Kensington
Egerton Crescent in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea was once named the most expensive British street to live on Getty

KEY POINTS

  • One in seven families in London's Kensington and Chelsea borough classified as homeless.
  • Charity Shelter condemns the "shocking" findings.

One in every seven families living in the wealthiest area of the UK is technically homeless, according to reports.

Homeless charity Shelter said a total of 1,441 families living in the London borough of Kensington and Chelsea are staying in temporary accommodation or places that are insecure, unsafe or could not "reasonably" be called a home.

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Overall, around 44,000 families in the capital are classed as homeless by Shelter, an increase of 46% over the past five years.

Among some of those homeless families include those displaced in the wake of the Grenfell Tower fire who still have not been permanently rehomed.

Polly Neate, CEO at Shelter told the Evening Standard: "It's shocking that one in every 24 families in London is homeless. Every day we help parents desperate to escape the cramped accommodation they're forced to raise their children in."

A spokesman for Kensington and Chelsea council said: "We're doing everything we can to prevent and combat homelessness, redoubling our efforts to increase the number of social homes despite being one of London's most built-up and expensive boroughs."

Elsewhere, it was recently revealed the number of people sleeping rough on the streets of England increased 15% to 4,751 – the highest figure since the current set of comparable records began in 2010.

According to figures released by Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, there were an estimated 617 more rough sleepers in autumn 2017 compared to the previous year.

Meg Hillier, chair of the Department for Communities and Local Government, has previously said that the government had been "unacceptably complacent" in its attempts at reducing the number of rough sleepers.

Grenfell Tower