Select committee: Public Accounts Committee
Conclusion 7
4th Report - Tackling homelessness
Published 24 Jan 2025
Addressed to HM Treasury
Public Accounts Committee Tackling homelessness All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Conclusion (the committee's words)
Despite legislation designed to tackle well-established problems and gaps in regulation, MHCLG has made no progress in improving the oversight of the supported housing sector. Supported housing can provide much-needed homes for people transitioning from homelessness, or may stop people from becoming homeless in the first place. But this Committee has previously expressed concerns that gaps in regulation mean landlords can provide costly, sub-standard housing with little support, supervision or care. The Supported Housing (Regulatory Oversight) Act came into force in August 2023. It brought forward national standards for support, and looked to give local authorities power to tackle poor quality supported housing in their area, yet by the end of 2024 the Act had not been implemented. MHCLG has applications open for membership of a supported housing advisory panel. It will be at least early 2025 before it issues a consultation on a proposed local authority licensing scheme for supported housing landlords. The consultation is likely to last for several months, after which MHCLG will need to evaluate the responses and lay the appropriate regulations, before finally implementing the scheme. We are not persuaded by MHCLG’s argument that it still cannot commit to any form of timetable for implementing the provisions of the Act. recommendation MHCLG should implement the provisions of the Supported Housing (Regulatory Oversight) Act as quickly as possible, and provide an update on its progress in its Treasury Minute response. 8 1 Support for people who are homeless or threatened with homelessness Introduction
From: Public Accounts Committee, 4th Report - Tackling homelessness (HC 352), 24 January 2025
Government response
Latest Treasury Minutes progress report to the Committee of Public Accounts on the Fourth Report of Session 2024-26
The government responded to the whole report on 4 June 2026.
Treasury minutes: Government response to the Committee of Public Accounts on the Fourth report from Session 2024-25
Published 6 May 2025.
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government states that it agrees with the Committee's recommendations on tackling homelessness, giving target implementation dates ranging from April 2025 to Summer 2026 and noting that some are already implemented.
- On temporary accommodation, the government agrees with the recommendation and reports it as implemented: the Emergency Accommodation Reduction Pilots, backed by £5 million (later £8 million in total), work with 20 local authorities with the highest use of B&B accommodation.
- On consolidating funding, MHCLG will merge its main rough sleeping and single homelessness grants into a single grant for 2025-26, and will "explore options" for aligning Homelessness Prevention Grant funding with rough sleeping funding. It will "consider whether and how" to consolidate homelessness grants into the Local Government Finance Settlement.
- On local connection tests, regulations in force since 18 December 2024 exempt all former regular armed forces members. MHCLG will bring forward changes for domestic abuse victims and care leavers under 25 "in due course".
- On supported housing, the government agrees, with a target date of Summer 2026. A 12-week consultation published on 20 February 2025 covers a licensing regime and National Supported Housing Standards, with a response to follow "as soon as possible".