Section 21s: Almost one million renters given no-fault evictions since Tories promised to scrap them

Published

2 weeks ago

April 18, 2024

admin

Almost one million private renters in England have been handed no-fault evictions since the Conservative government promised to abolish them, new data has shown.

Research carried out by YouGov on behalf of homelessness charity Shelter – and shared exclusively with Sky News – showed that since April 2019 a total of 943,000 people had been given Section 21 notices, which is the equivalent of more than 500 renters every day.

Politics live:
Sunak and Starmer trade jibes in ‘very personal’ PMQs

The figures also showed unwanted moves were costing private renters in England £550m a year, with 830,000 people having to move in the last 12 months alone due to either their fixed tenancies coming to an end, being priced out by rent increases or being served with a Section 21.

Add in the soaring upfront costs for rents and deposits and unwanted moves are costing more than £1bn a year – or an average of £1,245 per person.

Polly Neate, Shelter’s chief executive, said tenants were “bearing the cost of the government’s inaction” and warned any further delays to banning no-fault evictions would see more people “tipped into homelessness”.

But Levelling Up minister Jacob Young defended the government. He said abolishing Section 21s was “the biggest change to the private rented sector in more than 30 years” so it “takes time to make sure we get it right”.

A Section 21 notice is the legal mechanism allowing landlords to evict tenants without providing a reason, which creates uncertainty for those who rent their homes.

The government first promised to ban them five years ago this week – back when Theresa May was still in Number 10.

Yet despite subsequent Conservative leaders pledging to see through the policy, it still hasn’t come into law – with the housing secretary announcing an indefinite delay to the Renters Reform Bill last month.

‘I had a meltdown’

Natalie was served with two Section 21 notices within 18 months.

The 47-year-old from Brighton told Sky News she received the first one just after COVID and she took it in her stride. She said: “It wasn’t an ideal rental, it was quite dilapidated… but I had got into quite a good relationship with the landlord and I wasn’t freaking out. They just wanted to sell their flat and get out of the rental market.”

However, the relationship soon soured and turned into a “nasty environment” as she struggled to find a new home in a market with soaring costs and poor quality places.

“You couldn’t even see a property without having a £35k guarantor or you would have to have a whole year’s rent in advance and it just turned into a figures game,” said Natalie.

“If you don’t look good on paper, you are not going to get to see a flat, you are not going to be considered for it. You are not going to tick all the boxes. It is financial discrimination.”

After staying with friends for two months, Natalie found a new property, but in the first three weeks, it had flooded, and she noticed day by day the “shoddy workmanship”.

And after a year, again through no fault of her own, she got a call from the estate agent to say the rent was going up by £150 a month and she would need to leave.

Natalie said she had a “meltdown”.

“It’s an awful thing, not feeling like you’re an adult and not being able to support yourself or find space in a location you have decided is home – finding out that it doesn’t mean anything that you have been living there for 21 years,” she said.

She added: “I’d like people to be able to have a home if we are living in a so-called civilised society. How’s anybody supposed to get anywhere without having their home? It should just be like water and air – we all need that to function.

“Something really drastic needs to be done.”

Tories criticised for ‘excuse’ holding back change

Mr Young, the Levelling Up minister, told Sky News his “hope” and “primary focus” was to see the bill passed, banning Section 21s for new tenancies before the next general election – which must take place before the end of January 2025.

But he couldn’t “give a commitment on a solid date” for the ban to also apply to existing tenancies, meaning millions – including Natalie – would continue to be at risk of losing their homes.

“We have to do this in a proportionate and phased way, working with the sector to make sure our reforms are actually effective,” he told Sky News.

“If we were to abolish everything straightaway, that would create a lot of uncertainty in the sector.”

However, Shelter’s Ms Neate argued the reason for the delay was not about getting the legislation right, but about “bowing to backbench landlords”.

A group of Tory MPs – a number of whom are landlords themselves – raised concerns the courts were not prepared for the legal cases that could result from the simpler mechanism being outlawed.

As a result, the government said Section 21s would remain in place until an assessment had been made of whether the legal system could handle the changes.

But Ms Neate called it an “excuse”. She said: “The reason why they’re delaying is because they’re under pressure from their own backbenchers, many of whom are landlords, who just don’t want to see no-fault evictions ending.

“Why you would want the right to evict somebody for absolutely no reason is beyond me, frankly.”

She added: “Our frontline services every single day are seeing the worst effects of this.

