§ Mr. CallaghanTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many persons were registered as homeless in the Greater Manchester area in 1979 and in 1992.
§ Mr. BaldryLocal, authorities report the number of households for whom they accept responsibility for securing permanent accommodation under the homelessness provisions of the Housing (Homeless Persons) Act 1977 and the Housing Act 1985 in their quarterly P1(E) returns.
The numbers of households accepted as homeless in Greater Manchester in 1979 and 1992 were 3,370 and 14,120 respectively.
A new reporting system was introduced for metropolitan authorities from the third quarter of 1982. In addition the definition of acceptances was altered from the second quarter of 1991 to exclude intentionally homeless households. For these reasons figures for 1979 are therefore not strictly comparable with those for 1992.