scotland is pausing action after the government now on bbc news — panorama. tonight on panorama: the struggle to afford a home. if you have to sell it, you have to sell it. that is tough, isn't it? yes, it is. it has been quite hard. rising mortgage rates and rents are hitting homeowners and tenants hard. there was noise - coming from the hole. that's when i got my. phone out and i started to record. wow! millions are trapped in miserable conditions. i could put arm to arm to the walls, you know. that's how small it is.

and more families are being forced out. what does that due to the children? that is not fair to make them jump to all those places. could you live like that? why should they live like that, it is not fair. a house isn'tjust bricks and mortar. it's a home, somewhere to build a life. a house isn'tjust bricks and mortar. it's a home, somewhere to build a life. you'll make this as the front room, livingroom. the kids, obviously, spend lots of times on here. a midwife who can't

afford to keep the family home. so the christmas tree would go here, would it? in the month i have quite a toll ceiling. 2a years of christmas trees there? vicky has worked for the nhs for 14 yea rs. she brought up her two boys in this home in the london suburbs. they've now grown up but they still live at home. your lads, they were kids at that table. yeah, and it has been a good house for us. i got this lovely garden. vicky is on a track mortgage so it goes up or down with interest rates. when they were little in the summer and so pleased to have a big swing and slide under trampoline and a swimming pool the £320,000 mortgages interest only.

this year, they keep us make payments have risen from £300 to £850 a month so she has decided to sell. obviously, the interest rates have started to creep up again. it's gone up quite a lot, so i need to sell it because otherwise i'm going to end up paying probably £1000 and interest. that keeps going up more than i can't afford it. it isjust finding things, can i do it that way? can i do it that way? you know. those are big decisions. you might have had sleepless nights as i think that worrying about it. when he saw the interest rates rising started to physically affect you ? in the market is terrifying commercially. have a good job, i work hard but even having that salaries still pity me in that situation. how's that affected you? made over the emotional. sometimes i could just get

emotional no reason. it is not for the want to sell it but, a stage where you have to. it is tough, isn't it? yeah, it is. yeah, it has been quite hard. interest rates have been increased this year to try to control inflation. putting pressure on the uk's already creaking housing market. september's mini budget pushed it deeper into crisis. this year, fixed—rate mortgages have gone up from two to 6%. it is not the sole of the people at the very bottom of the housing system now who are struggling. it also increasing numbers of people who would previously have regarded themselves as secure and comfortable are struggling to meet

their housing costs. housing touches everything. it is so important to our society and our economy. the number of families urban form because people are unable to leave home and move in with a loved one and for the people who don't see housing is important, i would say, just look around, it is absolutely fundamental to our economy and our society. it is notjust buying. the rental market is under pressure as well. rents were already rising because of a shortage of homes. higher mortgage costs are pushing them up further. the landlords we have spoken to have interest only mortgages are there seen them increase in the good think about how they're going to meet that payment and those of the landlords who are starting to think about how they might pass those costs on

increasing the rent. this is a nurse facing eviction. she and her partner have for school age kids. they've lived in this bristol hells for ten years and pay house for ten years and pay £950 a month rent. but the landlord says that's far below the market rate and the house needs to be renovated. so the landlord has issued a section 21 eviction notice. no fault, no blame, just a date to get out. december 15. you just think, what are you meant to do? we've got four children. how do we find somewhere in eight weeks? it is not long enough. to then look for somewhere

alongside working and managing the children and how do you financially find that money to do it? they both work full—time. she is a ward manager in the nhs and he works nights in a warehouse. despite earning £60,000 a year between them, they say they can't afford another place like this. it is £1800 a month per three bedroomed house in bristol. thus the majority of my wages. that's all a bit. that's all of it. my aim in life is to put a save roof over my children's heads. i've worked really hard to earn money to make sure my children are safe and i wanted to be able to provide from them and even though i'm doing this i can't maintain their safety. they are looking at be homeless. is that what you think might happen? yeah, because we don't have any other option. her family is not alone.

like her, 20,000 households face homelessness after receiving a 21 eviction notice in england last year. evictions went down during the pandemic but now they are rising. the number of inventors forced out by their landlords has more than doubled in the past year. there is widespread fear amongst tenants that they could be evicted for a section 21 notice through no fault of their own. i feel sad, to be honest. i think the housing system is dysfunctional. it creates poverty for people. and lots of people live in very vulnerable situations and sadly i think the numbers of people living in those situations is only going to increase. once you're out, it can be hard finding a new place to live.

