One in four low-to-middle income households are spending more than 35 per cent of their income on housing, a report has found.
The study from the Resolution Foundation think tank has found 1.3 million low-income families across Britain are spending more than they can afford on housing.
Private rents across the UK have risen to their highest level since last November, according to the latest figures published today.
The LSL Buy-to-Let Property Index for April shows the average rent in England and Wales has risen by 0.2% since March to £736 per month. Continued growth leaves rents in April 3.9% higher than a year ago.
The Universal Credit direct payment demonstration projects will be extended for a further six months, Minister for Welfare Reform Lord Freud announced today, as new findings from the projects are published.
The Department for Work and Pensions says the extension will help to further develop the support needed for social housing tenants moving onto Universal Credit. The projects will now run until the end of the year.
Welfare reform minister Lord Freud has described a suicide linked to his controversial bedroom tax policy as a "desperately sad event".
Giving evidence to the House of Commons Welsh Affairs Committee, which is investigating the impact of housing benefit reforms in Wales, Lord Freud extended his condolences to the family of Stephanie Bottrill, who left a note in which she blamed the government for her death.
A grandmother who killed herself left a note in which she blamed the Government for her death.
Just days before she died Stephanie Bottrill, 53, from in Solihull in the West Midlands, told neighbours she simply could not afford to live any more.
Birmingham City Council recorded a huge increase in the number of people seeking help to pay their rent in the first two weeks after government welfare reforms came into effect.
The council says almost 2,000 applications were made for Discretionary Housing Payments (DHP) in the first two weeks of April – 50% more than for the whole of the first quarter of 2012-13.
The government is expected to seek to restrict migrants’ access to social housing and benefits in measures to be outlined tomorrow.
Tomorrow’s Queens speech will include an Immigration Bill. This is expected to include measures to limit the access that migrants have to health services, benefits and social housing. There will also be measures to make it easier for foreign criminals to be deported.
A new report from Shelter that claims to have uncovered the damage done to children who grow up in private rental homes has hit controversy.
The report, Growing up renting, claims that children pay the price for insecure tenancies, high rents and constant moves that Shelter says are standard in today’s market. Some tenants have nowhere to go between tenancies and families end up sofa-surfing.
Letting agents in London were targeted on Saturday in an angry city-wide protest by demonstrators.
Some who had got wind of the ‘Let Down’ demonstration beforehand decided to stay shut for the day while Foxtons, in Brixton, reportedly hired security officers. Others locked their doors as the protesters tried to enter and make agents answer their ‘survey’.
Housing benefit payments will be sent directly to landlords after tenants have gone into two months of arrears during the Universal Credit (UC) pathfinders.
A circular published by the Department of Works and Pensions (DWP) said: “Landlords can refer rent arrears cases to Universal Credit; those which are under two months’ rent will trigger Universal Credit to contact the claimant to discuss their non-payment as part of the Personal Budgeting Support process, where as those with over two months arrears will be switched to direct rent payment automatically and relevant budgeting support activity arranged subsequently.”