Consequently we, like many other local authorities, have been working for many years to persuade those tenants who want to move and are "under-occupying" (occupying a home larger than they have come to need) to consider downsizing.
But from April the new regulations would mean that they are under-occupying their specially adapted flat in Southport, Merseyside.
Under the reforms, tenants can expert to lose a portion of what little income they do receive through a penalty for under-occupying their homes.
A separate judicial review has been considering whether the impact of the government's so-called bedroom tax on tenants "under-occupying" social housing is discriminatory.
The Department for Work and Pensions says that 456,000 households are under-occupying their property, meaning people have more than one spare room.
Local housing association Coast & Country has 1,800 households who are currently under-occupying their properties and looking for a smaller home, but they only have two one-bedroom homes available on their books which these people could move into.
Oldham council for their 'Downsizing Scheme' which helps tenants of social landlords who are under-occupying their home (by two bedrooms or more) to move to a smaller home.
The proposal approved by the council said that high-rise two-bedroom properties, which are deemed non-family accommodation, would be difficult to let out to tenants that would not under-occupy the property and would increase homelessness.
His mother was told she would lose £15.52 a week when the council judged they were under-occupying.
The analysis breaks down how many people may be affected area-by-area and estimates that across Scotland 39% of tenants of working age who receive housing benefit are under-occupying.
