Cornwall and Scotland’s homeless children expose the limits of temporary accommodation

Cornwall’s temporary-accommodation caseload rose from 250 households before the pandemic to 912 in March 2025, an increase of 264.8%, with many of those households including children.¹ That should put permanent homes at the centre of the housing debate prompted by Home Truths. A family’s emergency placement should mark the start of a route out of homelessness, rather than become the destination.

Scotland provides an equally clear warning: a record 10,715 children were in temporary accommodation at the end of March.² Among couples with children whose homelessness cases closed in 2025–26, the average stay was 406 days, compared with 237 days for households overall.² Another 1,350 households with children had spent more than two years there.²

Call accommodation temporary for long enough and the label starts to obscure the policy question. What does an emergency housing system owe children when their stay stretches across school years? A roof is essential. It should also be the minimum standard, not the measure of success.

These reports deserve to be read together. Cornwall’s expanding caseload and Scotland’s prolonged family stays reveal different dimensions of the same institutional challenge.¹² Governments should be accountable for both the households entering temporary accommodation and their ability to leave it for a secure home.

The response should put permanent affordable housing alongside immediate shelter and support. Councils need the means to prevent homelessness and secure lasting homes; ministers should be judged on whether those routes work. Announcing emergency capacity cannot substitute for demonstrating that families can move on.

The broader argument about housing failure in wealthy countries needs this discipline: follow the household beyond the initial placement. Count children’s time in temporary accommodation as seriously as the availability of a bed. Prosperity should be judged partly by whether a family can secure somewhere stable to live.