Private landlords will no longer be able to evict tenants at short notice without good reason under new government plans. The change is intended to protect renters from “unethical” landlords and give them more long-term security.

At the moment Section 21 notices allow landlords to evict renters without a reason at the end of their fixed-term tenancy. Under the government's new plans, landlords would have to provide a “concrete, evidenced reason already specified in law” in order to bring tenancies to an end.

First Minister Mark Drakeford has announced similar plans for Wales, while in Scotland new rules requiring landlords to give a reason for ending tenancies were introduced in 2017. There are no plans in Northern Ireland to end no-fault evictions where a fixed-term tenancy has come to an end.

Housing reforms risk hurting tenants
However, landlords are warning of “serious dangers” to the supply of rental housing for vulnerable tenants as a result of these planned reforms to rental housing. David Smith, policy director at the Residential Landlords Association (RLA) said: “Whilst the RLA recognises the pressure being placed on Government for change, there are serious dangers of getting such reforms wrong. With the demand for private rented homes continuing to increase, we need the majority of good landlords to have confidence to invest in new homes. This means ensuring they can swiftly repossess properties for legitimate reasons such as rent arrears, tenant anti-social behaviour or wanting to sell them. This needs to happen before any moves are made to end Section 21.