6 October 2023
NFA Policy Director on party conference housing panel
NFA Policy Director Chloe Fletcher joins a panel of leading figures from the social housing sector next week, presenting our findings to Labour conference on the impact of the cost of living crisis on tenants’ day-to-day lives.
‘A Fair Future: How can the next Labour government tackle poverty?’ is a special fringe event that brings together partners from across the sector this coming Monday morning.
The panel will discuss the role decent, affordable housing can play in poverty prevention and community investment.
Chaired by CIH Chief Officer Gavin Smart, the event begins at 10.30am at Tate Liverpool and will feature the Shadow Minister for Building Safety and Homelessness, Mike Amesbury MP, Grand Union Housing’s CEO Aileen Evans, John Greaves of Places for People and Doug Sarney from MRI Software.
Chloe’s focus will be the 2023 joint NFA and ARCH special publication, On The Edge: Cost-of-living findings from the council housing sector. It reveals that arrears are rising as tenants struggle to balance ever more tightly squeezed budgets, even among the two-thirds who are in paid work.
Meanwhile, councils report increasing pressure on their homelessness and housing advice services, and on budgets dented by increasing numbers housed in temporary accommodation.
The findings come from data submitted by collection and financial well-being officers managing rents from around 300,000 homes.