Homeless families moved out of hotels in Cornwall

About 130 people living in emergency accommodation in hotels have been moved out to make way for paying customers according to a council.

Cornwall Council said it had faced "exceptional pressures" on housing as a result of the Covid pandemic.

Olly Monk, the council's cabinet member for housing, said hotels which had housed people now "want to get back to normality" for a busy summer season.

He said the "vast majority" of people had been rehomed.

Mr Monk, Conservative councillor for Newquay Trenance, said the pressure on accommodation was only expected to worsen during the summer.

He said: "We're already at crisis point and we're trying to avert a disaster."

In March 2020 at the beginning of the pandemic the government announced a scheme to give accommodation to all rough sleepers.

The councillor said people in need of emergency accommodation had been housed in hotels for large parts of the coronavirus crisis but only under rolling short-term contracts.

He said: "Because June is very, very busy hotels are turning round to us and saying they want to get back to normality.

"I guess they have decided they can make more money by going back to their normal business model."

Mr Monk did not name the hotels involved but said it had affected families across Cornwall.

An estimated 120,000 visitors were in Cornwall over the bank holiday weekend, Visit Cornwall said.

Cornwall is also hosting the G7 summit from 11-13 June but Mr Monk said that was not directly related to the shortage in accommodation.

Cornwall Council said the number of households in temporary accommodation more than doubled in 2020.

There are understood to be about 1,000 people in need of temporary or emergency accommodation in the county.

Mr Monk said the crisis developed over the past week as England continued to move out of lockdown and with half-term holidays for many schools.

He said the "vast majority" of people had been rehoused with fewer than 10 people "making their own arrangements" such as staying with family or friends.

The Conservatives took over the running of Cornwall Council in May from an Independent and Liberal Democrat coalition.

Homeless woman Diane Perry has been sleeping in her car since Friday after having to leave a Newquay hotel where homeless people like her were being accommodated.

"I have had to sleep across the front seats because the back is full up with bits and pieces," she said.

"They said I was supposed to go out of county but I'm not going out of the county because I'm Cornish."

Cornwall Council said it was investing more than £40m and had acquired more than 100 properties to increase capacity for emergency, long-term and specialist accommodation.

It said a purpose-built hub for rough sleepers would open in November with accommodation for 11 people and it would be using funding from the government's Next Steps Accommodation Fund to provide homes and fund support workers.

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