Brent Council is facing a significant financial challenge, with a £15.4 million overspend on temporary accommodation projected for the 2024/25 financial year. This substantially exceeds the allocated budget of £2.4 million. The situation is expected to worsen, with a potential £5 million overspend forecast for 2025/26, as expenditure is predicted to reach £18.1 million against a budget of £13.1 million.
The council, like much of London, is experiencing record levels of homelessness, driven by rising private rents, a broken private rental sector, and years of underinvestment in genuinely affordable housing.
The issue was discussed during a Council meeting on Monday, 15 September 2025, where Councillor Sandra Kabir questioned Councillor Fleur Donnelly-Jackson, Cabinet Member for Housing, about the growing subsidy gap between council payments for housing benefits in temporary accommodation and the reimbursements received from the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP).
Councillor Donnelly-Jackson acknowledged the financial strain and attributed it to the surge in homelessness, rising private rents, and a lack of investment in affordable housing by previous governments. She highlighted that the council is taking innovative approaches to address homelessness and the need for temporary accommodation, consulting on a new homelessness and rough sleepers strategy, and working closely with Crisis, who chair the Homelessness Forum. The council is also working with Crisis on the Built for Zero approach, which uses real-time data to respond to the needs of homeless people. The Radical Place pilot is looking at how the council can effectively work with partners, and the council has access to the GLA's CHAPS grant to deliver new temporary accommodation units, which will help to save on subsidy loss.
The Cabinet Member for Housing also said that it may be easier to circulate a written answer that has those figures instead of reading out the entirety of the table for those years. But I did want to thank you very much for the comment around our innovative approach to temporary accommodation."
The council's subsidy loss for temporary accommodation over the past five years paints a concerning picture:
- 2020/21: £3.3 million
- 2021/22: £2.9 million
- 2022/23: £3.7 million
- 2023/24: £11.0 million
- 2024/25: £15.4 million
The increasing expenditure on temporary accommodation is having a knock-on effect on the council's overall finances. To manage the shortfall, all departments are being asked to deliver service-specific savings and contribute to cross-cutting measures totalling £10 million this year.
Councillor Donnelly-Jackson said that the council is working with Crisis, who chair the Homelessness Forum, and that they're an organisation who I'm looking forward to finding out whether they win the London Homelessness Award that they've been shortlisted for for their work with refugees who are facing homelessness."
The council is also working on a Built for Zero approach, which uses real-time data to respond to the needs of homeless people, and the GLA's CHAPS grant to deliver new temporary accommodation units, which will help to save on subsidy loss. The council has raised the subsidy gap with the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, as has London Councils, and we will continue to press for reform of the outdated subsidy framework.
