Older tenants need Renters Reform Bill insists pressu...

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25 October 2023

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By Graham Norwood

TODAY'S OTHER NEWS

Older tenants need Renters Reform Bill insists pressure group

Older private renters must have their voices heard In support of the Renters Reform Bill.

That’s the view of Joanna Elson, chief executive of Independent Age, a national charity providing support for older people facing financial hardship.

“Older renters in financial hardship desperately need greater protections, including an end to discriminatory ‘No DSS’ policies which mean older people no who receive financial support like Pension Credit can be refused housing” she says.

The Bill received its Second Reading in the Commons this week and now goes on to the Committee Stage - where it receives detailed analysis by MPs.

Elson continues: “The UK Government must also quickly implement the promised end to Section 21 ‘no fault’ evictions. Our research shows that in just one month last year, more than 2,600 older private renters were put at risk of homelessness as they were evicted from their home.

“With only two months' notice currently required to be given by landlords, finding somewhere new to live can plunge those affected into unimaginable levels of stress.

“…Older private renters have already waited too long for much-needed security. The Government must not delay any further in giving renters, including those in later life, the rights they deserve.”

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- John McKay
- 25 October 2023 07:11 AM
S21 is a mechanism or process. WHY were those 2600 older tenants evicted? Address the cause(s), not the symptoms.

- Annoyed Landlord
- 25 October 2023 08:31 AM
Everybody has a “Pressure group” except Landlords.

- Tricia Urquhart
- 25 October 2023 08:33 AM
I would imagine the reason a pensioner with pension credit is not allowed to rent a property is more to do with affordability than being in receipt of benefits!
Barry X

25 October 2023 11:09 AM
Yes, plus all the added and utterly unnecessary risks for the landlord in having the self-interested Local Authority involved in the tenancy, interfering now and then - at times very detrimentally indeed for the landlord - and generally screwing it up and making the poor landlord wish s/he never accepted thier otherwise perfectly respectable tenant.

Based on very bitter experience indeed I/we would ONLY consider accepting someone (maybe) on any sort of benefits IF they came with an outstanding, rock-solid, independent Guarantor AND the AST was appropriately modified to completely and properly cutout any potential involvement or intervention of the interfering L/A who - as you should know, are trying to use and abuse us as extra low cost, arms length social housing they can dump people into then keep them there with no, or minimal, rental increases, little or no chance of relocating if needed - unless forcing the poir landlord to evict them (a costly excercise for us and huge waste of time) just so technicslly they didn't become "voluntarily homeless" (the l/a does this just to save money as the new accommodation is usually slightly more expensive, plus they can postpone their paperwork admin at the landlord's expense)....

Oh, and if anything goes wrong with their benefit claim, (even a year or two after it alledgedly happened) did you know the L/A might have the legal right to DEMAND you REPAY potentially months of rent to them earned long ago?!!! Even while just "investigating" and as a "precaution to protect public money"?!

Yes, it's true and has happened to us.

Anyone with both sense & knowledge of the risks & downside would be wise to stay well clear.
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- Barry X
- 25 October 2023 10:51 AM
Older tenants do NOT need the disastrously misconceived, interfering & disruptive "rental reform act"....

What they actually need is a vibrant, well, run, dynamic PRS that attracts good quality landlords insentivised by supportive legislation, fair taxation, not unreasonable red tape, onnourous regulation or risk, and all the reassurances to INSENTIVISE them (rather than detter and drive them/us out) to INVEST in providing respectable well maintained accommodation at the right price and in the right locations to attract and retain them and keep them happy - and paying the rent.

Tenants - in all sectors and catagories, very much including older more long term tenants - would benefit even more than landlords from a well run, well governed, highly insentivised PRS..... our useless, utterly ignorant and incompetant government simply doesn't seem to understand this - or care if it does - and as a result everyone - ultimately tenants most of all (through loss of choice, becoming trapped and unable to move, and spiraling costs for worse quality accommoddation) will inevitably suffer..... while we largely innocent landlords are demonised, defamed and blamed for it all.

Humph. Rant over.... hardly anyone will read this, I know, and obviously nobody who could make a difference, but I feel better for having "published" so I can now be damned!

😀