Decision details

To enter into a 2-year internal repairing lease with Worthing Homes Ltd for two one bed flats at Flats in Pavilion Road, Worthing, West Sussex, BN14 7EG for the purpose of temporary accommodation (TA) provision pursuant to Part VII of the Housing Act 1996.

To enable the councils to fulfil their statutory housing duties under Part VII of the Housing Act 1996.

Demand for TA is increasing and the council is required under a statutory duty to provide this. Without long-term provision of lower cost TA, the only option is to use financially unsustainable short-term spot-purchased accommodation which can sometimes lack adequate cooking and clothes washing facilities and is unable to fully meet housing needs. Doing nothing and continuing to use spot-purchased TA will see costs spiral and is therefore not recommended.   

Both ADC and WBC have commenced capital works programmes to purchase and develop their own TA stock. So far three buildings have been developed to create 38x self-contained flats in Worthing and one building in Adur consisting of 6x self-contained flats. WBC also has further developments comprising 16x self-contained flats and ADC is developing 7x houses and has commenced a leaseholder buy back scheme to deliver a further 8x self-contained flats which are all scheduled for completion within the current financial year. Whilst this forms a key part of an effective long-term strategy to lower the cost of TA, it can take many months or years to develop each site and therefore this in isolation is not sufficient to keep up with current demand.

We are also continuing to operate our ‘Opening Doors’ letting service. This has been a great success and has been key in preventing and relieving homelessness by enabling a supply of good quality privately rented homes to people with housing needs and assisting with moving people on from TA. Since its introduction in July 2019, we have achieved 148 lets with an additional 16 properties in the pipeline expected to be occupied by the end of Q4 2024/25. However, due to high numbers of people presenting as homeless, this is not sufficient to keep up with current demand and therefore a supply of cost-effective TA is required to meet the immediate housing needs for the homeless.