The Renter’s Rights Bill is set to become law in the Autumn. With 2.3 million landlords and 11 million private renters in England, this landmark legislation aims to give renters greater security and stability. It also seeks to improve standards in the private rented sector and strengthen local authorities’ enforcement powers.
Ahead of the Bill’s royal assent, we sat down with lawyer and Bond Solon trainer Geraint Jones, to find out a little more the Bill and its impact on housing departments.
Q. Hello Geraint, please can you start by telling us more about the Bill’s advantages for housing departments?
Whilst primarily introduced to address the private renting crisis and rebalance the rights and responsibilities of landlords and tenants, there are notable advantages for local authorities as well.
Firstly, the Bill increases the powers of local authorities to investigate landlords – for example by entering business premises and obtaining information from third parties such as banks.
Secondly, the period for which landlords can be required to make rent repayment orders has been doubled to two years and extended to new offences such as illegal evictions and violations of property standards (for example, failing to maintain a safe and warm home and tenant discrimination). In addition, the value of civil penalties has been increased from £30,000 to £40,000. The funds generated from these fines can be used to give local authorities greater power to enforce standards, for example, by hiring additional staff.
Q. And I believe this will all be covered in our Rogue Landlord’s course, which you co-authored. Can you tell us more about the course?
Yes, we’ve incorporated the new Bill into the Rogue Landlord course and will be covering the key provisions.
The course itself is a two-day course and is designed to be of benefit to both experienced housing officers and newer members of the team. We start off by covering the key legislation like The Housing Act 2004, Housing and Planning Act 2016 and the new Bill. We then cover key enforcement tools such as civil penalties, rent repayment orders and landlord banning orders.
Delegates will have the opportunity to put this into practice through a series of case studies that focus on drafting civil penalties and applications for rent repayment orders and banning orders. Of interest to more experienced housing officers we also provide a case law update and a summary of current tribunal trends.
Q. What are the benefits of attending this course for housing officers?
We hope that by attending this course, housing officers will gain confidence in using the enforcement tools available to them. We also hope that by looking at the approach the Tribunal takes to these cases they can avoid investigative pitfalls that could lead to adverse court judgments.
Q. The feedback has been very positive so far. What observations have you made when delivering the courses?
It’s been hugely rewarding delivering these courses and meeting and learning from the housing officers on the front line. My overall impression is that whilst housing officers are aware of the law, because of the huge work pressures they face, they lack confidence in using some of the very effective enforcement tools available to them. It’s gratifying seeing these officers leaving the course with renewed enthusiasm about their ability to deal effectively with problem landlords.
Please find some details on the Rogue Landlords course here. If you are interest in exploring this course for your department, please contact one of the Bond Solon team on +44 (0) 20 7549 2549 or info@bondsolon.com.