A rental sector insurance firm has hit back at claims made about Section 21 by the charity Citizens Advice.

A spokesperson for the Citizens Advice charity claimed that private landlords serve Section 21 notices on tenants to avoid doing repairs. Kirsty Rowlinson is reported by local media in Southampton to have said: “We see quite a lot of seemingly retaliatory evictions. A tenant will ask for repairs to be carried out and they will see soon after the landlords just issued a section 21.

“The legal process as I understand it for getting a tenant evicted is far quicker than the legal process for getting repairs done, so the landlord knows that the tenant is going to be gone before the court case for the repairs comes through. This is what we are seeing at Citizens Advice in Southampton.”

She continued: “Sanctions, section 21s and rent arrears have risen hugely in Southampton over the last couple of quarters. The last couple of months in particular we are really feeling the increase. Landlords want to raise the rent and tenants aren’t able to afford the increase.”

Now Sim Sekhon, managing director of LegalforLandlords – a tenant referencing and insurance supplier – says the idea that a landlord would willingly choose the expense, worry and disruption of the current eviction process without justification is simply laughable. 

He says: “I don’t know a single landlord who wouldn’t rather carry out repairs. Doing the work necessary to keep a good tenant happy and protect the value of their investment makes sense and is far preferable to battling through a lengthy court process.” 

Sekhon says he finds it galling that the fair and responsible landlord is expected to put up and shut up while the bad tenant works the system to their advantage. And he claims he knows of numerous examples where tenants use stalling tactics or claim ‘breathing space’ protection to further delay the court process. 

He says often there is no legitimate defence and, eventually, the court proceedings conclude in the landlord’s favour but with no compensation for the significant financial losses or the distress suffered. 

“Landlords are already at the end of their tether. Many are using Section 21 as a way of leaving a sector that neither supports nor respects them. It is their legal right to do so, and to insult them with these generalised, unbalanced slurs is simply unfair.”