GLASGOW City Council only managed to house slightly more than half of the city’s homeless last year, according to a damning report.

The local authority, Scotland’s largest, was slated in the review by the Scottish Housing Regulator, who said the homeless in the city were spending too long in temporary accommodation waiting for a house.

In 2016/17, the council only managed to find homes for 2405 of the 4195 households it had a responsibility to house.

On average, those waiting for a home spent 238 days in temporary accommodation.

The regulator said the council needed to up its ambition and substantially increase its current target, which is to house 3000 homeless each year.

Under current laws, the council had a duty to make an offer of temporary or emergency accommodation to households on 10,350 occasions, but, according to the regulator, made an offer in only 60 per cent of those cases.

The council was also accused of losing contact with around a quarter of people who are homeless while they wait for a home.

This, the regulator said, was down to the “length and complexity of the process” of rehousing people in Glasgow.

The city’s housing associations, or registered social landlords (RSLs), also came in for criticism, with the regulator saying some were turning away homeless people referred to them by the council because the person had rent arrears from a former letting.

Michael Cameron, the regulator’s chief executive, said this was not a good enough reason: “Local authorities have a duty to provide homes to people who are homeless. RSLs have a duty to help them do that.

“The council is not housing enough people who are homeless quickly enough and it is not referring enough people to RSLs to meet housing need. Some RSLs make a good contribution to providing homes to people who are homeless, some have more to do.

“We expect the council and its partners to respond positively to the recommendations in our report. The council must improve urgently the services it provides for people who are homeless.”

Shelter Scotland said “radical action” was needed.

The charity’s director in Scotland, Graeme Brown, said: “Radical and comprehensive action is now needed to ensure homeless people get the services they need, are entitled to and deserve in Glasgow.

“We hope this report will force Glasgow City Council to sit up and take the meaningful action needed so that they meet their statutory duties for all homeless people in the city.

“Shelter Scotland has for years been raising concerns about the experience of homeless people in Glasgow.

“In particular, we have serious concerns that Glasgow City Council is too often failing to meet its legal duty to find suitable homes for homeless households and that too many people are being turned away from the services they have a legal right to. These unacceptable practices must stop now.”

A spokeswoman for the council said: “The report also identifies many areas of positive practice in Glasgow’s homelessness system and also the scale of the challenge faced by the city’s support services.

“The council and its partners are working together more effectively to support those affected by homelessness. However, we accept that improvements within the system are still required to ensure people who present as homeless can move into a permanent home as soon as possible.”

The latest Scottish Government statistics show there were 2023 families living in temporary accommodation between July and September last year, a 4 per cent increase on 2016.