The Sound of Heaven
£9.99Fauzia and her family have been living in a temporary accommodation in west London for eight months now. While having to deal with damp, mould and overflowing sewage, they still managed to survive. “I spray before my kids come downstairs to eat their breakfast. This is how I live”, Fauzia told reporters. The excrement which continuously overflows from the toilet bowl is just one of the many problems this family has to endure. If anyone runs the kitchen tap, the sewage bubbles up higher. To make matters worse, the windows don’t close properly and are stuffed with bin bags to keep the cold out.
Enfield Council had to let a private landlord £2,543 per month for this substandard property to house Fauzia’s family as they were evicted from their previous home which was put up for sale. The family is part of a “record 123,000 households living in temporary accommodation in England, including 160,000 children.” Councils have spent £1bn dealing with this issue last year as the numbers soar, 50% higher than in 2022.
The combination of rising rental/property prices exceeding wages and no-fault evictions has accelerated homelessness. The UK government has pledged to ban these types of evictions, which is expected to become law by summer 2025. Demand is so high for temporary housing that councils have to place families miles away from work or school which hurts the children’s education. One child in every classroom in London will be homeless this Christmas, according to Shelter.
The UK government announced how it would allocate the £1bn it earmarked in the Budget to tackle the housing crisis by spending £633m trying to prevent homelessness and for temporary accommodation. Nearly £200m will be used to curb rough sleeping and investing in drug and alcohol services for homeless people. As soon as the BBC became involved, the family was rehoused within 48 hours and is now living in temporary accommodation in Barking and Dagenham, which is about 50 minutes’ drive from their children’s school.
The spokesperson for managing agents LTA Direct acknowledged photos of the property sent to them by the BBC were “horrific”. The agents claim that when they inspected the property on 2 December, there were no drainage issues and that mould and damp treatment was due to take place this week. The agency says the leaking sewage is a structural issue and has told the landlord that a complete refurbishment is needed to make the property habitable again. Fauzia, like many others, is still bidding for a council property – a feat she has been attempting since 2012
Read the full article from The BBC here: Read More
