Briefing: Budget 2020

Shelter is the UK’s largest housing and homelessness charity. Last year we gave information, support and advice to millions of people experiencing bad housing and homelessness.

For generations, social housing played a vital role in meeting the housing needs of ordinary people, giving millions the quality and dignity of life that insecure and unaffordable private renting could not. A steep decline in social housebuilding has contributed to an increase in homelessness and a huge increase in private renting as more and more cannot afford to buy a home. Councils are spending over a billion pounds a year on temporary accommodation to house homeless households.

This years Budget offers an opportunity to turn the tide on the housing emergency by:

1. Committing to increasing capital investment in social rent housing.

2. Committing to ensuring Local Housing Allowance (LHA) payments cover the costs of private rents by re-aligning LHA rates with at least the 30th percentile of local rents from financial year 2020-21.