Homeless people in Seattle are being offered their own wooden huts and tents in a new settlement behind a petrol station.

'Othello Village' is funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and offers residents a shower, toilet and kitchen along with boxes of food.

The settlement is part of a wider 'tiny house' movement across? the USA which, according to the Guardian, has been accused of starting shanty towns or slums.

Barbara Poppe, former director of the US Interagency Council on Homelessness, called some of the houses "completely deplorable", arguing this stigmatises its residents. However, in Olympia, Washington, a 'tiny house' resident named Alan calls his home an "utter relief" having stayed now there for two years.

In response to the 'shanty town' comments, he said: “To the people out there on streets, living in cardboard boxes in alleyways, this represents the promised land.”