Thousands of children face Christmas without a home as number in temporary accommodation at record high
The number of households and children in temporary accommodation in England has hit “shameful” record highs, with nearly 139,000 children living without a permanent home, according to new figures.
Government statistics on homelessness show that between April and June this year, 105,750 households were in temporary accommodation – a new high since records began 25 years ago and an increase of 10.5% compared with the end of June last year.
Overall, 64.4% of households in temporary accommodation included dependent children, with 138,930 living in temporary accommodation – up from 131,500 at the end of March.
Housing charity Shelter said the figures showed the country had hit “yet another shameful record in the housing emergency” as it warned that nearly 139,000 children were now “facing spending Christmas without a safe and secure place to call home”.
Other figures published by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) showed a total of 73,660 households were assessed as needing help from their local authority due to being homeless or threatened with homelessness.
Of the 34,850 households that were assessed as being threatened with homelessness, 6,640 households had been issued with a Section 21 notice, also known as a no-fault eviction notice, which the government promised to ban in its landmark Renters Reform Bill.
Meanwhile, there were less than 9,000 new-build homes for social rent available in the latest financial year.
It came as yet another council in Scotland declared a housing emergency, blaming, in part, failures with the UK’s asylum system.
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Shelter chief executive Polly Neate blamed “decades of failure to build enough social homes combined with record-high private rents” and said many are facing “months or even years in temporary accommodation, where their lives are stuffed into cardboard boxes and they can be forced to move at the drop of a hat”.
Rick Henderson, CEO at Homeless Link, said the statistics were “shocking”.
“The cost of providing temporary accommodation is crippling local authorities across the country, to the extent that some are filing for bankruptcy and others are on the verge of going under,” he said.
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Sarah-Jane Mee speaks to a woman who received an eviction order and became homeless.
“At the same time, the people living in temporary accommodation, including over one hundred thousand children, too often experience very poor conditions such as overcrowding and severe mould and damp.
“Cleary this situation cannot continue. In the long-term, whoever forms the next government must build the 90,000 social homes per year we need, so people have affordable, secure homes to live in.”
The government has promised to ban Section 21 notices through the Renters Reform Bill, but the pledge could face long delays after Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove told Tory backbenchers he would not enact the policy until courts have been reformed.
He made the concession to Tory backbenchers – some of who own properties themselves – following reports they considered the measure as “un-Conservative” and “anti-landlord”.
But Tom Darling, campaign manager for the Renters’ Reform Coalition, said the statistics were “yet another reminder of the urgency of abolishing Section 21 evictions – which are a key driver of homelessness, as well as a source of constant insecurity for millions of tenants”.
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Matt Downie, the chief executive of Crisis, said the level of social homes being built is “a disgrace” and accused the government of a “failure to address the chronic shortage of genuinely affordable homes”.
A total of 63,605 affordable homes were completed across England in the year to March 2023, which the government said was a 7% increase on the previous 12 months and the highest delivery since 2014-15.
A DLUHC spokesperson said it is spending £2bn over three years “as part of a cross-government strategy to build homes for rough sleepers, give financial support for people to find a new home, and prevent evictions”.
They said the government has a “multi-billion pound programme to build thousands of new affordable homes, with a large number for social rent” and referred to progress of the Renters Reform Bill through parliament and the unfreezing of the Local Housing Allowance from April, announced in last week’s autumn statement.
Acting US Attorney for the Eastern District of New York (EDNY) John Durham has departed as President Donald Trump’s pick takes control of the office.
In a May 5 notice, the US Attorney’s Office for EDNY said Joseph Nocella will serve as interim US Attorney for the region for 120 days or until a Senate-confirmed nominee assumes the role. Nocella’s appointment came as jury selection began in the criminal trial of Braden John Karony, the former CEO of crypto firm SafeMoon.
It’s unclear how the advancement of Nocella, appointed by US President Donald Trump this month, could affect prosecutors’ case against Karony, who faces charges of securities fraud conspiracy, wire fraud conspiracy, and money laundering conspiracy. Nocella said he intended to help prosecute “narcotics-traffickers, gang members, terrorists, human-traffickers and other criminals.”
The former SafeMoon CEO asked the court in February to consider pushing back the start of the trial based on “significant changes” Trump had proposed affecting US securities laws, potentially impacting his criminal case.
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Though not as well known for criminal cases involving high-profile figures in the crypto industry, the Eastern District of New York has been responsible for overseeing cases against individuals tied to digital assets, including a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) complaint against Hex founder Richard Heart and fraudsters.
Its neighboring district, the Southern District of New York, will oversee the sentencing of former Celsius CEO Alex Mashinsky on May 8. Jay Clayton, a Wall Street insider and the former chair of the SEC, became the interim US Attorney for the district in April.
Criminal trial to start on May 6
SafeMoon’s Karony, Kyle Nagy, and Thomas Smith were charged in November 2023 for “diverted and misappropriated millions of dollars’ worth” of the platform’s SFM token between 2021 and 2022. Karony has pleaded not guilty to all charges and has been free on a $3 million bond since February 2024.
