Shunted from pillar to post and still in limbo

LITTLE Andrew spent his fifth birthday homeless and in a bed and breakfast.

It broke his mother Rachel Gardner’s heart to watch her son, who has autism, plead to go back to the only house he had ever known.

She said: “He was begging me, crying to take him home. He desperately needs routine. He was so distressed.”

Rachel is a victim of a lack of social housing that has resulted in a reliance on the private rented sector. Her story shows how precarious life becomes for tenants when landlords decide to sell.

Rachel, 24, Andrew and daughter Lucy, six, lived in a two-bedroom private let in Granton in Edinburgh from December 2012.

She was given a two-month notice to quit the property by April this year after her landlord decided to sell up.

Tenants who rely on benefits often struggle to secure private lets when they are forced to move on as they don’t have cash for a deposit and breakfast for three days. It was clean but it was a tiny room with three single beds, a TV and a kettle. There were no cooking facilities, so they had to eat out or have Pot Noodles.

Rachel tried to pretend to the children that they were on holiday. But they were miserable and Lucy, a bubbly child, became withdrawn.

The family were then placed in a Travelodge.

After that, they were given a temporary three-bedroom home, where they have been since May.

They can’t settle there as they know it is not permanent and their possessions are still in storage.

Rachel said: “We just want a place we can call home. Surely my children deserve that.”