Councils Not Recording Tenants' Nationalities

Over half of the new council housing lets in London do not record the nationality of the tenant, new research has revealed. The campaign group Migrationwatch UK found that one fifth of all social housing in London is occupied by foreign nationals, and that one third of the capital's new council lets are not even recorded in the Continuous Recording of Sales and Lettings (CORE) data.  Migrationwatch says that local authorities are failing in their legal duty to provide information on the nationality of the tenant, and that four London councils - owners of a quarter of the capital's council-owned stock - provided no information at all to central government.

Affordable Homes Rent Averages 68% of Market Rate

Social landlords are charging an average of 68 per cent of market rent for homes built through the affordable homes programme.  CLG figures on social housing lettings and sales for 2011/12 show how the affordable rent tenure is being implemented for the first time.  There were 4,612 affordable rent lettings in 2011/12, with average general needs rent for these homes at £110. Under the £1.8 billion affordable homes programme housing providers are given grant to build homes that can be let at up to 80 per cent of market rate. The average rent charged by housing associations rose by 6 per cent in 2011/12, to an average of £81 a week. The average weekly rent across all providers, including local authorities, was £76.  Download the CORE report from the CLG website.

Supported Housing: Young People

Mr. Chaytor: How many and what proportion of young people under the age of 19 years are living in supported housing schemes; and what is the maximum weekly housing benefit payable to such people?
Mr. Ian Austin: Figures on the total number of young people living in supported housing schemes are not collected centrally. There is no universal definition of supported housing, the different data sources CLG collects contain information on different types of supported housing (therefore the two following data sets are not comparable). Of the 32,813 clients under the age of 19 years who accessed housing related support services funded by the Supporting People programme between 1 April 2008 and 31 March 2009, 15,155 (46%.) entered supported housing. The Continuous Recording (CORE) of lettings provides information on the number of supported housing lettings in the social housing sector. Between 1 April 2008 and 31 March 2009, CORE estimates that 15,200 new supported housing lettings were provided to households headed by a young person under 19. Of all under-19s receiving new social housing lets, 60% were provided with supported housing. Read the full answer on the Parliament website.

Social Lettings Tables 2008/09

These tables give information about the characteristics of households receiving general needs social lettings. Estimates cover the whole social housing sector, including both housing associations and local authorities. The figures are based on lettings information reported through the CORE system for 2008/09 and the Housing Strategy Statistical Appendix (HSSA). View the tables by clicking on the CLG logo below.