This article by Vicky Spratt, Housing Correspondent for the i newspaper and shortlisted for the Orwell Prize for Reporting Homelessness, reports on families being moved out of London boroughs to temporary accommodation elsewhere.

In 42-year-old single parent Stacey-Anne McDonald’s end-of-terrace house, there is hardly any furniture, and very few toys for her two young children to play with. “We were told we had to come here with just a few hours’ notice,” she says, holding her 7-month-old baby, “and we could be asked to leave again any time.” Stacey’s other daughter, who is 4 years old, runs around asking questions. “She’s been anxious since we moved here,” Stacey explains.

Care worker Stacey and her family have been made homeless. They were evicted by a private landlord via a Section 21 ‘no fault’ eviction notice in February this year just as she gave birth. This sort of eviction allows landlords to evict their tenants at short notice without having to give them a reason. It’s a leading cause of homelessness in England and Wales.

“Here” is temporary accommodation in Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire where they were forced to move – 63 miles, two hours’ drive or four hours total journey by train – away from her home area, her job in Peckham, her family, and her eldest daughter’s school – by their local council, the London Borough of Lewisham.

If she had said no, Stacey would have made herself “intentionally homeless” according to a piece of legislation called the 1996 Housing Act and forfeited all rights to state support.

“It feels like they just toss you somewhere and forget about you,” Stacey said, sitting on a sofa in the bare living room of her interim home.

“Lewisham council said I had to take this property, or they would discharge their responsibility to me,” she continued. “I felt very stressed, like I had no choice but to come here or I would be on the street with my kids. I felt distraught. My head was spinning, I didn’t know what to do and I couldn’t get through to anyone at the council on the phone. Nobody answered.”

Stacey’s story is not unique. She is just one of tens of thousands of households who are being “exported” by local authorities to other areas because they have no permanent social housing for them. This is because local councils are “running out” of temporary housing for people experiencing homelessness according to new research from the homelessness charity Crisis; 97% of councils told the charity that they are struggling to source private rentals or affordable housing to support people.

Housing people who are experiencing homelessness outside of their local area, as Stacey’s council has done, is also known as an out-of-area placement. The displacement caused by this practice can have drastic effects on the health and wellbeing of the people impacted, particularly women.

As Dr Kesia Reeve of Sheffield Hallam University who has been a dedicated housing researcher for over 20 years has noted out-of-area placements isolate women “from crucial support networks” and leave them feeling “punished, blamed, and abandoned, rather than protected and supported by the services, policies and legislation designed to help them”.

Stacey doesn’t drive so she can’t commute back to Peckham by car for work, to see her family, who used to help with childcare, or her partner, the father of her children who also used to help “a lot” with children.

“If I had something to do – like a job interview or errands – my partner would look after the children so I could do it. “But now, because of the distance we can only talk on the phone,” Stacey says. “He doesn’t drive either. He works seven days a week as a street sweeper – it’s very difficult and expensive for him to make the journey.”

The cost of an adult single ticket from Peckham to Hemel Hempstead is £22.50.

Stacey’s family has been broken apart by her out-of-area placement.

“I haven’t heard from my council support worker since he gave me the address of this house in Hemel Hempstead,” Stacey adds. “It feels like they throw you away like garbage.”

“I just want to know what’s going to happen next, but the council doesn’t communicate with me.”

According to the government, moving people experiencing homelessness miles away from their hometown ought to be a “last resort” but exclusive data obtained via freedom of information (FOI) requests can reveal that councils in England are using out-of-area placements more than at any point since records began.

A Lewisham Council spokesperson said that it would not comment on Stacey’s case but said: “Like the rest of London, we’re facing significant challenges in the housing market and an acute shortage of accommodation. So, while we would always aim to place households in or close to Lewisham, this isn’t always possible given the number and location of properties available to the council.”

Being moved away from her home area, her community, and her support network has taken a serious toll on Stacey’s mental health. She is struggling with low mood and anxiety, her four-year-old daughter is also experiencing anxiety caused by the uncertainty.

As a result, Stacey has been prescribed talking therapy and is currently working with a cognitive behavioural psychotherapist in Hemel Hempstead.

In a letter written by her therapist addressed to Lewisham Council he says that Stacey is experiencing mental health struggles because of “being away from friends and family” and because “it is harder to move around easily without a car and costs more to do so [in Hemel] than it does in London.” He then asks the council to confirm whether Stacey will be moved back to London and whether they can provide a timeframe to help her manage her anxiety.

Two weeks after the letter was sent, neither Stacey nor her therapist had received a response.

Lewisham did not respond to requests for comment about this either.

The government’s own data shows that the number of people becoming homeless and needing temporary housing is growing: 104,510 homeless households were living in temporary accommodation at the end of March this year. That’s a 25-year high and far greater than when the Conservatives took power in 2010.

The total number of children – 131,370 – in temporary accommodation is at the highest level since records began in 2004.

Social housing is scarce, and renting is more expensive than ever, meaning that there are fewer and fewer homes that are affordable to rent for people on low incomes because the government has frozen the Local Housing Allowance – which is how Housing Benefit is calculated – at 2019/20 levels.

