Council U-turns on decision to remove 90-minute distance cap on temporary accommodation placements

Lutfur Rahman, mayor of Tower Hamlets, said the reversal was down to new data showing the number of families waiting for accommodation in hotels in the borough had reduced from 43 in October 2023 to one, as well as the change in government.

“As far as I’m concerned, that is one family too many waiting in hotels for permanent housing, but it is nonetheless tremendous progress considering where we were this time last year. Crucially, this progress has been made under the existing policy,” he said.

Mr Rahman said that the new government had also “talked extensively and promisingly about a reset in relations with local government”, including working with councils “to address and solve the housing and homelessness crises”.

The homelessness placement policy had been a “natural area to review”, given the “acute housing shortage and associated financial pressures”, Mr Rahman said.

“There has been much scaremongering and misinformation about this proposed policy change over the past week, in a way that – too often – plays politics with the lives of our residents,” he added.

He said the decision had also come after listening to residents’ views and that an update on the review would appear “in due course”.

The London Councils group warned on Thursday that boroughs are at risk of exceeding their homelessness budgets by £250m in 2024-25, with temporary accommodation costs reaching £3m a day.

Earlier this year, Tower Hamlets Council announced it would carry out a review after the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman discovered it had a six-month backlog for processing housing register applications.

The local authority is set to bring its housing management back under direct control in the face of regulatory and financial pressures.