Benefit changes may harm children

In last month's emergency Budget, it was announced that housing benefit will be capped at £400 a week for a four-bedroom home and £340 for a three-bedroom property to shave £1.8bn off the annual benefits bill.

However, Family Action warns this will leave the most vulnerable families, particularly those in London where a parent has a mental health illness, at risk of eviction. It is also feared such housing concerns could exacerbate parents' mental health problems and heighten child protection worries.

Families finding themselves unable to make up the shortfall in rent could find themselves classed as "intentionally homeless" or forced to move across council boundaries. This will make it harder for social workers and other children's professionals to support them, the charity adds.

Rhian Beynon, head of policy, said: "Constant upheaval of families with children at risk because of rental prices will make it much harder for social services and organisations like us to keep track of these families.

"It also makes it harder to establish communities of concern around children and to make child safeguarding everyone's concern in the way the government is urging us to do."

Housing problems and movement across council boundaries were a major factor in the child protection failures highlighted in the Victoria Climbie inquiry.

More recently, a serious case review into the death of four-year-old Chloe Fletcher in Wirral, who was killed by her mentally ill mother, highlighted the impact of the families' housing problems on the deterioration of the mother's mental health.

Beynon added that among many of the 45,000 families the charity supports, poor quality and overcrowded accommodation is already a major concern.

A spokeswoman for housing charity Shelter says it is concerned that the most vulnerable families, including those with mental health problems, will be affected by the housing benefit changes.

She said: "Many families are going to struggle to make up the shortfall in paying rent, which will put an enormous strain on them."

Last week, London Councils estimated that 18,645 households in London could be forced to leave their homes as a result of the housing benefit changes.