§ Mr. Nicholas BrownTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will give the number of homeless households in priority need in England in each year since 1979; and if he will give this information for England as a whole and for each district council and London borough.
§ Mr. WaldegraveThe estimated numbers of households accepted by local authorities under the homelessness provisions of the housing Acts, are derived from quarterly returns. The figures for England are in the table. I regret that in the reply given by my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary to the hon. Member for Redcar (Ms. Mowlam) on 18 May at column481 the acceptance figures quoted for 1979 to 1987 were those for 1978 to 1986.
Total acceptances of which priority need 1979 57,200 55,030 1980 62,920 60,390 1981 70,010 65,530 1982 74,800 69,930 1983 78,240 71,590 1984 83,550 76,760 1985 94,530 87,540 1986 105,280 96,490 1987 112,730 102,440 The readily available information on priority need acceptances by individual authorities comes from their housing investment programme returns. The figures appear in column B5 of the "HIP1 all items print" for each of the years 1981–82 to 1983–84, column B6B for 1984–85 and column C1B for 1985–86 and for 1986–87; copies of these documents are in the Library. In some cases, figures in HIP returns may differ slightly from those reported in the quarterly returns.