Just like the Conservative government before them, Labour has promised to put an end to Section 21 ‘no fault’ evictions. But the promise to private landlords that there will be no introduction of rent controls, will provide little reassurance to the thousands of families stuck for years on the housing list, no longer able to rent privately or find affordable housing.
Last year I found myself served a Section 21 eviction notice, having been told that my landlord had wanted to sell the house. A year later, the same house was back on the market but for almost three times the amount in rent we had been paying.
The house, which we had become our family home for seven years for less than £1,000 rent per month, was listed last month for £2,400. We were very lucky to have found another place to rent before we were forced out by bailiffs, but so many families are not.
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Even if the previous government had abolished Section 21 before we were served our notice, it would have still been valid due to the clause allowing such evictions if the reason given was for the sale of the property. The finer details of Labour ’s plans and how thhey differ from the Tories ‘ Renters Reform Bill that never became law are yet to be confirmed.
People leaving the private rental market is currently the number one reason for homelessness in our city. While an end to Section 21 is a change that would be welcomed by anyone who has experienced the insecurity that comes with being a private renter, it will not solve the crisis of affordability, which is seeing families forced out of the private rental sector.
Afterall, Section 21 is nothing new and came as a shock to me when I had the same experience in Bristol in 2016, when my youngest child was still a baby. Although it was a highly stressful experience having to suddenly move house after less than one year, we had multiple viewings and were able to find a similar property locally in less than two months.
Although in theory Section 21 gives renters two months to leave, if they are unable to find somewhere to live in that time, they could remain in the house for a year or more before they are served the court papers that allow bailiffs to evict them. But despite that, many people are still unable to find a new place to live.
We have been told for many years in Bristol that more homes need to be built to solve our housing crisis. But when the vast majority of houses built are for sale or private rental, the few new affordable homes do very little to bring down the city’s growing waiting list figures.
There are now so many people stuck in temporary housing in Bristol that the council is running out of temporary housing options. Even if the previous local Labour administration or new national Labour government actually had the backbone to build and invest in council housing again, buy up properties and put some serious work into putting empty properties back into use, it would take some years before such action could solve the current crisis.
If rent controls were introduced it would reduce the current pressure on the country’s dwindling social housing stock, which has not seen any genuine investment since the 1960s. We have been losing council housing for many decades not only as a result of Margaret Thatcher’s ‘Right to Buy’ policy but also through the simple fact that very few new council houses have been built for decades.
Right to Buy was introduced in the 1980s and gave council tenants the right to buy their home at a discounted rate. It was coupled with legislation that restricted the power and resources available to local governments to build and manage social housing. This resulted in the number of new social homes being built falling by 50 per cent in just three years and last year we lost 11,700 more social homes than were gained.
Despite the desperate situation we find ourselves in both locally and nationally, there has been no serious protest movement organised to pressure the government into making the changes that we need. In 1915 it was the workers and housewives of Glasgow who took matters into their own hands when faced with crippling rent increases, which resulted in rent control legislation being passed by the UK government.
They organised mass protests, refused to pay rent, resisted evictions and even held pickets outside empty homes to prevent them from being let to new tenants who had agreed to pay the rent increases. The end result was change in legislation that benefited private renters across the UK and by the end of that year a law was passed allowing for rent controls and restrictions on mortgage interest rates.