Chancellor Rachel Reeves has opted to keep local housing allowance (LHA) rates frozen at the autumn budget despite pleas from housing , homelessness and rent campaigners to peg housing benefit to record-high rents .

Local housing allowance determines the maximum amount of support that private renters on university credit or housing benefit can receive to cover their rental costs.

It is supposed to cover the bottom 30th percentile of market rents, but is rarely uplifted to reflect rising record-high rents. The Westminster government has frozen LHA rates in eight of the last 13 years, while rates have only been repegged to market rents in 2020 and 2024.

Reeves decided to continue with the freeze. That was perhaps no surprise – the government’s spending forecasts from the summer ass

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