Recession blamed for increase in homeless

[bicycle]

HOMELESSNESS is on the increase in Huntingdonshire as the recession bites - just as a hostel for people who have lost their homes may have to be rebuilt at a cost of £2.75 million because it is out-of-date.

Huntingdonshire District Council has seen more people being accepted as homeless in the first six months of the current financial year compared with the previous year.

Ninety-one households were accepted as homeless compared with 76 for the same period last year and the council is expecting an overall increase in homelessness this year.

Cllr Deborah Reynolds, executive councillor for housing and public health, said it was impossible to forecast how the future would develop and that the picture could change rapidly if a major local employer was forced to shed a significant number of jobs.

"The whole team is going to work hard to keep homelessness down as much as possible," Cllr Reynolds said.

Cllr Reynolds said people were losing their homes through unemployment and the end of affordable mortgage deals, as well as landlords who bought to let having to sell up because of the financial situation or who now face repossession on the property.

She said the council was also looking into Government-backed schemes to ease homelessness.

Homelessness in the district had fallen from 254 cases in 2004-05 to 146 last year. It has also seen the number of households where homelessness was prevented rise from 98 in 2005-06 to 138 in 2007-08 and 129 have been helped in the first six months of this year compared with 52 last year.

Coneygear Court, which is owned by the Granta Housing Society, is used by the council to provide temporary accommodation for the homeless and is facing demolition, even though it is not very old.

The building has 21 housing units with shared kitchens and bathrooms which is now considered to be out-dated.

Plans have been drawn up to demolish the building or refurbish it to create self-contained units.

Granta believes demolition and rebuilding at £2.75 million would be the most cost-effective option.


http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/cn_news_huntingdon/DisplayArticle.asp?ID=378345

[rhydra]

While I lay some of the problems on the doorstep of the current and previous governments, most of the blame has to be with the banking industry and the financial institutions. Money is not water, mortgages are not things which can be placed on a "sale" with three months free but you end up paying wice as much over the long term etc. Governments may come and go, the banks have been consistently abusing their positions for years. It is time, in my opinion, to nationalise the banks, place proper balances on lending, lend responsibly, not willy nilly and if someone can't pay their mortgage the government "repossesses" the house and rents it out to the ex owner who becomes the tenant. That way no one becomes homeless.
Debt also leads to mental illness, lost jobs very quickly become lost homes, displaced families, separated parents and emotionally damaged children, moving from bed-sit to bed-sit.
The people who have crippeled this country, who have probably made more people homeless than the bombers of WWII, are the bankers and mortgage companies.
The first thing that needs to be done is to put the financial establishment of the United Kingdom in the dock.