Public Health (Coronavirus) (Protection from Eviction) (England) (No. 2) Regulations 2021

Baroness Greengross Excerpts

Thursday 18th March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Greengross (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I welcome and support this regulation, laid before the House on 19 February, which further extends the eviction ban during the Covid-19 restrictions. I do so, however, with some trepidation about the long-term implications of this crisis for renters and landlords in this country.

Figures from Generation Rent show that one in three private renters have lost income because of the Covid-19 pandemic, and half a million of these people are currently behind on rental payments. We know that increasing numbers of young people are in private rental accommodation, but so, too, are many older people—there are more than 750,000 private renters over 60 years of age in the UK. The extension of the current eviction ban through this regulation does not apply to tenants who are six months or more in arrears. We know that many of these people will be in dire financial situations or at a very high risk of becoming homeless.

At the start of the pandemic, the Government managed to house all the homeless people in London in temporary accommodation, meaning that, for the first time in decades, there was a significant reduction in the number of rough sleepers in the city. But more recently, the number of people sleeping on the city streets has increased again. Given the number of empty office buildings in the city—many of which may remain empty even after restrictions lift due to increased levels of remote working—we now need to look at how buildings can be repurposed to house the homeless. Also, how can we support businesses to facilitate this change where appropriate?

This is not an easy issue and the Government have done the right thing in stopping evictions at this time —but other measures are going to be needed to ensure that there is no explosion of rough sleeping and homelessness, once this eviction ban ends.