Rents: Increases

(asked on 19th April 2023) - View Source

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

To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what assessment his Department has made of the implications for its policies of the use of section 13 notices on increasing rent in residential properties in each of the last five years.


Answered by
Rachel Maclean Portrait
Rachel Maclean
This question was answered on 27th April 2023

The Government will introduce a Renters Reform Bill that will deliver the manifesto commitment to end Section 21 'no fault' evictions. This will support a buoyant private rented sector and continued investment, including from institutional investors. We will publish a full Impact Assessment of our proposed reforms alongside the passage of legislation.

Our proposals on rent increases will avoid rent increases being used as a backdoor method of eviction, and allow both parties to negotiate effectively. Nothing in these proposals will prevent landlords being able to increase rents to market prices.

The Government does not publish data on the average time taken for a Section 13 case to be heard. Decisions on Residential Property Tribunal cases in England, including Section 13 cases, from December 2018 onwards can be found here.

To free up court capacity, we will develop an improved dispute resolution offer for the private rented sector (PRS). This includes improving access to redress through a new PRS Ombudsman and increasing the use of mediation.

We are working with the Ministry of Justice to assess the impacts of our reforms on the justice system. We will ensure it works for landlords and tenants, including through increased use of digital and online technologies.

The Ministry of Justice publishes data on the timeliness of possession cases through the county court, but this is not divided into the grounds for eviction which the landlord has used.

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