the high cost of buying a home means more people are renting. here in leeds, rents have risen 10% in the past year. which property was it, sorry? is that the two bed at 850 a month? fantastic. can i just ask you is living at the property. there can be dozens of people competing when new rental properties come on the market. more often than not, we do block viewing so we will go to a property in show six different people round and we do cap the viewing set 6—8 per day otherwise itjust gets too much, you're showing 20 around the property and only one person can take it. some people coming for viewing are desperate. it is so busy at the minute. we are seeing rent increases the demand keeps

getting higher and higher. we have seen tenants being priced out of the market and what we have seen, actually, is a huge increase in tenants wanting room shares because the pricing is a bit more affordable for them. there is a darker side to the housing market. when tenants are desperate, landlords might cut corners. this is georgina. she is living in a flat that's falling apart. here we go, you can immediately see it. a massive chunk of the ceiling has just come down. the 27—year—old graphic designer has been living here in birmingham for two years. it was about a month after i moved in. i was in bed and i could hearthe rain and i

thought it sounded really nice and very loud and then i realised, that was because the rain was inside. georgina fixed the first hole with tape last year. her repairs held firm until the middle of the night two months ago. there was noise coming from the hole, which is a sentence i would never thought i would have said. and then i started to hear cracks and at that point, when i heard the cracks, that is when i got my phone out and they started to record. wow. oh, my god. that is extraordinary. she pays £580 a month for the flat. it's now effectively a bedsit. she can only use the lounge.

what's been the worst bit? the fact that it is damp, it is cold and they don't want to heat, light, when there isjust cold air coming out of this hole, so i'm layering up but my stuff is going mouldy. it is with the damp. georgina's landlords are renovating the top floor. they say they want to fix georgina's flat but no one answered the door when they called. georgina says she has asked them to fix the ceiling and they haven't. you could potentially face a winter here? yes, yeah, yeah. what is that prospect like? ithink... ithink, right now, i'm just living on nothing, that is what i do. i think i shut that door and focus on

heating where i am, which is not very much of a life, is it? the figures show a third of. the private rented sector is in disrepair. some of the demand is pushing downwards into what _ i would call the shadow part| of the private rented sector. so we might see some than those i without good quality properties i at all also able to find - tenants for the tenants are getting desperate in terms of where they need to be. i in london, midwife vicky has put her family home on the market. thanks for coming in. it is a lovely house. it's got bags of accommodation. what we have to bear in mind that the market has slowed down. yeah, i did think that as well. you make in terms of the market might be going think we might see prices slipping back little. she's going to use the money from her house sale to buy some are smaller and cheaper. i don't want to get a stage

where the interest rates are so high i can't afford my mortgage and then i lose my house. that is a massive way for an awful lot of people. in terms of timing, terms of how long it is going to take to sell, it's really a crystal balljob. willjust have to be patient? yes. i need to be able to sell it but you can't... you can take a horse to water but you can't make it drink. how do you view the next three months? i think it will be required for the next couple of months and then hopefully, after christmas, it will start to pick up. vicky hopes she can escape her own personal housing crisis. and around the uk, millions of families are facing difficult choices.

more than 60% of respondents to a poll for the bbc last month said they expect it will be difficult to pay housing costs this winter. i think there are multiple housing crises within the | system and i think it has got worse over time. - housing is now significantly more expensive in - relation to earnings and that creates more problems for. households in choosing where to live. - we think the need to be - a cross—party commitment to building the new generation of homes that are affordable fori people in below—average incomes _ to live on. we saw you know, the national living| wage become something that both i parties got around after it was . introduced in the late 1990s. i think the need to be a similar. commitment to providing living i homes set at around people can afford. in bristol, it is an important day. the nhs nurse and her family face being evicted ten days

before christmas. so she's come to the council for help. so how important is this meeting? so important. i don't have any other option budgeting for social housing is the only option we have got. it is so scary because this is our only option, is terrifying. if i work in here now and they say we don't meet the criteria, do? we don't have the solution. it's huge. she's in the office for a0 minutes. these are crucial moments for the family. how did that go? terrible. were not entitled to social housing because of our annual income.

what was the moment like? devastating because what my men to do? so, she talked about temporary accommodation so that essentially will never be homeless if we got to the point where the bailiffs came and we had to leave. she said that, then? we would be housed in temporary accommodation but she said with need a three bedroom for the children. we will not be able to get that so it be in a two bedroom and then we were then moved to another place you could move around for three times before you find somewhere so what does that due to the children. that's not fair to make those places. could that happen? why should they have to live like that when their parents work, it's not fair. it's not fair. councils everywhere are struggling to house homeless families. in england, they are spending £1.11 billion a year on temporary

accommodation. people are adjusting to cost of living pressures and it is making life very difficult for people but there are children going to sleep in temporary accommodation tonight and that's got to be the priority. social housing is to be the safety net. social housing used to be the safety net. but 1.4 million social homes have been lost in england alone over the past a0 years. the countries in building around 150,000 homes of all types a year. less than half than what the government said we need and that puts even more pressure on the private rental market. those people who would want to own have to privately rent because they have no other option. at the same time, we've got people who might prefer or who should really be in social housing because it is lower events of that is why everyone is looking towards the private rented sector at the moment because those two other bits of

