Labour renting reforms ‘tinkering at the edges’, leading lawyer claims

David Smith of JMW Solicitors says property law in England is a "mess" and the market "dysfunctional".

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The Government’s overhaul of the private rental sector is just “tinkering at the margins”, according to a leading property lawyer.

David Smith, a Partner at law firm JMW (main picture), said housing law in England was a “mess”, and the property market “dysfunctional”.

Other countries in the UK had tried to “unmess” their property law, but in England that hadn’t happened, he said.

The Renters’ Rights Bill, which was given its second reading in Parliament this week, will ban Section 21 ‘no fault’ evictions, and outlaw bidding wars for rental properties.

I don’t think landlords are the problem.”

But Smith said: “I don’t think landlords are the problem.” A failure by under-funded local authorities to enforce existing regulations is one of the main issues, he told the Shelagh Fogarty show on LBC Radio.

He described enforcement by councils as a “postcode lottery” and a “disaster zone”.

There wasn’t enough housing to resolve the current crisis in the property market, and the Government’s plans to build 1.5 million homes were flawed because there isn’t enough skilled workers to deliver them, he said.

Unworkable

Smith previously warned that the Labour Government would abolish Section 21 notices without improving capacity in the courts.

And he criticised plans to end bidding wars as unworkable, and impossible to enforce. He said there was no evidence a similar measure in New Zealand had made any difference.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer said before taking office that landlords had to be stopped from “driving rents through the roof” and “ripping tenants off”.

Your guide to the main points in the Renters’ Rights Bill


2 Comments

  1. Kier Gloriously Self Unaware Starmer is too busy accepting free Football ticket, glasses, clothes and hospitality to notice how much tosh he has talked.
    Landlords operate in an open market.
    First come first served.
    Sadly we have spent time on four applicants who failed to pass muster.
    We re-advertised and the four subsequent applicants are all now tenants and paying on time.
    I have been a landlord in Northampton for28 years and have never experienced “Bidding Wars.”
    Is this just another Loch Ness Monster story?
    A distraction from the fact that we do not have enough properties to rent and not enough skilled tradesmen & women to build them.

    1. I have experienced “bidding wars” but not initiated by me , the agent but by the tenants themselves. When demand exceeds supply and there are others all looking at the same property, it’s the tenants who then offer a higher price, hoping to secure the property. We have never accepted this, as we feel, (like with retail shops], the price offered is the price to accept. However we will then choose not the highest offer but the best tenant. That’s our duty as agents for the landlord, to find the tenant who we hope will maintain the property and pay the rent. We have done this consistently for 40 years and we have hardly ever experienced any unpaid rents. Most tenants do their best to clean for the next tenant. Nearly all tenants get their deposits back in full.

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