In Britain poor people in social housing live under constant threat of eviction. Lose one week’s work and you risk losing your home. Someone makes a mistake on your housing benefit and you are one step away from sleeping rough. In 2014 more than 100,000 social landlords issued possession claims against tenants. Most of those people face eviction because they can’t find the money to pay their rent.
Bonnie, the mother threatened with eviction in Coventry, is 42. She’s on a zero-hours contract, so she doesn’t know how much money she will earn each month. Sometimes it is much less than her rent. Even if Bonnie is saved from eviction today, in her current job she will always be close to missing a rent payment, always one step away from losing her home.
