Prime minister’s questions (PMQ’s) are never the most riveting of Parliamentary broadcasting but the session on 9 September 2026 came to life when Kemi Badenoch asked when and how the planned defence budget increase would be funded. She had said that a future Tory Government would cut housing benefit to do this.
The Prime Minister’s response was that national security cannot come at the expense of social security, and that the Tory party’s plans would lead to increased homelessness.
When Kemi Badenoch was interviewed the next day on the Radio 4 Today programme, she re-stated that a future Tory Government would cut £4m from housing benefit for private renters, and denied it would result in an increase in homelessness. She did make one worrying statement, that residents who couldn’t afford the rent anymore would have to move, just as home owners do, but with much less security.
What is housing benefit?
On average, housing costs are much higher for people who rent privately than for people with mortgages. So, residents who rent privately are able to apply for help to pay their rent if they are unemployed or on a low income.
Housing benefit for private renters is calculated through the Local Housing Allowance (LHA). LHA is intended to ensure the cheapest 30% of properties in any geographical area are affordable to people on low incomes. The benefit payable is capped at the LHA rate, which determines the amount of benefit available. This is based on market rents in the local rental market area, the size of the household, and the number of bedrooms allowed.
However, LHA has been frozen for eight out of the 10 years since 2016. The latest freeze has been against a backdrop of significant private rent increases, which have been outpacing earnings for almost two years. As rents have continued to increase, the gap between rent and housing benefit payable has grown. Fewer properties are affordable at LHA rates and more low-income renters have shortfalls between the benefit they receive and the rents they have to pay. Data from the homelessness charity Crisis confirms that only 2.7% of private rented homes across Great Britain are now affordable at LHA rates.
The impact of the current freeze and any future potential cuts is concerning. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation finds that nationally, if LHA had not been frozen between 2011 and 2025, private renters would have been on average £684 per year better off. And at the same time, rents have risen 19%, widening the shortfall. As a result, over that period, those households, among the poorest in Britain, have lost almost £5,000 each.
A local example
To take a local example. The 2021 census shows that in Broadland (Norfolk), where I live, 7,095 households (12.3%) were private renters (an increase from 10.3% in 2011). Over the decade, those on LHA in a 2–3 bed home here will have effectively ‘lost’ £7,000– £9,000. That is not a small sum for people living on, or below, the national minimum wage.
Broadland District Council’s recently published draft housing strategy shows this growing gap between rents and housing benefit. Private rents in the Broadland council area have risen on average 65% between 2015 and May 2026 while LHA rates have risen by less than 20%. Rents here average £692 for a 1-bedroom property, 2-bedroom £894, 3-bedroom £1,079 and 4-bedroom £1,550 per month.
So, for lower income households receiving housing benefit there is a significant, and growing, gap between housing benefit & actual rental costs. There is a shortfall of £103.62 per month for 1-bedroom homes to £403.14 per month for 4-bedroom homes.
In the low-wage economy of Norfolk, being in work doesn’t always provide the answer.
Yes, we need to invest in defence, but is making people poorer and homeless or saying they have to move home really what is acceptable and good politics? Surely, the state helping families avoid losing their home is social security at its most basic.
