“Councils are playing checkers with people’s lives”, says Ross Kemp, in his new ITV documentary revealing how vulnerable families are moved outside of their boroughs just to keep a roof over their heads.
Kemp was named a Big Issue Changemaker for 2020 after his award-winning Living With series brought mainstream attention to the problem of counting rough sleepers last year.
Tonight he turns his attentions to homelessness once more, revealing the stories of some of the 24,000 people left with little choice but to move sometimes hundreds of miles from where they live because the housing crisis means that their local authority has no place to offer them.
Kemp’s investigation found that northern cities such as Bradford have received at least 290 households from 31 different boroughs over the last two years. The influx of families from London, Kent and Essex is putting pressure on services and schools to meet demand.
And 60 councils have failed to inform other local authorities that they are housing people in their area, despite a legal duty do so. The widespread practice has seen 28,000 households moved out of their boroughs every year, moving a total distance of more than 350,000 miles in the last two years.
The programme, which was filmed before and during the Covid-19 lockdown, tells the stories of Jade and William – two neighbours who live in a former insurance office block on an industrial estate in Wimbledon despite hailing from Tower Hamlets on the other side of London.