the housing market and working. the housing market aren't working. i'm just wondering if you got my e—mailabout my with the ceiling. georgina does not have the whole mended and she is ringing the local council. the council tell her they will not come to inspect the ceiling because she has already decided to move out. thank you for answering all of my many questions. she has found a new place. i'm going to move. the tenancy agreement is signed. and the only, like, way, i've been able to move is i borrowed

money off family members, off my mum. i have lived like this for two months, 60 days of a hole in my ceiling. now there is mould so there's that to contend with as well. i'm going to move to the new place and be opening boxes pray my things haven't gone mouldy. so what is your situation, how can we help? the housing charity shelter is getting 1000 calls a day from people looking for help. so there is a section 21 as well. have you got any food in the house? shelter survey suggests rents have risen for nearly a third of private tenants in the last

three months and that one in three have borrowed money to pay the rents. a court order. things are getting worse and you can hear the worrying in their voices and when we afford to pay the rent we pay food, but come across anything like this before, if i'm honest. life can be very groom at the bottom of the housing ladder. an inquest was shown shocking pictures from inside housing association flat in rochdale. the coroner concluded a young boy died because of prolonged exposure to mould.

1.6 million people are living in dangerously low quality homes. and arm to arm, i can put them to the walls- — michael lives in this tiny rundown bedsit in south london. he's been here for five years. one bed, one chair, and a broken toilet. it is completely moulded off. got little perfume things just to get the smell the damp away, you know, that's a definite because every time i come here, all i can

smell is the damp. the landlord says there is no damp and there aren't any issues with the flat. how are you? peter from lewisham council. nice to see. can we have an inspection in your room? the issues here are the damp in the corner. and that is coming from the outside. you can actually feel it. so we've got an open drain and broken guttering so everything is just going to have straight of not be taken away so it's just going to hit and obviously

where it is coming through. we are going to need to liaise very closely with the landlords and hopefully we can engage with them and they're going to engage with us and we can get it fixed. the property needs, he can't live like that any further. we are restricted to a wonder, like an alleyway. it is like an alley, living in an alley but, yeah, it ain't good so the price for what for, it's not worth the money. you know. the rent is a staggering £880 a month. that's more than the uk's average mortgage. it's all paid from housing benefit. you're paying for something that's not even livable. it's like being in a cell, in a police cell, if you wanted to know. a failure to invest sensibly over many, many years, several decades now, let us to a position where

we are paying lots of money in housing benefit expenditure over the years and that's gone to about £30 billion now. about 8 billion or so on average over the last ten years paying into the private sector and we don't get much bang for buck there. the government says it's committed to delivering 300,000 homes a year in england. its capping rent increases in social housing and will legislate to allow private renters to challenge unjustified rent increases. one thing is clear. surviving the uk's housing market is getting tougher with renting or buying, millions of people face a bleak winter. georgina is finally leaving herflat. she will be paying

an extra £170 a month at her new place. yeah, definitely looking forward to just putting it behind me had a fresh start, really. it is a lot more expensive but it is kind of the nature of the market at the minute. vicki, the nhs midwife, is hoping her house sales before her mortgage rises any further. i accepted there but i was annoyed at first. i like to keep the house. but i'm not in a situation where i can so i don't really think about that. my life is easy her underwear be when i move but, then, you my life is easy her here and it won't be when i move but, then, you _ know, i'll adapt and i'll make my life as easy as possible for a meal. -- for when i move. and nhs nurses being evicted hasn't found anywhere else to live.

packing up the family home that has nowhere to go. the boys were too when i moved in. i my oldest was four- so they don't remember being anywhere else so it is done to makes the thought | of them to their must be really| hard. i feel like i failed not. from a fault on my own. i'd done nothing - wrong but it's gone. i can't do it. can't keep them safe with a roof despite . trying. after we filmed, the landlord agreed they could stay for an extra month, but the family are still losing their home. for households struggling,

their experiences shared by millions. as the uk faces a winter of worry, many can no longer afford a decent home. hello. still quite a lot of active weather across the north and west end gale force winds to the rest of the night. whisking eastwards around the

centre of low pressure. elsewhere, for the south, the winds ease a little and the share activity back to the coast quite chilly. it looks like a drier window for many. they are charging then indwells, still quite a lot gathering across the north and west of scotland. if you are pushing east. snow over the mountains, still a strong gusty wind. gales in the hebrides and north and west. that's the feel of things. further south, 12 to 14 of things. further south, 12 to 1a celsius. 0vernight into saturday, a touch of frost, some patchy fog with rain holding up in eastern areas until after dark. further west, for outbreaks of rain, heavy at times, strong southerly but mild winds for the most of us. the rain makes it to the southeast end lingers into sunday.

welcome to bbc news — i'm david eades. our top stories... mounting pressure on iran as the un human rights council votes for an international investigation into the violent suppression of protests in the country. daily covid infections in china hit another record high , despite crippling restrictions and snap lockdowns. nurses in parts of the uk are the latest to announce strike action as the country has one of its biggest days of labour unrest. portugal's cristiano ronaldo becomes the first man to score at five world cups as friday's matches see england taking on the usa and wales face iran.