“Section 21 no-fault eviction is one of the leading causes of homelessness in this country. And that’s why we’re so eager for the government to end it.”

Government still ‘committed’ to abolishing no-fault evictions

Mr Young denied there were “vested interests” in his party and said he did not “begrudge” his colleagues for having rental properties.

He said: “We can’t just listen to one side of the sector in this argument. It has to be that we’re delivering a bill that benefits both tenants and landlords.

“This bill is about protecting good tenants and landlords, and pitting them against the rogue actors in the system.”

Revealing his own aunt had been subject to a Section 21 just before Christmas, Mr Young added: “It takes time to make sure that we get it right. There are 11 million renters in the country. If we get it wrong for those 11 million renters, that doesn’t help them at all.

“I know the uncertainty that [Section 21s] can provide to families. That’s why I’m committed to abolishing it. That’s why I’m focused on delivering this.”

Matthew Pennycook, Labour’s shadow minister for housing and planning, said his party is committed to ending the “ever-present fear” of Section 21s “immediately” if it gets into power – and would put forward amendments for government legislation to speed up the process.

He told Sky News the abolition of no-fault evictions could be done “overnight” if the Conservatives chose to, leading to “a stable private rental system… [where] families can live and thrive in what should be their homes, not just an asset that can just be taken back at a moment’s notice”.

Mr Pennycook also said he believed the court system could “cope” with the changes, but added: “I think what private tenants would argue is [the government has] had five years to get to the point where that they can introduce a system to honour this commitment to abolish Section 21 notices, and they’ve played around for far too long.

“We think they’re selling out to vested interests in bringing these changes forward.”

Politics

Sir Keir Starmer considered quitting after 2021 local elections and Hartlepool loss

Published

1 hour ago

May 1, 2024

admin

Sir Keir Starmer considered quitting after 2021 local elections and Hartlepool loss

Sir Keir Starmer has admitted he considered quitting as Labour leader after the party lost both the Hartlepool by-election and council seats in 2021.

Speaking to Sky News political editor Beth Rigby ahead of tomorrow’s contests, Sir Keir called it “a low point”, with his party recording a net loss of eight councils, as well as the North East constituency – which had been held by Labour since the 1970s, but went to the Conservatives on the night.

“I did [consider quitting] because I didn’t feel that I should be bigger than the party and that if I couldn’t bring about the change, perhaps there should be a change,” he said.

“But actually, in the end, I reflected on it, talked to very many people and doubled down and determined, no, it is the change in the Labour Party we need.”

Politics live: Scottish government survives no-confidence vote

Sir Keir said he felt “vindicated” by his decision to stay on “because we are now a changed party, nobody argues with that”.

He added: “And the biggest change is we are now a party that confidently and proudly says country first, party second. That is a changed Labour Party.”

Voters will be heading to the polls on Thursday for a range of local council and mayoral elections, as well as a by-election in Blackpool South following the resignation of its Tory MP Scott Benton.

But reflecting on the losses his party suffered the last time the seats were up for grabs, the Labour leader told Beth Rigby: “Oh yes, it was the low point and it really hit me because my job was to turn around the Labour Party and take us from defeat to success.

“Losing hurts and it should hurt in politics, because this isn’t about me, it is about whether the Labour Party can come back into government and serve working people. So yes, it was a very, very low moment.”

However, Sir Keir said the experience – which came around a year after he took over the party and while Boris Johnson was enjoying a surge in popularity in so-called Red Wall seats – led him to “double down and turbocharge the change that we needed”.

“So, in that respect, retrospectively, it was a good thing because it forced that onward pace, but I am not going to pretend it wasn’t a really hard time.”

Thursday’s vote is predicted to be a different story for Labour, which has come out of the shadows of their worst-ever loss in the 2019 general election and when they are soaring ahead of the Conservatives in the polls.

But Sir Keir would not put a target on the number of council seats or mayoralties he hoped to win by the end of the counts, saying instead he just wanted his party to “show progress”.

“We have to show that people have the confidence and the trust to vote for this changed Labour Party so we do need to show that progress,” he said.

“The polls don’t predict the future, the polls don’t change the country, but I’ll be looking for that progress because it is really important in the locals and the mayoral elections, but also because of the story it tells for the change we need at the general election.”

Meanwhile, the Conservatives were playing down their prospects ahead of Thursday’s vote, with Chancellor Jeremy Hunt saying he expected it to be a “difficult day” for his party.

