Category Archives: Communities

Millions cannot afford to heat homes as UK faces Arctic cold snap

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As temperatures plunge, fears grow for households struggling to pay for heating, food and warm clothing

More than 3 million low-income UK households cannot afford to heat their homes, according to research, as a “dangerously cold” weather front arrived from the Arctic.

The UK Health Security Agency has issued a cold weather alert recommending vulnerable people warm their homes to at least 18C, wear extra layers and eat hot food to protect themselves from plummeting temperatures.

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Arctic air to boost demand for warm spaces as archbishop urges people not to despair

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Justin Welby says too many people face ‘real hardship and pain’ as temperatures fall and bills rise

A surge of Arctic air causing sub-zero temperatures across the UK is poised to send demand for warm spaces surging, and the archbishop of Canterbury has urged people not to despair in the face of “real hardship and pain”.

The weather system moving quickly south from Norway, nicknamed the Troll of Trondheim, will result in colder weather for at least a week, the Met Office has forecast, as a network of “warm hubs” said it had seen 80,000 people use its facilities in the last week.

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Landlord admits it made assumptions about family in mouldy Rochdale flat

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Rochdale Boroughwide Housing says ‘we got that wrong’ after two-year-old killed by exposure to mould

The landlord of the flat lived in by a two-year-old boy who died because of long-term exposure to mould has admitted it made false assumptions about his family’s lifestyle when they raised complaints.

Awaab Ishak’s parents, who originally came from Sudan, last week accused Rochdale Boroughwide Housing (RBH) of racism over its handling of the damp and fungus they faced. The landlord failed to fix the mould or improve ventilation despite complaints and had suggested issues such as bathing habits and cooking techniques might be a cause when they were not.

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More black people than white find stop and search humiliating, UK survey finds

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Poll shows levels of trust in the police markedly lower among black people than white people

More than half of black people stopped and searched by the police say they were left with feelings of humiliation or embarrassment, according to a survey.

It also shows levels of trust in the police are markedly lower among black people (46%) than white people (64%), with barely a third (35%) of black Caribbean people saying they had confidence.

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Phoenix could see deadliest year for heat deaths after sweltering summer

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With 22 days hitting 110F or higher, suspected heat deaths in the Arizona capital topped 450

Extreme heat contributed to as many as 450 deaths in the Phoenix area this summer, in what could be the deadliest year on record for the desert city in Arizona.

The medical examiner for Maricopa county, which includes Phoenix, has so far confirmed 284 heat-related deaths, while investigations into 169 more suspected heat fatalities are ongoing. The highest number of deaths – and emergency hospital visits – coincided with the hottest days and nights.

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Buy-to-let landlords facing financial cliff edge after mini-budget

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Mortgage market meltdown has left many amateur landlords facing a stark choice: to raise rents or sell up

Britain’s amateur landlords have benefited from years of runaway house price inflation, while intense competition among tenants has sent rents soaring. Now, thanks to the meltdown in the mortgage market triggered by last week’s disastrous mini-budget, many face a financial cliff edge.

Figures shared with the Guardian show that the number of new buy-to-let mortgage deals available has plummeted by 55% in less than a week as lenders frantically pulled products and in many cases increased prices.

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Services for county lines victims in England and Wales get funding boost

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Up to £5m allocated to help young people escape drug gangs, with money also going to helpline

Up to £5m has been allocated by the Home Office to support victims of county lines exploitation over the next three years.

Hundreds of victims will be helped to escape drug gangs following the expansion of support services in London, the West Midlands, Merseyside and Greater Manchester.

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Bring back eviction ban or face ‘catastrophic’ homelessness crisis, ministers told

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Sir Bob Kerslake calls on government to protect at-risk tenants as it did during pandemic

The former head of the civil service has warned of a looming “catastrophic” homelessness crisis caused by the cost of living unless the government reintroduces the eviction ban that protected tenants during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Sir Bob Kerslake, who chairs the Kerslake Commission on Homelessness and Rough Sleeping, said a failure to act “could see this become a homelessness as well as an economic crisis and the results could be catastrophic; with all the good achieved in reducing street homelessness since the pandemic lost, and any hope of the government meeting its manifesto pledge to end rough sleeping by 2024 gone”.

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London council could seize oligarchs’ homes for affordable housing

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Exclusive: Westminster looking at compulsory purchase orders to tackle laundering of ‘dirty money’

Homes acquired with “dirty money” in the richest parts of London could be seized and turned into affordable housing under plans to crack down on oligarchs using Belgravia, Knightsbridge and Mayfair “to rinse their money”.

Labour-controlled Westminster city council is examining the use of compulsory purchase orders in extreme cases where it finds properties are not being used for their stated purpose, as part of a push to “combat the capital’s reputation as the European centre for money laundering”.

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More ‘banking hubs’ to open across UK to tackle branch and ATM closures

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Additional 13 hubs will bring total to 25, where customers of almost any bank can carry out transactions

More shared “banking hubs” are to be rolled out across the UK to help communities hit by branch and ATM closures to get continued access to cash.

A banking hub is a shared service that operates in a similar way to a standard branch, with a counter service run by Post Office staff where customers of almost any bank can withdraw and deposit cash, make bill payments and carry out regular transactions.

