Temporary accommodation costs in Portsmouth soar to £2.9m as more families face homelessness

Between 2018 and 2019 a total of £2.9m was spent on bed and breakfasts, and other accommodation, for city residents who had nowhere else to go. That is a 68 per cent increase from £1.7m the previous year.

Just over £1m of the cash came from Portsmouth City Council and a further £1.9m was provided in housing benefit and government grants.

It is thought around 150 households are currently using temporary accommodation - both B&Bs and council-owned units.

Councillor Steve Pitt, Portsmouth City Council's deputy leader, said the quality of life for those without a fixed home was more concerning than the cost.

He said: 'B&Bs and hotels also don't provide a decent quality of life for people. At the end of the day people don't have access to laundry and cooking facilities and that makes a huge difference.

'Also they might not be accessible for people with disabilities.

'We don't want to have anyone in temporary accommodation unless absolutely necessary.'

Work to build 23 units of self-contained temporary accommodation in the city has already begun. And the council may make more temporary accommodation by converting buildings it already owns, or buy more properties.

Cllr Pitt added: 'We are actively working to get that number down. It's a big problem. It makes more financial sense to not have people in temporary accommodation as well. But we also need to work on the causes so no one is in that situation.'

Nationally councils saw a rise in temporary accommodation with the bill surpassing £1bn from 2018 to 2019, an increase of nine per cent since 2017.

Polly Neate, chief executive of homelessness charity Shelter, said the figures were a shocking but 'entirely preventable consequence' of the country's housing emergency.

She said: 'If consecutive governments had built the genuinely affordable social homes that are needed, fewer people would be homeless, and we would not be wasting vast sums on unsuitable temporary accommodation.

'What’s even more shameful is that so much of this public money is lining the pockets of unscrupulous private landlords, who can charge desperate councils extortionate rates for grim B&Bs, because there’s nowhere else for families to go.'

As of late November 2019 there were 67 Portsmouth households in self-contained temporary accommodation and 84 in B&Bs.