Generation Rent and members of the Renters Reform Coalition handed a letter into 10 Downing Street today to urge Boris Johnson to end unfair evictions for good in 2022 and announce a Renters’ Reform Bill in next Tuesday’s Queens Speech.

A quarter of a million landlords are letting families live in homes that are so expensive to heat they are illegal to let out. We estimate tenants in properties across England to be spending £321 million more this year on energy bills than they would if their homes met basic standards.

Councils that require landlords to be licensed take more than twice as much enforcement action as those that don’t.

Moving home is expensive - it's even worse when you have no choice in the matter. Unwanted moves are costing private renters in England £229m per year. 

A sharp rise in properties being let out as holiday homes, has meant that renters around the UK are being priced out of their own local communities, our latest research has found. And renters in Scotland, Wales and the South West of England are the worst hit.

The ban on most evictions was lifted this week and the notice period on Section 21 evictions has been reduced from 6 months to 4 months. But if your landlord has failed to provide you with certain documents you could be protected from eviction - up to three quarters of renters, according to our latest research.  

Our new research has also revealed the lack of knowledge about rights among private renters, which the first Renters' Rights Awareness Week, taking place on 14-20 June, aims to change.

One in 12 private renters has been given notice to move out without a reason since March 2020, a new poll by Survation reveals today.

The survey, commissioned by us, indicates that as many as 694,000 private tenants have been served with a Section 21 notice during the pandemic, which allows landlords to evict tenants without needing a reason.

The survey also found that one in three private renters fears that they will lose their home in the year ahead – which represents nearly 3 million adults in England.

Half a million private renter households are losing £53m a month because the benefits system is failing to cover their rent. That is the shocking finding from our latest report on the impact of coronavirus on private renters.

Between February and August the number of private renters claiming benefits increased by 36% - or 507,000 households.

Two in five private renters (42%) – 1.9m households – now rely on Universal Credit or Housing Benefit to pay their rent, but miserly benefit rates mean that 538,000 households can’t cover their rent.

More than 340,000 private renters in Great Britain work in sectors at risk of lay-offs when the furlough scheme ends. This will add to the numbers of people who cannot cover their rent because housing benefit levels are inadequate, and are at risk of arrears and eviction.

We are calling on the government to raise Local Housing Allowance to cover the median rent so that families do not get into debt and to set up a fund to clear the debts of renters who have already got into serious arrears by compensating landlords up to 80% of the rent owed. We are also calling for fast-track abolition of Section 21 “no fault” evictions to prevent unnecessary hardship now that courts have reopened.

At the end of August, courts were poised to reopen for eviction cases. Tenants who had been served an eviction notice during lockdown would have been left with no more protection from losing their home. 

We continued to push the government to make good on its promise to keep people in their homes. One renter, Nichola, who faces eviction with her two daughters, spoke out and started a petition that got nearly 40,000 signatures. At the eleventh hour, the government announced a one-month extension of the evictions ban until 20th September. It also extended the notice that landlords must now give tenants to six months, as of 29 August. 

But the respite will be short-lived. Tenants who have been asked to leave are still facing huge uncertainty. And because so many people have lost income in since the pandemic started, prospects are grim.