Amnesty International has described the criterion of being intentionally homeless, used by english local authorities when deciding whether or not they have a statutory duty to provide accommodation to someone who presents to them as being homeless, as being "outdated and cruel" and says that it should be scrapped.

In their recent report, An obstacle course: homelessness assistance and the right to housing in England, published earlier this month, they have called for housing to be enshrined in UK law as a human right and said that housing in England is "not fit for purpose" and that homelessness was made worse because local authorities had to "ration" available housing.

The organisation also called for local housing allowance rates to be "immediately adjusted" in line with increasing rents in the private rented sector.

Sacha Deshmukh, Amnesty UK's chief executive said " The absurd obstacle course which a person experiencing homelessness has to get through in order to 'qualify' for housing help is intended to lock them out, because there simply isn't enough housing for the ever growing need."

At the same time as producing the report Amnesty also carried out polling along with Servanta ComRes which showed that nearly a third of people polled believed that, because of rising housing costs, they will be either sofa surfing or in temporary accommodation within the next 5 years.