Public Health (Coronavirus) (Protection from Eviction) (England) Regulations 2021

David Lammy Excerpts

Tuesday 26th January 2021 General Committees

[Mr David Lammy (Tottenham) (Lab)]

Mr Paisley,

“no one should lose their home as a result of the coronavirus epidemic.”

So said the Government’s Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, the right hon. Member for Newark (Robert Jenrick), last March. It was an honourable sentiment, which rightly enjoyed the support of those on both sides of this House. Unfortunately, in the months since, we have witnessed the Government’s promise be broken again and again.

Between the start of April and the end of November 2020, 207,543 households approached their local councils for help with homelessness or the threat of homelessness. Of those, 50,561 were judged to be threatened with homelessness; 70,309 were already homeless. Ministry of Justice statistics show no possessions were recorded between April and September, but clearly those numbers are hiding the reality on our streets. Most people leave their homes before their case ever gets to court, let alone wait for a bailiff.

A dangerous cocktail of illegal evictions, tenants put under pressure to leave before eviction, and pressure on lodgers—who have never had protection—has meant that hundreds of thousands have faced the indignity of the threat of homelessness.

Why does the Minister think it is right to allow tenants to be kicked out for arrears that they have built up since the start of the pandemic? This breaks the Housing Secretary’s promise. Why does the Minister think it is right to extend the ban on evictions only to 21 February, when we know that restrictions on our liberty, lives and work will go on for much longer than that? That breaks the Housing Secretary’s promise. Why does the Minister think that there is a difference in seriousness between this lockdown and March’s lockdown, when his Government put in place a clear ban on evictions? That again breaks the Housing Secretary’s promise.

Instead of creating another cliff edge just a few weeks away, we need a package of support for renters and home owners to ensure that nobody loses their home because of the pandemic. It is time to extend the ban on evictions and repossessions, extend mortgage holidays, make the six-month notice period that will soon come to an end permanent, raise the local housing allowance to cover median market rates, reform housing law to end automatic evictions through the courts, reduce the waiting period to receive support for mortgage interest payments, retain the £20 uplift to universal credit, end the five-week wait and suspend the benefits cap.

People are facing the biggest crisis of a generation because of this Government’s incompetent management of the pandemic. The last thing they need now is to lose their homes. Labour will not oppose the regulations today, because any extension to the eviction ban is better than none, but we will not vote for them either, because we are urging the Government to go further—to stick to their promises and not let anyone else lose their home.