Another £2.62 million to be spent on housing for homeless refugees in Shropshire

Shropshire Council hopes the money – £1.2 million of which will come from the Government – will fund the purchase of 10 new properties for families who have fled war-torn Afghanistan.

It comes after councillors agreed to spend £7.6m on up to 30 homes for Ukrainian and Afghan refugees at a meeting in March, which included £3.2m from the government’s Local Authority Housing Fund round one allocation.

A report to councillors says the council has now been allocated £1.2 million in round two of the fund.

It intends to match fund this with £450,000 from ‘section 106’ funds collected from housing developers, plus £970,000 of borrowing.

Nine of the additional homes will be offered to households currently being put up in bridging hotels in the West Midlands, while the tenth will be used as temporary accommodation.

All 40 homes from both rounds of the programme will be used to alleviate wider homelessness pressures once the immediate need to help refugee families displaces by the conflicts in Ukraine and Afghanistan has eased.

Councillors will be asked to back the plan at a meeting next week.

The report, by Mark Barrow, director of place, says the 10 additional properties will range from two to four bedrooms, and the council aims to have completed the purchases by March 2024.

Mr Barrow says that while Shropshire does not have any bridging hotels for Afghan refugees, families are currently being accommodated elsewhere in the West Midlands and “it is important for the council to assist where possible in providing settled accommodation”.

The homes will be offered to households on either the Afghan Citizen Resettlement Scheme or Afghan Relocations and Assistance Policy.

The report says: “This includes households who are currently in bridging accommodation or who have left bridging hotels and are homeless, at risk of homelessness, or living in unsuitable temporary accommodation.”

It concludes: “Given the pressures on the council surrounding its homelessness duties, and that when the initial need of providing Afghan refugees a home, subsequent lettings can be used to help meet the council’s wider housing and homelessness pressures, it would seem pragmatic to accept the full allocation of capital funding to acquire the target number of homes and use best endeavours to deliver.”