Councillors have agreed to start the process of bringing temporary homes that are leased to a charity back under the council’s control.
Brighton and Hove City Council currently leases 499 homes to Seaside Homes and uses them for temporary accommodation.
The council set up Seaside Homes – formally known as Brighton and Hove Seaside Community Homes – in 2008 as a not-for-profit independent charitable company so that it could secure funding to bring the houses up to the “decent homes standard”.
At the time, council spending was limited by a borrowing cap but a “local delivery vehicle” such as Seaside Home could borrow to refurbish the buildings and lease back the housing for “temporary” homes.
The council’s executive director for housing, neighbourhoods and communities Rachel Sharpe said that the current arrangement was “expensive” and carried risks.
She told a special joint meeting of the council’s Housing Committee and Policy and Resources Committee that Seaside had approached the council to refinance the current arrangements.
As of this month, the council had a “historically high number” of 1,288 households in temporary accommodation and 531 in emergency housing.
Seaside Homes accounted for 40 per cent of the council’s long-term temporary housing.
At the joint meeting yesterday (Monday 27 February), housing campaigners raised concerns about the effects of bringing the temporary housing under council control on households affected by the benefit cap.
Housing campaigner Daniel Harris said that some of the city’s poorest tenants experienced higher rents when living in temporary housing.
He said: “I remember a Seaside Community Homes tenant who was ‘benefit capped’ and had £70 per month left to live off with four children.
“They came to council to discuss that. Their next-door neighbour, who was a council tenant, was paying £1,000 less per month.”
Green councillor David Gibson, who serves as a co-chair of the Housing Committee, said that the proposed “direction of travel” would alleviate the problem and see a “considerable lowering of rents”.
If the council does bring the homes under its control, then they would be let at 90 per cent of the “local housing allowance” (LHA) rate.
Sussex Homeless Support founder Jim Deans said that people living in Seaside Homes properties were using food banks because rents were high.
He said: “I fear we are trapping people in rent debt and on benefits due to the LHA – plus … the LHA is still not enough to run it so (the council) tops it up.
“So if a tenant on benefits found work, what would the real rent be? Certainly not affordable. So living in a council home, paying double council rent, this cannot be correct. I would request a public involvement meeting regarding this proposal.”
Councillor Gibson agreed that a public meeting would be a “good idea”.
He said: “If this proposal is agreed upon today then the rents are proposed to come down and the whole thing will become more affordable.
“There is a lot of discussion – and a proposal will come back to a future committee with the detail and there will be time between to have those discussions – but, certainly, all the rents will come down if this proposal comes to fruition.”
Labour councillor Amanda Grimshaw backed the comments made by Mr Harris and Mr Deans, having experienced living in long-term temporary accommodation with Seaside Community Homes herself while “benefit capped”.
Councillor Grimshaw said: “With the benefit cap, you can be (living) in a Seaside and you can’t actually afford to be there.”
She added that working people on low incomes and those who were “benefit capped” had a very low standard of living when you are trapped in a long-term temporary home.
The council’s assistant housing director Martin Reid said that the proposed rents would be lower than through Seaside and the council would engage with all residents as part of the process.
Conservative councillor Anne Meadows asked what happened to the money that was generated in rent by the properties.
She said: “The council pay for the maintenance, repairs, the insurances and management. Where has the money gone? There was a huge amount which helped us reach the decent homes standard.”
Mr Reid said that Seaside had taken out a loan from Santander bank which was used to cover the cost of refurbishing the properties. They were some of the “poorest quality” of the city’s housing stock and had been brought up to decent homes standard.
Councillor Meadows and Conservative group leader Steve Bell voted against the proposals.
Green and Labour councillors agreed that talks should start to take back the properties with a final decision required as soon as practicably possible.
