A Labour MP has spoken of loopholes in the Renters Reform Bill – a narrative now being pursued by some activists who initially supported the government’s legislation.

Yvonne Fovargue, Labour MP for Makerfield, writes an article for the Wigan Today website with references to the need for the Bill to be toughened to counter what she varyingly calls “bad-faith landlords” and “ill-intentioned landlords.”

Fovargue – a shadow minister when Jeremy Corbyn was party leader, but now a backbencher – says the government must extend notice periods to a legal minimum of four months with what she calls “firm punitive measures for landlords who do not abide by the law.”

She also accuses the Bill of lacking support for local authorities “to act on injustices in their local private rented sector.”

She says she wants the Bill to strengthen enforcement powers, and to require councils to report on enforcement activity and allow them to cap the advance rent that local landlords can request.

“The government owes local authorities an explanation of why it has neglected to give them the means to ensure the new legislation is successfully enacted” she writes.

And while she concedes that landlords must be able to deal with antisocial behaviour or criminal activity by their tenants “the government must ensure that such exemptions cannot be exploited by bad-faith landlords to unjustly evict tenants.”

On the iconic issue of Section 21 eviction powers – abolished in the Bill – she says: “Even though the Bill provides steps towards scrapping section 21 evictions, there remain ways for ill-intentioned landlords to remove tenants unjustly.”

The Bill is currently awaiting its Second Reading in the House of Commons.