Move follows campaign to update 1935 standard that counts kitchens as sleeping space
The government has agreed to make it possible to change the standard that measures whether or not a home is overcrowded.

The change appears to be in response to growing calls from the sector to change the outdated standard, which was set in 1935.

Junior housing minister Yvette Cooper made the announcement during a Conservative debate on housing in the House of Commons on Wednesday afternoon.

A campaign by Housing Today earlier this year highlighted the fact that the standard allows for living rooms and sometimes kitchens to be counted as acceptable sleeping space (HT 27 February, page 18). This means many families, even those sleeping four or five to a room, are not classed as overcrowded.

An ODPM spokesman said: "We are going to amend the bill to give us the power to change the present standard whenever we want. It is a case of getting the bill through parliament first and then seeing what we want to do next.

"The minister has yet to take a view on how urgently he wants to pursue this."

The announcement was accompanied by a document from the ODPM that called for research into the extent of the problem – estimated to affect 500,000 UK families.

The document, to be considered in next week's report stage of the Housing Bill, found it was difficult to draw conclusions into the impact of overcrowded living conditions on issues such as children's education and health.

This was because of the large number of variables that affect the situation and the wide number of definitions of overcrowding.

Andy Love, MP for Edmonton and long-time campaigner for the standard to be updated, said: "I'm delighted; this will help remove some of the misery for some of our most vulnerable families."

Source

Housing Today