Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what discussions he has had with the Lord Chancellor on resuming the suspension of housing possession claims, which ended on 20 September 2020.

Housing possession claims are able to be heard through the courts, but evictions will not be enforced apart from in the most serious cases. The Government believes this strikes the right balance between prioritising public health and supporting the most vulnerable renters, whilst ensuring landlords can access and exercise their right to justice.

Bailiffs have been asked not to enforce evictions across England whilst the new national restrictions apply from 5 November. The only exceptions to this will be the most egregious cases, including cases of illegal occupation, fraud, where tenants have demonstrated anti-social behaviour or are the perpetrator of domestic abuse in social housing, and where a property is unoccupied following the death of a tenant. We also intend to introduce an exemption for extreme pre-Covid rent arrears and will provide more detail in due course.

Together with the pause on evictions starting in December, this means that evictions will not be enforced in England until 11 January at the earliest, except in the most serious circumstances. To further protect renters over winter, we legislated in August to increase notice periods to 6 months in all but the most serious circumstances. This means that most tenants served notice now would not be asked to leave until at least May 2021.

These measures build on the Government’s major economic package of support, including assistance for businesses to pay wages which has now been extended to March 2021; boosting the welfare safety-net by more than £9 billion; increasing Local Housing Allowance rates to the 30th percentile; and providing £180 million funding for Discretionary Housing Payments, for local authorities to distribute to support renters needing additional help.