we can do everything we can at the front end in order to prevent that, it avoids a horrific life event for those people, the children, and everybody else affected by it.”

Burgin added: “Some of [the prevention approach] is around negotiating with families, negotiating with landlords, using the discretionary housing benefit payments, using the household support fund where people might be struggling in accommodation.

“We’ve recently over the last year or so launched the scheme for landlords who are considering service serving notices to contact us much earlier through the process,” he continued. “If they’re having issues around social behaviour, if they’re having issues around people paying their rent, we’d much rather engage with them much earlier in order to try and work with them and the tenants to try and prevent whatever is making the potential tenancy failure happen.”

The city council is also “blessed” to have incredible partner organisations in the community working alongside it to help tackle these problems, Burgin said, adding: “All accept that this is not just a council issue.

“It’s a much broader issue and much broader solutions are needed around that. They understand that they play a part in what happens within the city.”

In June last year, the council awarded a £10,000 grant to Action Homeless, for their Money Talks project to support those facing homelessness. At the time, Eilidh Stringer, funding manager at Action Homeless, said: “It was amazing. It gives us the ability to do the work, and we are really grateful to the council. The grant was a boost and an add-on to other grants we have received.”

Stringer added: “I think they [the council] have been working against a very difficult backdrop with Covid-19 and, now, the cost of living. But they do help. All bits of funding and support do contribute to breaking the cycle of homelessness.

“Leicester is not an affordable place to live if you have low income.”

The pressures are still huge — and costly — at a time when the council is struggling financially. Earlier this year, the city council put forward plans to cut rough sleeper support to statutory levels — those it legally has to provide — in order to save money.

The move did not go ahead, with the proposal scrapped before it could be debated. However, officers are still warning that costs are becoming unaffordable.

The LDRS asked Burgin if those cuts could be revisited. His answer was yes.

He added: “We have got one eye on how much it costs and […] even though we’ve put 10 million pounds extra in this year, it’s likely that that will cost us £8 million even over that budget to accommodate those people in temporary accommodation and bed and breakfast. There’s an ongoing commitment to make sure we continue to do that.”

However, he said: “I suppose it ultimately comes down to the politicians' decisions over what is prioritised. But if you get to a situation where you have to balance the books, then I suppose […] it’s feasible that money might have to come off that particular budget.”

Ultimately, however, he feels the only real solution to the city’s problems is in the delivery of more homes. He said: “Ultimately, this comes down to the availability of housing. People don’t move through temporary accommodation because you just haven’t got housing available.”