Jeremy Hunt says ‘right to a house is a basic human right’ as he vows action to tackle homelessness

Jeremy Hunt has pledged to give homeless people immediate access to a permanent home if he becomes prime minister in a move which could get 1,000 extra people off the streets of Britain. 

The Foreign Secretary said rising homelessness in the UK was a ‘source of great shame’ as he set out a new plan to tackle the issue. 

Mr Hunt remains the overwhelming underdog in the race for Number 10 with Boris Johnson widely expected to secure an easy victory in the Tory leadership race and become PM on July 24. 

But Mr Hunt is still fighting for the votes of Tory Party members and today he set out his vision for compassionate conservatism. 

His plan to reduce homelessness would make it much easier for people to secure a place in permanent accommodation. 

As well as the guarantee of immediate or near immediate access to a place to live Hunt is also promising that vulnerable people would get ‘unconditional access to whatever treatment they need’. 

 The government has been under growing pressure to do more to tackle homelessness after statistics showed the number of people dying while sleeping rough was on the rise

The latest announcement builds on a housing plan which Mr Hunt unveiled earlier on in his campaign to succeed Theresa May. 

That plan included delivering 1.5 million new and cheap homes to help young people get onto the housing ladder. 

Setting out his ‘Housing First’ plans in an editorial written for the Big Issue magazine, Mr Hunt said the right combination of ‘money and political will’ would address an area in which ‘we can and must do better’. 

He said his approach would be based on the two principles that ‘housing is a basic human right’ and that tackling homelessness would result in other clinical and social issues also being resolved. 

He wrote: ‘It essentially means adopting the following approach.

‘Immediate or near immediate access to permanent accommodation for people on the streets without a housing readiness assessment. 

‘No preconditions of treatment access or engagement are required to get this accommodation. They get unconditional access to whatever treatment they need.’

The approach advocated by Mr Hunt has already been trialed in pilot programmes in the West Midlands, Liverpool and Manchester.  

But Mr Hunt said the UK does not have ‘time to wait’ for the pilots to conclude as he promised to commit an extra £30 million to expand them to London and at least two other cities. 

The Foreign Secretary said doing so ‘could help at least 1,000 people off the streets’ as he said he would also publish a long term strategy to tackle homelessness if he beats Mr Johnson. 

The government is under growing pressure to address the number of people living on Britain’s streets after statistics published at the end of last year painted a devastating picture of the UK’s homelessness crisis. 

A map produced by the ONS showed that the vast majority of homeless deaths took place in urban areas, where the majority of those who live on the streets are focused. Some 597 people died while homeless in 2017, the most recent year for which figures are available

The ONS figures showed that 105 out of 597 homeless deaths in England and Wales in 2017 took place in six council areas in some of the largest cities

Data published by the Office for National Statistics showed the number of homeless people dying in England and Wales had increased by a quarter over a five year period. 

Just shy of 600 deaths were recorded in 2017 alone with campaigners labelling the figures a ‘source of national shame’.

The data also showed that the problem of homelessness deaths was overwhelmingly concentrated in urban areas.

Out of the 597 deaths of homeless people in 2017, some 571 – or 95 per cent – happened in urban areas.

More than one in sixth deaths took place in just six of the 347 council areas in England and Wales, the figures showed.