Evictions and homelessness are rising, so some councils are resorting to out-of-area “temporary” placements more and more. But, the problem is that they are often anything but “temporary”. People can be housed “temporarily” for years with one woman reporting that she was in limbo for 11 years.

In the first quarter of 2023 alone, a total of 29, 940 households were living in temporary accommodation outside of their local area. However, this figure may not account for those people who were offered an “out of area” placement and declined or those who were moved back to their home area quickly.

The average household size is 2.4 people so, based on FOI data, those 29,940 households are likely to contain around 71,856 people. All of whom have been displaced.

The issue is particularly acute in the capital. FOI data shows that over 21,000 homeless households from London boroughs were placed in out-of-area temporary accommodation in the first quarter of this year alone.

These include some of England’s most vulnerable households – single parents, people with complex needs, children, people fleeing domestic abuse, and ex-offenders.

Bromley placed some homeless households as far as West Bromwich (160 miles away, or 3 hours by car) while Hillingdon placed households as far as Peterborough (100 miles away, or 2 hours by car).

In the year from 1 January 2022 to 30 October 2022, 26 local authorities including Newham, Birmingham, and Manchester placed an average 130 of households containing people classified as “vulnerable” in out-of-area accommodation. In Islington two-thirds of all out-of-borough placements were registered as vulnerable, in Milton Keynes and Sutton it was nearly half, and in Birmingham more than one in four.

Sixteen local authorities are placing ex-offenders as far as hundreds of miles away. In Hackney, one in five households placed out-of-area included ex-offenders; in Barnet, that figure is one in six.

Concerningly, council record-keeping was incredibly poor: in Lewisham, of the 384 households they placed out-of-area, they have no record of the offending history of three-quarters of them (284). Lewisham placed more households into temporary accommodation outside its own authority than within it.

Bromley, Newham, Birmingham, Manchester, Hackney, Sutton, Milton Keynes, Islington, and Lewisham councils all responded by saying that they were increasingly under strain due to rising homelessness and that though they endeavored to house people in their respective boroughs, it wasn’t always possible due to a lack of affordable housing.

​​Hackney Council cited “over a decade of austerity” and “the government’s continuous failure to tackle the root causes of the housing crisis alongside welfare cuts and reforms,” as a reason for housing shortages in their area.

Hillingdon Council did not respond to requests for comment.

However, FOI data also shows that out-of-area placements are not just a London problem, as homelessness is rising and social housing shortages are raging across England.

Placements by non-London authorities increased by 120 per cent over the last four years, from 2,540 households to 4,990 households. This is being led by local authorities in the North West and the South East.

Out-of-area placements from Manchester have increased by 75 per cent over the last four years, with 592 households housed out-of-area in the spring of 2018 compared with 1,037 households at the beginning of this year. This is the first time that an authority outside of London has breached 1,000 placements since data started being recorded.

A spokesperson for Manchester City Council said: “Pressure on temporary accommodation caused by demand relative to supply means that there are occasions when people have to be temporarily accommodated outside the immediate Manchester City Council area.”

“In making decisions about out-of-area placements we carefully consider the needs of households and individuals and prioritise those with the greatest needs – for example those receiving support from children’s services or psychiatric services – for temporary accommodation within the city. Support is also provided to anyone who is temporarily housed outside our boundaries,” they added.

Legislation (the Housing Act 1996) requires that local authorities give the council that they are placing a household in notice so that the people who have been moved to a new area can access services once there, such as social care or substance misuse services, as well as find schools for children.

However, despite the overwhelming number of vulnerable households affected by out-of-area placements, many authorities did not do so according to FOI responses.

Greenwich placed 970 households out-of-area between 1 January 2022 and 30 October 2022 but could only confirm that they had definitely notified receiving authorities on 191 occasions.

Greenwich did not respond to requests for comment about this.

The Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead placed 187 households out-of-area during the same period but could only confirm that they had definitely notified receiving authorities on 111 occasions.

A spokesperson for the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhea said that they “always endeavour to accommodate households within the Royal Borough,” but that “unfortunately that’s not always possible due to acute demand for temporary accommodation.”

“In circumstances where households are located outside of the borough, the council will notify the receiving authority and the notification process varies between local authorities,” they added.

37-year-old full-time carer Blessing (who asked to be identified by her first name only) found herself in a similar situation to Stacey earlier this year. She and her family were made homeless in May after a Section 21 eviction was served on them at their privately rented home in Plumstead Common, Woolwich.

“The landlord evicted everyone in the building,” Blessing said, “and we couldn’t afford to rent anything else in the area, so we were suddenly homeless.”

Blessing’s husband is a local council worker in west London. The couple has two children, a son aged 8 and a daughter, aged 5.

The family’s local council, Greenwich, initially moved them to a Travelodge in Croydon where they all shared one room before relocating them to temporary accommodation in Greenhithe, Dartford, Kent.

This was 15 miles, an hour’s drive in traffic or a two-hour bus away from Blessing’s children’s schools and support system. This posed a particular problem because her daughter is non-verbal and autistic and requires specialist teaching and support.

