…but this week's budget could give us another helping hand
Almost 200,000 children across the country will spend tonight homeless.
Facing homelessness and being placed in temporary accommodation is one of the most distressing and stressful experiences a household can face. But for hundreds of thousands of families, this is their reality. This isn't just a crisis in housing. It's a moral failure.
And fixing the issues at the heart of the temporary accommodation crisis is about more than just bringing down waiting lists, it's about big picture thinking. It requires strong leadership willing to do more than just fire-fighting, but to move forward with the determination to tackle these issues head-on.
That's what the story has looked like in Merton.
Between 2021 and 2025, like other London boroughs, Merton's number of households in temporary accommodation tripled as house prices and soaring private rents outpaced wages and housebuilding.
The reality for so many local authorities is that temporary accommodation can mean a single room for an entire family, often far away from the borough where they became homeless. And despite the name, It is now far from temporary, with many households spending years, rather than months, in this situation.
But this year in Merton, we reversed that trend. While other London boroughs have seen a 4% increase in the number of households in temporary accommodation, Merton has reduced its numbers by 13%.
This is not just about figures. Every household prevented from entering temporary accommodation is another family in safe, secure housing, closer to their support networks, schools and workplaces, with more certainty about their future.
This reduction is a huge step in the right direction, but it has not happened overnight.
In 2025, Merton established a delivery unit to oversee our plan to tackle rising numbers in temporary accommodation. We brought together teams from across the organisation, including Children's Services, Digital, Customer Services, Housing Benefit and Employ Merton, our in-house employment service.
We sought to deliver the wraparound support needed to prevent homelessness in the first place: better advice, more training and resources for our Housing Needs Service, stronger negotiation with landlords, fewer spot purchases of costly temporary accommodation, and a greater focus on acquiring properties within the borough.
We’ve achieved great progress, of which we are extremely proud, but councils cannot tackle this crisis on their own. The Government must put also temporary accommodation prevention at the heart of its homelessness strategy.
Already stretched London councils are now spending more than £5.5 million every day on temporary accommodation, and across the UK, £2 billion was spent on managing the crisis between 2023/24 and 2024/25.
This is not only a crisis for families; it also represents the transfer of vast sums of public money into the private sector, further entrenching the economic inequality that ballooned over 14 years of Tory austerity.
But there still remains plenty to be hopeful about. Building on the support and leadership already provided by central government, there are several concrete steps it could take in this week's Budget to further help councils like Merton:
Continue and expand the Local Authority Housing Fund, giving councils the ability to acquire more safe and secure homes within their boroughs that are owned and managed by the local authority.
Remove ringfencing from the Homelessness Prevention Grant, giving councils greater flexibility at a time when pressures are at an all-time high.
Most importantly, increase investment in affordable and social housing, enabling councils to build the homes that are desperately needed at the pace required to tackle the crisis.
Every household that ends up in temporary accommodation is one too many. We have shown in Merton that, with political will and a clear strategy, we can begin to turn the tide on this crisis.
The Government has already made welcome progress towards ensuring more households have a safe place to call home. This week, it should take another step forward to help bring the temporary accommodation crisis to an end.
