Agencies condemn plans for homeless

CHARITIES, housing providers, advice agencies and churches have united against plans to end the right of the homeless to priority housing, writes Nicholas Timmins.

Few social policy initiatives since the creation of the Social Fund, which replaced grants with loans for the least well-off, and which remains the most criticised part of the 1988 social security reforms, have attracted such ire and dismay.

In responses this week to the Government's consultation document the National Association of Citizens' Advice Bureaux has warned Sir George Young, the housing minister, that 'a legacy of poverty and family breakdown' will result.

The National Council for One-Parent Families said the proposals would prove 'a disaster for the vunerable and in particular one-parent families', and the National Federation of Housing Associations - one of the key providers of housing affected by the plans - said that far from being fairer, as ministers claim, the opposite will result.

The plans deny those officially classified as homeless any priority for council or housing association homes. Instead, for 'a limited period only', councils will put them into temporary accommodation such as a private letting, from which landlords can evict after six months. There they will queue alongside others on the housing list.