Homeless families in south London could be sent to Dover and Luton under the council’s plan

Homeless families in south London could be sent to Dover and Luton under a council plan to cut spending on hotels.

Lambeth Council is in advanced negotiations to take over new build developments in Kent and Bedfordshire as temporary housing. Council documents claim the accommodation will provide “high-quality, family-sized accommodation within reasonable walking distance of the borough”.

The coastal town of Dover is around two hours’ drive from Brixton, home to Lambeth Council’s town hall. Direct trains from London Victoria to Dover take around the same time.

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Meanwhile, a drive from Brixton to Luton takes around one hour and forty minutes. The fastest trains from St Pancras International can take less than half an hour to the commuter town.

There are currently over 4,500 Lambeth families in temporary accommodation. As of June 2024, 78.3% of placements were private pay-per-night accommodation such as hotels.

On average, the council spends around £14,000 a year hosting a family in paid accommodation per night. Lambeth believes this type of temporary housing is expensive and wants to reduce reliance on it.

One of the ways the council plans to do this is by increasing its supply of different types of temporary housing, such as developments in Dover and Luton. Known as Private Rented Housing (PSL), this type of housing has been rented to the private sector for years.

The council says it’s cheaper and usually better quality. Lambeth has already acquired leases on a number of developments to use as temporary accommodation, including 82 flats in a new development near East Croydon station.

Danny Adilypour, Lambeth’s deputy leader for housing, investment and new homes, told a housing review panel on Tuesday (July 16) that the Labor council has three aims to deal with the temporary housing crisis.

He said: “The first is the need to work on that homelessness prevention strategy. The second is to increase our offer of alternative, long-term (temporary accommodation) services so that we can reduce our reliance on expensive nightly charges and thirdly to increase our ability to move from your to private rented sector where appropriate.”

Alex Clarke, the council’s deputy director of housing needs, told the committee it could take five years for the strategy to bear fruit. He added: “For those households who are in temporary accommodation, we want to find better quality accommodation (and) which is at the lowest cost to the council. But most importantly, we want to move away from the use of pay-per-night accommodation, which is very expensive for the council, (and) very poor quality (for) residents.”

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