‘Huge issue’ over B&Bs for homeless

Major shortage of accommodation

Stirling has a drastic shortage of B&Bs willing to take homeless people and some of those that will are being deemed not fit for purpose.

Housing officials told Stirling Council’s housing and environment committee on Thursday there was a “huge issue” in Stirling with B&B owners not accepting homeless clients.

While efforts to accommodate fewer people in such establishments appeared to be succeeding, the decreasing opportunities to do so if need be was causing a problem.

Housing service manager Carol Hamilton said: “We have done a considerable amount of work in the last few months trawling websites etc for accommodation.

“We have a huge issue in Stirling just now where B&Bs won’t accept our clients or, because of the summer season, they will take them through the week but then want them out on the Friday. Officers are therefore having to spend time anticipating these cases.

“An extra issue is that we have an unusually high number of large families approaching us and those looking for somewhere with wheelchair access and we don’t have a lot of that type of accommodation available in general.”

Councillor Alasdair Macpherson said he had heard of a case where a family slept in a car overnight rather than travel to accommodation found for them in Glasgow and another case of a man sleeping in his ex-wife’s shed because suitable accommodation hadn’t been found.”

Housing officials said they were aware of the family’s case and while it was “unfortunate” that they had chosen to sleep in the car officers do cover public transport costs if homeless applicants have to be sent outwith the Stirling area.

Councillor Jim Thomson said he was aware of Stirling B&Bs which provide accommodation for homeless clients from Falkirk and Clackmannanshire.

Ms Hamilton said, however: “We are trying to minimise the amount of moves people have. There’s a shortage of B&Bs available to us in Stirling, but we would rather put someone in a neighbouring authority than use some of the ones that are used here by other authorities.”

The committee heard that the average number of applicants in B&B accommodation was continuing to decrease. In 2016/17 the average number of clients in such placements per night was 12.9, the target being a maximum of 45. This compared with 17.1 in 2015/16 and 23.3 in 2014/15.

Satisfaction rates with the quality of temporary accommodation offered had increased from 83.8 per cent in 2015/16 to 88.9 per cent in 2016/17.

However, the number of homeless applications in 2016/17 was 630 - up from 583 the previous year.

There’sashortageof B&Bsavailabletous in Stirling, but we would rather put someone in a neighbouring authority than use some of the ones that are used here by other authorities