Speaking to The Politics Hub With Sophy Ridge, he said: “We are very realistic. “We have been in power a long time and a government in office can often get punished in the local elections.

“It happened to Tony Blair in 2001 and 2005 and we are expecting it to be a difficult day tomorrow.”

Mr Hunt added: “Tony Blair lost… councillors and David Cameron lost hundreds of councillors in the run up to the 2015 election, so we are expecting to see significant losses, that often happens in local elections.

“But what we say to people is, look, this may be a moment where you want to express a view about the national picture, but actually the local services you depend on will be decided by how you vote – and if you want better public services as independently audited time after time, and lower taxes, then you should vote Conservative tomorrow.”

For all the ways you can follow the local elections live across Sky News, click here.

Politics

Scottish government survives vote of no confidence at Holyrood

Published

1 hour ago

May 1, 2024

admin

Scottish government survives vote of no confidence at Holyrood

The Scottish government has survived a vote of no confidence at Holyrood.

Scottish Labour pressed ahead with its motion despite Humza Yousaf announcing earlier this week his intention to stand down as SNP leader and first minister.

It failed by 58 votes to 70.

The Scottish Greens voted against the motion, with party co-leader Patrick Harvie branding it “chaos for the sake of chaos”.

If it had passed, all ministers in the minority SNP government would have been forced to quit.

Opening the debate, Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar thanked Mr Yousaf for his service and wished him well, but said Scotland was “crying out for change” from the UK Conservative government and the SNP Scottish government.

He said the country needed “credible and effective leadership” to deal with “twin crises” in the economy and NHS.

Mr Sarwar added: “I have no confidence in the SNP’s ability to deliver that and that is why I am bringing this motion to parliament today.”

The outgoing first minister defended his government’s record, adding that in the 13 months he has spent in charge he had not “heard a single positive idea” from Scottish Labour.

Mr Yousaf added: “What I have heard is the deafening sound of principle after principle being thrown out of Anas Sarwar’s window.

“U-turning on the two-child cap, U-turning on the devolution of employment law, U-turning on the devolution of drug law, U-turning on his support for Waspi women.”

Mr Yousaf said pro-UK parties, in their “cosy Westminster alliance”, would be “terrified” of a vote of no confidence.

He added: “As I have found out only too well in the last few days, politics is definitely about the choices we choose to make.

“As a government, I am exceptionally proud of our choices.”

The debate and vote has come following the breakdown of the Bute House Agreement.

Within hours of the powersharing deal with the Scottish Greens coming to an end last week, Scottish Tory leader Douglas Ross announced he would be bringing a motion of no confidence in the first minister.

Angry over the way the party was dumped from government, the Scottish Greens announced its MSPs would be backing the motion.

Scottish Labour then announced it was planning a motion of no confidence in the Scottish government.

Mr Yousaf reached out to his political opponents in an effort to stem the uprising but conceded that he had “underestimated the level of hurt and upset” his actions had caused Scottish Green colleagues.

Speaking to Sky News earlier on Wednesday, Mr Yousaf said: “I will certainly be regretting the way it ended.”

The Scottish Tories dropped their motion following Mr Yousaf’s resignation, but Scottish Labour pressed on as the party believes the decision on the next first minister should be put to the public.

Mr Yousaf intends to remain in post until his successor is announced.

Former deputy first minister John Swinney and ex-finance secretary Kate Forbes have emerged as potential frontrunners to throw their hat into the ring.

Mr Sarwar pointed to reports that Ms Forbes could struggle to appoint ministers and described Mr Swinney as “the finance secretary that broke the public finances and the worst education secretary in the history of the Scottish parliament”.

Mr Ross, whose party threw its support behind the Scottish Labour motion, was forced to apologise to Mr Swinney after referring to him as “not so honest John” in the Holyrood chamber.

Mr Ross was first reprimanded for referring to Mr Swinney as “honest John”, but when presiding officer Alison Johnstone reminded him not to use nicknames, he said: “Oh sorry, I thought it was on accuracy because it would be not so honest John with some of the things we’ve heard recently.”

Apologising, Mr Ross said: “I will apologise. I’m very sorry for any hurt caused.”

The Scottish Tory leader added: “Whether we have a bitter battle or a cosy coronation to elect the next leader of the SNP, they will continue campaigning for independence and the Scottish people will continue to be failed by them.”