In a May 5 filing, Karony agreed to have jury selection for his trial proceed under US Magistrate Judge James Cho. District Judge Eric Komitee is expected to oversee the trial starting on May 6.
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US President Donald Trump’s crypto businesses are drawing increased scrutiny on Capitol Hill and beginning to influence the progress of US digital asset legislation. As Republican lawmakers in the US House of Representatives unveiled their draft of a digital asset market structure bill on May 5, Democrats prepared for a united response to Donald Trump’s deepening connections with the industry.
Speaking to Cointelegraph on May 5, a Democratic staffer with knowledge of the matter said that House Financial Services Committee Ranking Member Maxine Waters planned to lead some members of her party out of a Republican-led hearing discussing digital assets. The May 6 hearing, entitled “American Innovation and the Future of Digital Assets” and led by Committee Chair French Hill, could address draft legislation proposed by Republican lawmakers to establish a crypto market regulatory structure.
In a May 5 statement, Rep. Hill and three top Republicans unveiled the draft bill, which could clarify the treatment of digital assets by the US’s financial regulators: the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). Hill and others echoed some of Trump’s talking points on crypto — e.g, making the US a “crypto capital of the world” — suggesting deference to the president’s previously announced policies.
The draft bill included a provision requiring the SEC and CFTC to issue joint rules defining digital commodities. According to the text, transactions involving digital commodities “shall be deemed not to be an offer or sale of an investment contract” as long as the purchaser did not have “an ownership interest or other interest in the revenues, profits, or assets.”
According to the Democratic staffer, rules required all members of the House Financial Services Committee to agree to move forward with the digital asset hearing, suggesting that Waters intended to block the Republican-controlled event and conduct a shadow hearing to explore Trump’s and his family’s ties to the crypto industry. At least nine Democrats have reportedly considered a similar move to oppose a proposed stablecoin bill in the Senate.
Calls for impeachment, criticism from both sides
Some members of Congress have already called for Trump’s impeachment after he offered the opportunity for some of his top memecoin holders to tour the White House and attend a private dinner. In addition to the memecoin, the president’s family has backed the firm World Liberty Financial, which recently launched its own stablecoin, and an Abu Dhabi-based investment firm used the USD1 stablecoin to settle a $2 billion investment in Binance.
Related: US Senator calls for Trump impeachment, cites memecoin dinner
Waters, according to the staffer, requested that Hill and Republicans amend any proposed legislation to explicitly prevent potential conflicts of interest in which Trump could personally enrich himself through crypto ventures. Cointelegraph reached out to Hill’s office but did not receive a response at the time of publication. The Arkansas lawmaker reportedly said in March that the Trump family’s involvement in the crypto industry makes related legislation “more complicated.”
Republican lawmakers in the United States currently have control of the House, Senate, and presidency. At least two senators supportive of Trump have criticized his memecoin dinner, hinting that the president was selling access to his office. It’s unclear at the time of publication who among the memecoin holders could attend the May 22 dinner in person.
Magazine: Trump’s crypto ventures raise conflict of interest, insider trading questions
This is a developing story, and further information will be added as it becomes available.
Asset manager VanEck has asked US regulators for permission to list an exchange-traded fund (ETF) holding BNB, the native token of Binance’s BNB Chain, regulatory filings show.
The ETF is designed to accumulate spot BNB (BNB) tokens and “may, from time to time, stake a portion of the [fund’s] assets through one or more trusted staking providers,” according to the ETF’s S-1 prospectus. The filing marks the first time an asset manager has filed for a BNB ETF in the United States.
The BNB token has a market capitalization of roughly $84 billion, according to data from CoinMarketCap. As of May 5, BNB stakers earn a yield of approximately 2.5%, according to data from Stakingrewards.com.
Binance’s BNB Chain is among the most popular smart contract networks, with a total value locked (TVL) of nearly $6 billion, according to data from DefiLlama.
Related: Binance co-founder CZ proposes Bitcoin, BNB for Kyrgyzstan reserves
Bitcoin’s “spillover” effect?
The filing comes days after Binance co-founder Changpeng “CZ” Zhao reportedly said he expects the popularity of Bitcoin (BTC) ETFs to eventually “spill over” into altcoins.
“This cycle so far has been the ETFs. And it’s almost all Bitcoin. Ether hasn’t had as much success but Bitcoin success will spill over to the others eventually,” CZ reportedly said during the Token2049 conference in Dubai.
Spot Bitcoin ETFs attracted net inflows of more than $40 billion since launching in January of 2024, according to data from Farside Investors.
VanEck’s filing is the newest in a flurry of filings seeking to list ETFs holding altcoins.
The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has acknowledged dozens of cryptocurrency ETF proposals since US President Donald Trump took office on Jan. 20.
They include plans for ETFs holding native layer-1 tokens such as Solana (SOL) as well as memecoins such as Dogecoin (DOGE).
VanEck has filed to list other cryptocurrency ETFs over the past few months, including funds holding Solana and Avalanche (AVAX).
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