Tens of thousands of residents in the Greater Manchester region are living in unsafe, poor quality homes with inadequate insulation, think tank finds.

Research by IPPR North has found that approximately 25% of the 223,000 private rented sector (PRS) homes in Greater Manchester are classed as ‘non-decent’.

Some residents said that they feel ‘exhausted’ and ‘overwhelmed’ by the state of their homes, and are concerned about the impact the poor housing with have on their children.

The research also discovered that around 15% of all households across tenures in Greater Manchester live in fuel poverty – some of the highest rates in England.

Over half of privately rented homes in Greater Manchester fail to meet Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) standard C.

IPPR North warned that the combination of the increasing cost of energy and poorly insulated homes is a ‘ticking time bomb’ under the Greater Manchester region.

Jonathan Webb, senior research fellow at IPPR North, said: ‘The private rented sector is not working for hundreds of thousands of people. Everyone deserves to live in a safe home and every child deserves to grow up in a healthy environment. But that isn’t the case for too many families here in Greater Manchester where many are enduring appalling, dangerous conditions with damp, pest infections, and cold homes.

‘The Government’s levelling up white paper sets out an ambition for the number of non-decent homes to halve by 2030. To achieve this, the next prime minister must commit to overseeing a country where homes are safe to live in, by making empowering local leaders, like metro mayors, their priority so that places have the powers and resources they need to level up homes locally.’