Families face eviction as ministers tackle £17 billion rental bill

Ministers are to crack down on excessive housing benefit payments in a series of reforms designed to curb the increasing £17 billion annual rental bill. Yvette Cooper, the work and pensions secretary, plans to cap the highest rates paid to private landlords — as much as £1,800 a week — to stop families on benefit living in palatial homes at the taxpayers’ expense. The reforms are expected to save hundreds of millions of pounds a year, but could result in hundreds of families being evicted from expensive accommodation with six months’ notice. The housing benefit bill, which covers rents in the private and social sector, has jumped from £11 billion in 1998 to £17.4 billion in 2008-09 and goes to 4.5 million claimants. The Treasury has forecast that this will rise to £20 billion by 2011 because of the recession, rising private rents and a critical shortage of social housing. The average rent in social housing is only £72 a week against £108 in the private sector.