Council housing used for temporary accommodation like ‘robbing Peter to pay Paul’

People facing housing emergencies will be placed into council housing on a temporary basis in a “stupid” plan to save money on hotels. Bristol City Council will continue a pilot for another two years, despite suggestions that tenants needing a home should simply be given one on a permanent basis.

Up to 180 council homes a year will be turned into temporary accommodation for people facing a housing emergency, while the council assesses their needs and they wait for a more permanent home. The bizarre plan will help end the use of hotels for homeless people, which is very expensive, by providing cheaper temporary accommodation.

While the quality of housing will be higher than privately owned temporary accommodation, the plan will lead to delays for people waiting for a permanent council home, as there will be fewer available. The council has run a 12-month pilot and consulted the public about the plan, but only 162 people responded, which is “lower than we would have liked”, one council boss said.

Most councillors on the housing policy committee voted to approve the plan on Friday, December 13, despite several criticising its effects. One councillor said the government was “making the council do stupid things”, due to perceived failures in housing policy, such as national funding not matching the exorbitant costs of privately owned temporary accommodation.

Green Councillor Jerome Thomas said: “This isn’t where we want to be. We’re having to rob Peter to pay Paul to do stupid things, because of the rules the government has designed. I do think we have to do this to protect the council’s finances, and we should be constantly knocking on the government’s door to say ‘look at the stupid things you’re making councils do’.”

The sole voice against the plan was Labour Cllr Zoë Peat, who said the council should simply allocate housing to people for their “forever homes”, rather than on a temporary basis. She mentioned a girl living in Barton House, who spoke earlier in the meeting, begging council bosses to rehouse her family from the block of flats which was evacuated last year.

She said: “Putting people into temporary accommodation that should be going to them is adding a level of bureaucracy. Why aren’t we providing this as council housing? It’s not right. These properties should be given to people as council homes, not temporary accommodation.

“Are you really going to tell that 12-year-old girl that she’s going to have to keep on moving homes until she’s found a council house? It’s not fair. If we’ve got the housing, it should be given as tenancies.”

She was repeatedly criticised by Conservative Cllr Richard Eddy, vice-chair of the housing committee, who was chairing the meeting. At one point before a vote on how many council homes should become temporary accommodation, she was refused the chance to speak.

Cllr Eddy said: “You can issue a press release. Write me an email or do a press release. Let’s not prolong the meeting.” He also thanked a Green councillor speaking after her with an opposing view for being “a voice of sanity”.

At the end of the meeting, Cllr Peat said: “I have not gone from living in a women’s refuge, to social housing to private renting, for you to act like I have no lived experience — or refer to my point of view as insanity. I just want that on the record.”

According to the latest figures, 43 Bristol households are staying in hotels as emergency temporary accommodation. One reason why the council still needs to use hotels is because it recently dropped the prices it would pay to landlords for temporary accommodation, leading to one of the main landlords refusing to accept the lower rents and pulling out of the contract.

This means that between 150 to 180 homes will no longer be available to the council to use as temporary accommodation. Overall, there are 1,646 households in temporary accommodation, comprising 756 single people and 890 families. In Bristol and across the country, the demand for temporary accommodation has shot up since the pandemic, costing taxpayers many millions.