How does my area compare?

Queen's Park and Maida Vale has the highest total spending on Housing Benefit in 2024-25.

Help with rent. Most people who get it now are pensioners or live in supported housing. Shown in 2026-27 prices, using CPI inflation, adjusted for inflation so that years can be compared.

Spending on Housing Benefit, total, 2024-25, by constituency

Total, low to high

  1. Under £21.0m
  2. £21.0m to £32.5m
  3. £32.5m to £44.0m
  4. £44.0m to £55.5m
  5. £55.5m to £67.0m
  6. £67.0m and over
Spending on Housing Benefit, total, 2024-25, by constituency. Boundaries are simplified. London is also shown larger, in a separate box. Northern Ireland is not covered. Every value is in the table below.
More ways to look at itHow ranks change, why spending changed, and spending compared with the expected level

Total or per person

Does the order change when you count per person?

Each line is one of the 632 ranked constituencies. It joins the area's rank for each way of counting. The 10 highest total are drawn in dark lines.

TotalPer resident1632Queen's Park and Maida Vale 1Birmingham Perry Barr 2Hackney North and Stoke Newington 3Brent East 4Holborn and St Pancras 5Tottenham 6Kensington and Bayswater 7Birmingham Erdington 9Islington South and Finsbury 10Birmingham Ladywood 13

What changed

More people, more claims or bigger payments?

Great Britain, Housing Benefit: yearly spending at the rate in March 2023 and in March 2026. The chart splits the change into three parts: the number of people in the age group, the share of them claiming, and the average payment. 2026-27 prices, using CPI inflation.

£17.3bnMarch 2023+£162.6mPopulation−£7.8bnShare claiming+£2.9bnPayment size£12.5bnMarch 2026
What changed: Housing Benefit
March 2023£17.3bn
Population+£162.6m
Share claiming−£7.8bn
Payment size+£2.9bn
March 2026£12.5bn
The share claiming is the number of people claiming per resident. Yearly spending here is the number claiming, times the average weekly payment, times 52. It is not the amount paid out over the year. Population after mid-2024 stays at the mid-2024 figure, so later growth shows in the share claiming.

Compared with similar areas

Is spending higher or lower than expected?

Benefit spending per resident, 2024-25. We compare it with the level we would expect from each area's share of children and of people aged 66 and over, how deprived it is compared with the rest of its nation, and the typical pay of people who live there. 2026-27 prices, using CPI inflation.

Chart step
This chart needs JavaScript. Each area's expected level is on its area page.
Expected level = −£880 + £1,417 × share aged 0 to 15 + £9,950 × share aged 66 and over − £207 × deprivation decile + £391 × ln(median pay) + £506 × Wales + £250 × Scotland. Fitted by ordinary least squares across 625 constituencies. R² = 0.84. Gold dots are above the expected level and grey dots are below it.

Every constituency

Spending on Housing Benefit, 2024-25. Rank is for total, and 1 is the highest. Areas with fewer than 1,000 people in the age group have no rank. The first 50 of 632 rows are shown.

Spending on Housing Benefit for every constituency, 2024-25
RankNotes
1Queen's Park and Maida Vale£133.9m£1,074
2Brent East£111.3m£812
3Birmingham Ladywood£109.7m£657
4Birmingham Perry Barr£107.5m£858
5Tottenham£100.2m£724
6Hackney North and Stoke Newington£98.3m£837
7Kensington and Bayswater£94.8m£716
8Birmingham Erdington£88.9m£704
9Holborn and St Pancras£83.5m£747
10Islington South and Finsbury£81.6m£672
11West Ham and Beckton£80.5m£544
12Islington North£78.7m£709
13Cities of London and Westminster£78.6m£599
14Hackney South and Shoreditch£78.4m£665
15Lewisham East£78.4m£665
16Croydon West£77.5m£587
17Edmonton and Winchmore Hill£75.4m£603
18Bethnal Green and Stepney£74.5m£553
19Enfield North£73.5m£576
20Birmingham Hall Green and Moseley£70.3m£584
21Liverpool Riverside£67.4m£512
22Poplar and Limehouse£67.3m£450
23Ealing Central and Acton£67.2m£484
24East Ham£67.2m£493
25Glasgow North£65.4m£568
26Birmingham Edgbaston£64.4m£584
27Hampstead and Highgate£63.3m£538
28Stratford and Bow£62.7m£454
29Birmingham Yardley£60.8m£516
30Erith and Thamesmead£60.4m£433
31Southgate and Wood Green£60.3m£472
32Ealing North£60.0m£446
33Peckham£59.8m£535
34Finchley and Golders Green£59.4m£457
35Streatham and Croydon North£59.2m£491
36Hammersmith and Chiswick£58.5m£494
37Vauxhall and Camberwell Green£58.5m£552
38Glasgow North East£58.4m£507
39Nottingham East£57.6m£458
40Chelsea and Fulham£56.6m£463
41Ealing Southall£56.3m£426
42Lewisham North£53.8m£459
43Ilford South£53.5m£387
44Dulwich and West Norwood£52.8m£501
45Lewisham West and East Dulwich£52.3m£526
46Hendon£52.2m£374
47Glasgow East£52.0m£493
48Edinburgh East and Musselburgh£50.3m£432
49Greenwich and Woolwich£50.1m£405
50Clapham and Brixton Hill£49.8m£481

League table of every constituency for the latest period

Values are total unless a column says otherwise. Sources: Department for Work and Pensions, Office for National Statistics, National Records of Scotland.

Every measureThe full list, as plain links

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