'It felt like squatting': The people forced to live without flooring

When Pia Honey had her house extended in 2021, the builders planned to put her old flooring into a skip - much to her surprise.

After all, it was in perfectly good condition.

Instead, Pia listed the carpet on Facebook. Three families each took a share.

"All three were single parents living in social housing with no floor covering," Pia, 55, says. "Each one told me the council had removed the previous carpets before they moved in."

It was this that ultimately led to the creation of her community interest company No Floor No More, which provides second-hand carpets to social housing tenants who would otherwise have to make do with bare floors.

Pia, who lives in St Albans, says it's "disgusting" that council and housing association properties are routinely left with partial floor coverings.

She estimates that she's provided flooring to about 1,400 properties, and is campaigning for social housing to come with flooring as standard.

A recent survey suggests three quarters of new social housing tenancies come with no, or only partial, flooring coverings.

The quality of social housing - including the provision of flooring - can have a huge impact on tenants' lives, says Aileen Edmunds, chief executive of Longleigh Foundation, which supports social housing tenants.

"We hear some really shocking stories," she says. "For example, people are more likely to return to the perpetrators of domestic abuse if where they've been rehoused doesn't feel like a home. We've heard of children being embarrassed to bring their friends round to play."

"Just simple things like having to wear shoes indoors and not wanting your baby to crawl on the floor. It's massively stigmatising to not have flooring."

The National Housing Federation, which represents housing associations, says that in social housing carpets have historically been removed between lets as standard practice, for practical and hygienic reasons.

In some cases, housing associations provide new flooring as standard when a home is re-let, or give decorating vouchers to new tenants, it said.

After Pia's extension, she continued to receive messages from people looking for flooring.

"I didn't have any more carpet but I wanted to help," she says. "I started asking around. I asked carpet fitters for offcuts.

"Things escalated and I started collecting second-hand flooring from all over the place.

"I've had lorry-loads of carpet from conference venues, high-end retailers have given me good quality carpet with slight defects. I've even had carpet left over from Warner Brothers' film sets."

Pia splits her week between her part-time beauty therapy job, caring for her grandchildren, and collecting and redistributing large quantities of carpet and lino.

She passes on the carpets at dramatically knocked-down prices, with the money going back into No Floor No More to cover some of the costs. She uses money from the sale of her late mother's house to fund the venture, too.

"I believe in what I'm doing so I'm happy to carry it financially for now," she says.

Her local council, St Albans City and District Council, said: "Tenants are asked to remove all flooring such as carpets before the property is handed back."

It said that the flooring may be in a poor condition or that pets may have posed a risk of flea infestations.

"In some instances, flooring may be gifted to the incoming tenant," the council said.

Sidony West recently received carpet from Pia after she and her three children lived with bare floorboards for more than two years.

In 2014, Sidony was offered a social housing flat in Bushey, Hertfordshire, having escaped a violent relationship. The flat had no floor coverings and she took out a loan to install linoleum throughout.

But when she moved to a housing association property in Borehamwood in 2022, Sidony was made to dispose of the lino, which she said was "immaculate".

"I was told I'd be charged £1,200 if I left the flooring behind," she says.

Sidony's former landlord, Hightown housing association, says flooring in "good condition" will be left in place, adding: "If it is in a poor state, and in line with sector practice, we will remove it because of hygiene and contamination risks for the new resident."

However, Sidony says her flooring was never inspected, and has shown the BBC her end of tenancy agreement which instructed her to remove carpets, underlay, gripper rods and laminate flooring.

Sidony's new property also came without floor coverings.

"One of my boys has kidney problems and asthma," she says. "Because there was no carpet it was so cold."

"I was going further into debt to pay our energy bills to keep the children warm."

Earlier this year, Sidony managed to get she carpet for the three bedrooms, hallway and stairs through Pia. She says Pia shared contact details for a carpet fitter who laid them "for next to nothing".

"It was such an incredible feeling," Sidony says. "After he left, we just kept running up and down the stairs and taking a look at our new carpets."

Neal Wylde, from Beeston Regis in Norfolk, is another social housing tenant who is all too familiar with a lack of carpet.

He moved into his property 13 years ago and was met with dusty concrete floors.

"I use a wheelchair and the dust from the concrete left tyre tracks everywhere.

"It was especially bad leaving the wet bathroom floor and going back into the corridor. It was cold and depressing.

"It didn't feel like home, it felt like we were squatting... it was embarrassing.

"The neighbours wanted to come round and say hello but we didn't want to let them in. Christmas that year was bleak and lonely."

"The neighbours told us the previous tenant was an elderly lady who kept the property in good condition – including the carpet."

He wants the policy on social housing flooring to change, "Why are they ripping up perfectly good carpets and putting them in landfill?"

Neal's housing association, Orbit, said it only removes carpets as a "last resort" if they cannot be "cleaned or if they are damaged beyond repair".

In Wales, there has been change at a national level following a campaign from the tenant engagement group TPAS Cymru.

From April 2024, all social landlords in Wales must provide "suitable and quality flooring throughout the whole of the home" in all new social housing lettings.

Other campaigners want the rest of the UK to follow suit.

"If, as a landlord, you can't afford to put flooring in as standard practice, please just stop ripping perfectly decent flooring out," says Aileen, the chief executive of Longleigh Foundation. "Give the next tenant a choice."