Welfare Reform Bill

I thank the Minister for his considered replies to the concerns raised. It was good to be reminded how many young people have been taken out of unemployment; that is extremely good news. I am also grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, for explaining the Conservative Opposition’s position on this. One question which I did not raise but which I know my noble friend Lord Best would have done concerns housing availability. We have 100,000 homeless children living in temporary accommodation in this country—perhaps the highest level since records of this kind began. There is a tremendous shortageof housing, but one area where there is some degree of over-capacity is in single rooms, where people have invested in housing and new build and it has not proved as popular as they imagined it would be. Would this provide a possibility for more young people to get accommodation? On Second Reading, the noble Lord, Lord Skelmersdale, referred to his local newspaper, where he saw advertisements for housing stating, ““No DSS””. Clearly, where there is a great shortage of housing and landlords know that young people cannot give the same guarantee of payment as older people, that may well inhibit them from taking on young people. It will be interesting to hear the Government’s understanding of what will be the impact on opening access to accommodation to young people. Many young people whom I come across do not necessarily have the benefit of ““leaving care”” status, but they have serious problems. I mentioned the research undertaken by the Youth Justice Board on young people in custody on remand. They have such difficulties with the relationships with their peers and with their parents. Young people with whom I have worked over several months are difficult people to live with. One man of whom I can think is charming for much of the time but suddenly turns around and is very aggressive and intimidating to staff. Another young man is completely self-absorbed and would drive anyone crazy by talking about himself all the time. Some of those people might fall under the provision of supported housing. We shall come back to that and I look forward to discussing this further with the Minister. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.