§ Dr. CunninghamTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will publish a table showing for each local authority in. England the number of persons accepted as homeless in each year since 1979 inclusive.
§ Sir George YoungI have today placed in the Library a table giving the numbers of households for whom local authorities accepted responsibility for securing accommodation under the homelessness provisions of the Housing (Homeless Persons) Act 1977 and the Housing Act 1985, for each year from 1981 to 1990.
In a majority of cases, the main immediate reasons for acceptance by local authorities were that their relations or friends were no longer willing or able to house them or as a result of the breakdown of a relationship. Those accepted will either have been rehoused directly, found temporary accommodation, or enabled to stay in existing accommodation until suitable permanent housing was found.
Information for the years 1979 and 1980 is available in edition No. 54—table 14—edition No. 61—table 11—and edition No. 62—table 13—of "Local Housing Statistics: England and Wales", copies of which are in the Library.
A new reporting system was introduced for non-metropolitan districts in the fourth quarter of 1980 and for metropolitan districts and the London boroughs in the third quarter of 1982, so that the figures are not directly comparable over the whole period.