How the next mayor can crack down on London’s criminal landlords
With candidates for London Mayor starting to set out their pledges, we reveal that half of London’s boroughs did not fine any landlords for letting out unsafe homes in the past year.
Join our campaign to demand the candidates fix the city’s renting crisis.
The winner of the mayoral election could step up the fight against criminal landlords overnight by letting tenants check online if their home needs and has a licence. An estimated 130,000 private rented homes in London do not have the correct licence, making 1 in 8 private renters eligible for a refund of rent. Those are good odds.
How new rent controls could work
The biggest talking point of Jeremy Corbyn’s speech to Labour Party conference this week was rent controls. Since 2014 Labour has been proposing to limit rises in rents during tenancies, but there was something different this time around.
This is what the Labour leader said on Wednesday:
We will control rents – when the younger generation’s housing costs are three times more than those of their grandparents, that is not sustainable. Rent controls exist in many cities across the world and I want our cities to have those powers too and tenants to have those protections.
Homes not hotels – what happens next
The damage that Airbnb-style lets is doing to our communities is becoming clearer. Last week, the Guardian revealed that in parts of London, Edinburgh, Devon and the Lake District, one in every four homes is listed as a holiday let.
As we told them, this is depriving communities of much needed homes.
What’s on offer for renters tomorrow?
Tomorrow is polling day! Before you cast your vote, here’s a round up of the policies from each party’s manifesto on the issues we’ve been campaigning on since the last election
The new Parliament must end the renting crisis
Last night, Boris Johnson won a landslide victory. He must take this opportunity to end the renting crisis.
Smaller parties manifesto round up
We’ve looked at what the SNP, Plaid Cymru, the DUP and the Brexit Party – parties that are only standing in parts of the UK – have to offer renters.
Three of these parties are only standing in nations where housing issues are devolved, so they understandably have less interest in housing at this election, but there are some issues – like housing benefit – that are decided by Westminster for the whole of the UK.
Conservative Party Manifesto: What can renters expect?
In the final instalment of our manifesto reviews, we take a look at what the Conservative Party has to offer private renters.
Labour’s Manifesto – Real Change for Renters?
Next in our series of manifesto reviews, we delve into the Labour Party’s pledges to assess what they offer for private renters.
What is your vote worth? Renters could make a difference in these seats
2.4 million private renters could miss out on voting at the General Election if they don’t register to vote by midnight tomorrow.
Private renters move house more frequently than homeowners, and as a result, just 58% are correctly registered, compared with 91% of homeowners, according to figures by the Electoral Commission. Many renters are on contracts of just 12 months, and private renters are six times more likely to move in a given year than homeowners.
We’ve worked out which Parliamentary seats could be decided by private renters on 12 December – the seats in orange and brown have more unregistered private renters than the number of votes the last MP won by.
Parliament abolishes £410m-a-year scam
The House of Commons has read letting agent fees their last rites! This afternoon MPs voted to approve the final version of the Tenant Fees Bill signed off last week by the House of Lords.
From 1 June, private renters moving home will no longer have to pay fees to start a new tenancy in England. Agents will only be able to ask for rent, and refundable holding and security deposits (capped at 1 week’s rent and 5 weeks’ rent respectively). The only exemptions are fees to cover the cost of lost keys, late rent payments, changing the name on a tenancy or ending a tenancy early.