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Woman shot dead at home in Liverpool seven years after brother killed

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Tributes were paid to council worker Ashley Dale, 28, who police believe was killed in a mistaken identity attack

Tributes have been paid to a 28-year-old woman who was shot dead in her home in Liverpool in the early hours of Sunday, seven years after her brother was also fatally shot.

Ashley Dale was shot in the back garden of her home in what is believed by police to have been a mistaken identity attack. Her younger brother, Lewis Dunne, was killed in 2015 at age 16 after a gang mistook him for a rival gang member. Their deaths are not believed to be connected.

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Tory contest shows government levelling up agenda is dead, Lisa Nandy to say

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Shadow minister to say PM hopefuls are vying ‘for the mantle of Margaret Thatcher, promising tax cuts for the wealthy’

The shadow communities secretary, Lisa Nandy, will claim the Conservative leadership contest has shown the government’s commitment to levelling up is dead, as she announces plans to give local communities the right to buy up assets such as empty shops.

Nandy will use a speech in Darlington to say Labour would press ahead with handing power to communities outside London and the south-east in an attempt to rebalance the UK’s economy.

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Gang warfare traps thousands in Haiti slum as fuel crisis add to desperation

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Calls for aid to be let into Port-au-Prince district after ‘battlefield’ violence leaves dozens dead and cuts supplies of food and water

Haiti’s capital has been racked by a week of heavy fighting between gangs, with the global medical charity Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) warning that thousands of people were trapped without food or water in one district of Port-au-Prince’s notorious Cité Soleil slum.

“We are calling on all belligerents to allow aid to enter Brooklyn and to spare civilians,” said Mumuza Muhindo, the MSF’s head of mission in Haiti, in a statement referring to the contested area within the sprawling Cité Soleil.

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Birmingham communities feel ‘ignored’ by Commonwealth Games bosses

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Exclusive: panel says organisers have failed to engage city’s diverse groups in a meaningful way

Organisers of the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham have left diverse communities feeling “largely ignored” and have failed to engage them in a meaningful way, according to a report.

The Birmingham Race Impact Group (BRIG) commissioned a panel of race equality practitioners and consultants to assess the Games in a number of areas including legacy, community engagement and procurement.

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Homes for Ukraine: refugees being left homeless, UK community groups warn

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Fears system could crash entirely amid growing reports of people being made to leave by sponsors

Growing numbers of refugees are being made homeless, and in many cases destitute, after relationship breakdowns with their Homes for Ukraine hosts in the UK, community organisations have said.

Some predict the system could crash entirely after reports of Ukrainian refugees being asked to leave the homes of their sponsors with only one day’s notice, leaving them with no option but to be referred to local authorities as homeless or, if they can afford to, attempt to seek last-minute rented accommodation.

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‘Painful choices’ remain over tribute to Grenfell Tower victims

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A memorial garden is the most popular option but families and the community have different views on the future of the tower

Bereaved relatives of those killed in the Grenfell Tower fire and the community living in its shadow are struggling to agree on the best way to commemorate the disaster.

Next month marks five years since a fire engulfed the tower block in North Kensington, west London, killing 72 people.

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Promote safety benefits of low-traffic schemes, Boardman tells councils

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Head of Active Travel England says aim is to give neighbourhoods back what has been taken away

Councils should face down rows over low-traffic neighbourhoods by reframing the debate in terms of livable streets that children can use safely, the head of England’s walking and cycling watchdog has argued as it unveiled its first raft of projects.

Chris Boardman, the former Olympic cyclist who heads Active Travel England (ATE), has promised his organisation will help local authorities navigate culture wars and media controversies over traffic schemes, along with carrying out its core role of ensuring good design.

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No-fault evictions: 200,000 renters in England served notices in three years

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Shelter says a private tenant is handed notice every seven minutes despite government promise to ban practice in April 2019

More than 200,000 private renters have been served eviction notices without doing anything wrong in the three years since the government first promised to ban the practice, housing campaigners have claimed.

Every seven minutes a tenant has been landed with a no-fault eviction notice since Theresa May’s Conservative government first committed to scrap them in April 2019, according to research by Shelter, the housing charity.

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Councils in England are failing to use new powers to block shoddy housing schemes

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Research by UCL finds cash-strapped local authorities in the south-west, Midlands and north less likely to challenge developers

Housebuilders are churning out substandard housing schemes with poor living conditions despite councils having the power to block them, according to new research.

The National Planning Policy Framework was amended in July to allow councils to refuse “development that is not well designed”. A study by University College London found that the Planning Inspectorate, which hears housebuilders’ appeals, is now three times as likely to back councils who reject developments on design grounds. But it also found that the vast majority of those blocked were in the south-east, suggesting that elsewhere councils were not using the new powers.

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Firms that refuse to fund cladding repairs could face trading ban

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Uncooperative developers to be threatened with loss of planning permission by Michael Gove

Developers that are refusing to contribute to the fund set up to fix dangerous cladding will be warned this week they could be blocked from selling new homes.

The levelling up secretary, Michael Gove, will explicitly threaten retaliation, citing powers in the building safety bill that would stop uncooperative developers getting planning permission.

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