Another raft of General Election pledges have been made to transform the private rental sector – this time from the Green Party.
The party says it has a target of four MPs in the next Parliament and says if elected they will push for:
– Rent controls “so local authorities can control rents if the rental market is unaffordable for many local people”;
– A new stable rental tenancy and an end to no-fault evictions “so tenants are secure in their homes and don’t have their lives turned upside down on the whim of their landlords”;
– A tenant’s right to demand energy efficiency improvements;
– So-called Private Residential Tenancy Boards “to provide an informal, cheap and speedy forum for resolving disputes before they reach a tribunal.”
Unsurprisingly the Greens put much emphasis on domestic energy efficiency and the party says: “Elected Greens will push for a local-authority-led, street-by-street retrofit programme to insulate our homes, provide clean heat and start to adapt our buildings to more extreme climate conditions.”
This would mean investment of £29 billion over the next five years to insulate homes to an EPC B standard or above; an additional £4 billion over the next five years to insulate other buildings; and £9 billion over the next five years for heat pumps and other low-carbon heating systems for homes and other buildings.
It would also want all new-build homes meet Passivhaus or equivalent standards and house builders include solar panels and heat pumps on all new properties.
The Green Party also pledges 150,000 new social homes every year through a mix of build and the purchase and refurbishment of older housing stock. Right To Buy would be scrapped for council tenants.
Rental activists have been quick off the mark to praise the Green Party’s manifesto.
Dan Wilson Craw, deputy chief executive of Generation Rent, says: “We welcome their commitment to ending no-fault evictions and their recognition of the devastating impact they can have.
“Unaffordable rents are a huge driver of poverty and homelessness. Plans to help social landlords and community housing groups purchase and refurbish poorly-insulated homes and bring them into the social sector will mean more people made homeless will find a stable home, while also cutting carbon emissions.
“Powers for councils to control rents will be an important mechanism to slam the brakes on the wild rent rises that tenants are facing, keeping us in our homes and easing the pressure on our wallets. We hope the party will set out more details about how far councils could intervene.”
