Shelter says tomorrow’s Queen’s Speech should herald the start of a widespread reform of all renting, particularly the private sector.
In a blog setting out a wish list for the speech, Shelter says: “Private renters have been waiting since 2019 for the government to follow through on the promise to scrap Section 21 ‘no fault evictions.’ It was something government said it would do in last year’s Queen’s Speech and is a huge bit of unfinished business.”
The campaigning charity admits it understands the government timetable may have been derailed by Coronavirus but it insists this commitment cannot slip further. “The pandemic has exposed exactly why reform of the private rented sector is so urgently needed. Due to the precarious nature of renting, the government had to step in and ban all evictions from the sector to avoid a wave of homelessness” it says.
“Our latest research shows that over three million private renters have been forced to live in unsafe or unhealthy conditions. The fear of being served with a ‘no-fault’ eviction notice stops renters from complaining about their living conditions, meaning bad landlords are not held to account.”
Shelter claims that in the past 20 years, the sector has doubled in size and that now families and older people are struggling in privately rented homes that offer little security or routes to redress when things go wrong.
“The government has acknowledged the problems in the sector, now they must get on and deliver the solutions.
“Throughout the past 18 months, our homes were meant to have been the first line of defence against coronavirus – the Queen’s Speech must ensure that they are genuinely safe and suitable for those who live in them. It can do that by making sure that renters, both social and private, get reforms to regulation that will make them safer and more secure in their homes. And by making sure that planning reform helps to tackle our shortage of social homes, rather than making it worse.”
The campaign also demands major reform of social renting management, especially to address issues emanating from the Grenfell Tower tragedy. It also wants commitments to improving the availability of social housing.
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It's difficult to know where to start pulling this hate group apart.
When will decent tenants realise the harm Shelter does to them by protecting rogue tenants from easy eviction which would release homes for decent tenants?
BTW. No such thing as a no fault eviction. No business turfs out good customers!
Could we also have in the reform that the tenants have to keep the property from going mouldy by not hanging washing in the radiators. Just a little something our way just this one thing please
Imagine if we had a group representing us the landlord with this energy and aggression
Let them all turn up at shelter doorstep when we evict them I look forward to that day coming
Oooooo! Please tell me when. Please.
I want to take photos and videos and use them to show non-paying tenants what is coming down the road for them.
Nice HD format too.
Very good I like it SHELTER DEMANDS widespread reforms. The Charity that supplies no housing have a £60m pot with £15m annual grant thrown in of tax payers money. Wonderful now why wouldn’t they have the right to dictate to us, how about removing the £15m subsidy and the additional money they got to go over the Border into Scotland to see how much damage they could do there. Then remove Charity Status & let them pay 40% income tax, stop paying some of their employees over £100k pa, plenty young people who be glad to do it for £60k.
Brilliant and so right.
My landlord refused to fix the place up for 6 years. There was loads wrong with the place...some ceilings had collapsed, and there were bare live wires hanging out, etc. Place was constantly damp when it rained.
When the landlord bought the place, I was an AST tenant already. When he bought it he told me he'd be 'forced' to raise the rent if he 'improved' the place.
So I went 6 years under threat of rent increase, with the firetrap of a place falling down around me.
I asked him to sort it out last year, or let me at least make some minor repairs. He refused to let me do it, but at the same time, he repeated that he'd 'have to' increase the rent if he 'made renovations'. I told him we'd discuss a rent increase when it came up. In the meantime, he still wouldn't let me make repairs, and wouldn't even recompense me for fixing the leak in the shower..a fix I had to do, because he took so long to address it. He agreed to do some essential repairs, but he really dragged his feet, and his initial efforts were actually life threatening.
I told the land lord I was going to ask the council to intervene. Due to covid, the council could only make a video inspection a couple months after I'd contacted them.
In the meantime, the landlord used form 6a to start eviction proceedings.
I didn't owe rent. I had been a model tenant.
He gave no reason for him wanting me evicted.
Meantime, the council have been told to 'take it easy' on landlords during the covid crisis..so all the council could do, was informally order the landlord to fix dangerous stuff, including fire safety.
So I'm sitting here, and the place is still semi derelict and unfinished, but now at least it's safer in an emergency.
The landlord has left it like this on purpose, whilst at the same time, he's gutted and renovated an empty property of his which is actually next door to me.
There's more. A lot more.
As you'd expect, this harassment has all caused me no end of stress - to the point that I've had to be put on antidepressants.
So yes, the law needs reforming.
As it is, landlords can get the hump with a tenant, and literally kick them out for nothing.
The system as is, is merely a vehicle that allows too many landlords to put vulnerable low income tenants into shoddy properties with a 'low' rent, and kick them out when they have to bring the place up to standard. Then they give the empty place a cheap facelift and rent it out for an extra £100 a month.
If landlords don't want the law changing, then maybe they should have done a lot more to get rid of the rogue landlords out there when they had the chance. When I got into difficulty, it wasn't a landlords group I went to for help. As far as I know, there's no landlord organisation that focuses on helping to take rogue landlords to court.
Tenants are not cattle..or animals..or cash cows. They are people.
It's about time the law forced all landlords to appreciate that.
Hi Adey, Sorry you seem to have your share of bad luck, how did electric wires become bare surely not by themselves, the ceiling coming down was it from the misuse of the bathroom above if not I apologise. Why did you stay 6 years its a free Country. I don’t blame the previous LL for selling very wise man. Of course Tenants are not cattle they are very respected human beings and we appreciate them very much as Tenants and help in every way possible especially at this extra difficult time. I hope to situation improves soon and find yourself a decent LL, it’s not worth the hassle to live like that. I wish you well.
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