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The number of BAME individuals becoming homeless in the past decade has not been reflected in an increase in BAME households being allocated social housing, MPs have heard.
Giving evidence to the Women and Equalities Committee on Wednesday, Cym D’Souza, chief executive of Arawak Walton Housing Association and chair of BME National, suggested that local lettings policies are out of line with housing need in BAME communities.
She said: “While we have seen an incredible increase in BME homelessness, we have just not seen those people come through into the social housing sector.
“So there’s something about the way that housing is being allocated that has to be investigated quite quickly, because we would expect an increase in social housing lettings to BAME people, just by the nature of need, but it’s not coming through.”
Government data shows that the percentage of homeless households from ethnic minority groups has risen from 21% in 2006/7 to 32% in 2017/18. Over the same period, the percentage of homeless households that are white fell from 74% to 62%.
Dr Zubaida Haque, interim director at race equality thinktank Runnymede Trust, told the committee that only one in four Black people now own their own homes, which is “an opposite pattern” when compared with other ethnic groups and less than was the case 20 years ago.
She said: “We do need to create much more social housing that people can access.”
Ms D’Souza noted that part of the problem is a lack of larger social housing that can accommodate BAME families, which traditionally account for more multi-generational households.
She said: “That has been quite detrimental, because if you are in social housing – whether council or housing association – you can’t allow overcrowding.
“So if you’re not building three-bed-plus housing, you can’t house many people from the BAME community.”
Dr Haque and Dr Andrea Barry, senior analyst at the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, also called for the government to scrap the Right to Rent policy, which Dr Barry said has been “fuelling discrimination in the market”.
The scheme, aimed at prevent illegal immigrants from renting homes in England, was found to be in breach of human rights law by the High Court in March because it causes discrimination.