“My daughter struggles on the train so it is very difficult,” Blessing said. Her temporary flat in Greenhithe, like Stacey’s, has almost no furniture. “I have to take her on the bus. We leave the house at 7.30 in the morning and get home at 7.30 at night. The journey is stressful for me and the children.”

Another issue was that the home given to Blessing and her family in Greenhithe was on the top floor of a block of flats and had no outdoor space, this meant that her daughter was at risk of falling down the stairs and had to be carried up and down because of her complex needs.

During a visit to Blessing’s accommodation in Greenhithe, she also demonstrated that the window in her third-floor flat had a flimsy safety lock and expressed her anguish about her children falling out of it.

Like Stacey, when Blessing was offered the flat in Greenhithe she was told that she would forfeit future support and be making herself “intentionally homeless” if she declined.

“I am not here to demand [things] and I don’t expect [support] to be handed to me but I don’t like the way I’ve been treated,” Blessing said when I visited her in Kent. “If I didn’t have a child that had special needs I would be working full-time like my husband, but I can’t, I’m just stuck.”

Greenwich Council was contacted to ask why Blessing and her family were relocated to unsuitable accommodation so far away from their local support systems. The council said that the family was being moved back into the borough of Greenwich.

Blessing and her family are now living in Plumstead Common once again. “I’m happy,” Blessing said. “I can now get the children ready to start school again this autumn.”

“I feel like I’m not stuck in a box anymore, I can actually prepare for the future. I feel like I am gradually getting my life back,” Blessing said.

A spokesperson for Greenwich Council said: “There are 1,848 households living in temporary accommodation in the borough, and as demand significantly outweighs supply, this number is only growing. Due to the immense shortage of housing, we sometimes have to find solutions that are not always ideal.”

“We understand how important it is for children with complex needs and their families to have access to their established support networks, and we have now managed to find accommodation inside the borough for [Blessing] and her family.

Not everyone in Blessing’s situation will be so lucky. At the time of publication, Stacey was still awaiting news of what the future would hold for her and her children.

Worse still, 47-year-old single parent and mother of two Rim (who also asked to be identified by her first name only) is fighting to get any support at all. She was also evicted by a private landlord using Section 21 and could not find anything else she could afford in the area.

The Conservatives promised to ban the Section 21 evictions that have impacted Stacey, Blessing, and Rim in 2019. The legislation which will fulfill that promise has yet to make its way through Parliament.

Rim is no longer being helped by her local authority, the London Borough of Ealing, because she declined to move 230 miles away from her home – Hanwell in west London – to temporary accommodation in Halifax, west Yorkshire. This would have been more than a four-hour drive away from her children’s father who is involved with their care though the couple is no longer together.

“They have stopped my support,” she said.

Like Stacey, Rim doesn’t drive. The cost of an adult single train ticket from London to Halifax can be as much as £64.80 for a three-hour journey with a change at Leeds.

“[The council] told me if I refused the offer [in Yorkshire] that they would stop my rent and I would choose to be homeless,” Rim said, sitting on the sofa in the house of a friend where she is currently staying. “That’s exactly what they did.”

Rim is sharing a bedroom with her two children. It is crowded, bags and suitcases full of their belongings take up all of the space.

Before staying here, Rim and her children spent 18 months in a bed and breakfast in Southall, West London where they shared facilities including bathrooms with other people experiencing homelessness.

Rim says the experience has impacted her children’s health wellbeing: “My son was a top student but this disruption has impacted his [performance] at school and my daughter keeps getting urine infections, one was so bad that she was admitted to hospital for ten days.”

The stress has also taken such a toll on Rim that she was rushed to hospital with a suspected stroke.

“The council told me they could not offer me anything else,” Rim said. “I don’t know what to do and I am worried for my health, for my children’s health.”

Being forced to move away from your home area to temporary accommodation elsewhere would be disruptive and difficult for anyone. However, experts like Dr Reeve note that mothers in particular must manage the financial as well as emotional implications of separation from family and social networks, and distance from their children’s schools when they are housed outside of their home area.

There is a potential causal link between poor quality and unsuitable temporary accommodation and child mortality.

Data from an NHS-funded body – the National Child Mortality Database (NCMD) – has linked child homelessness and child deaths. Of the 6,970 child deaths that were reviewed between 1 April 2019 and 31 March 2022, at least 200 children were either homeless or living in temporary accommodation at some point in their lives, if not at the time of their death.

A spokesperson for Ealing Council said that they regarded the home in Halifax as “suitable” and noted that “Ealing – like most other London boroughs has a chronic shortage of housing that local people on average incomes can afford.”

They said: “In this particular case, the Council offered what it considers to be suitable accommodation based on the individual circumstances of the household and prevailing housing conditions locally. The household was offered a good quality private rented property but refused the offer. The household has asked the Council to reconsider, and we are currently reviewing this case and will contact the household once a decision has been made.”

At the time of publication, Rim had not received any updates on her situation.

This article was first published in the ‘i’ newspaper.