Covid-19: Poverty and Mass Evictions

Baroness Grender Excerpts

Thursday 22nd April 2021 Grand Committee

[Baroness Grender (LD)]

My Lords, I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Bird, on his moving opening speech, on securing this all-important debate and on his work during this pandemic, in particular the Ride Out Recession Alliance. As he rightly said, the greatest danger of homelessness is among people leaving the rented sector, particularly the private rented sector, but I align myself totally with the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, and the noble Baroness, Lady Blower, about the all-important safety net of housing for social rent.

On Monday, in this very Room, we debated the latest piecemeal approach to evictions—or “stopgap actions”, as the noble Lord, Lord Bird, described them. While there is a stay on bailiffs enforcing evictions at present, it is the mere tip of the iceberg. According to Generation Rent, as the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, just said, around 700,000 people have received an eviction notice since March 2020. Can the Minister tell us what information he is using to ensure that only the most egregious cases are currently ending in eviction? When Tim Farron MP asked for a process, such as a register of evictions from landlords, he was told that that was not an option. Why not?

Gemma Marshall, who lives in the West Country, has recently been served with her second Section 21 in two years. She has an autistic son aged nine who struggles with change. She and hundreds of thousands like her have been forced to move during this pandemic. What advice does the Minister have for those tenants, and when will we see an end to this arbitrary eviction process?

Finally, arrears are now one of the most significant challenges for both tenants and landlords, as we heard from the noble Baronesses, Lady Warwick and Lady Gardner of Parkes, and the noble Lord, Lord Whitty. Citizens Advice tells us that it would take an average of seven years for the people who come to it to pay off their debts. They desperately need a financial package; I support the noble Lord, Lord Young of Cookham, in asking for an investigation into the viability of the kind of packages that we have seen in Wales and Scotland. As the noble Baroness, Lady Andrews, and the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, said in reference to the Commons Select Committee, this modest financial package of between £200 million and £300 million pales into insignificance in comparison with the subsidy for home owners during this period. As the Resolution Foundation has pointed out, the majority of tenants now in arrears do not qualify for the current system of DHP support. By the way, on DHP, the £180 million has not been increased since the pandemic began.

We will hear some arguments about balance between landlords and tenants where the Government are somehow acting as the honest broker. I dispute that because, as the National Residential Landlords Association says, this Government are clearly breaking their promise that

“no renter who has lost income due to coronavirus will be forced out of their home.”

It is time to fulfil that promise and, as the noble Lord, Lord Bird, said, deliver a long-term plan.