There has been a lot in The Argus recently about the increasing level of homelessness because of the low rate of housing benefit.
It was a stated aim of this Government to change the way housing benefit levels were to be calculated in order to reduce the then rapidly-rising national housing benefit bill.
Tenants were supposed to negotiate lower rents with landlords. This works in Nottingham, Hull and Hastings, where there are more properties than tenants.
Increasing rents are not the problem - the problem is that housing benefit is always 15-20 per cent short of the market rent. The Southern Private Landlords' Association, through the National Federation of Residential Landlords, has repeatedly explained this at government level but the advice we offered has been ignored.
-Barry Cocum, Marketing Manager, Southern Private Landlords' Association, Brighton
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