News article
Private tenants see eviction orders soar
13 August 2012 | Topics: none
New figures show there has been a 33% rise in court orders to evict private tenants over the past two years.
Crisis analysed Ministry of Justice statistics to reveal that in the last year 36,211 landlords have been granted a court order to evict their tenants, up 12% on the previous 12 months, and 33% higher than the 27,134 court orders granted two years ago.
Duncan Shrubsole, Director of Policy at Crisis, said: “Sadly it is no surprise that we are seeing tens of thousands of private tenants facing eviction. They face a dreadful combination of high unemployment and underemployment, draconian cuts to housing benefit and soaring rents. Our concern is that many of these people will have nowhere to turn, and end up falling victim to homelessness. In fact government’s own statistics point to this already happening.”
Crisis’ concerns for these evicted private tenants are borne out by latest statutory homelessness statistics which show that between 2009 and 2011 the number of people approaching their council as homeless due to the end of an Assured Shorthold Tenancy or rent arrears went up by 42%, to almost 10,000 households.
Recent findings from the National Landlords Association also paint a picture of struggling households in the private rented sector, with 49% of landlords experiencing rental arrears over the last year.
Shrubsole continued: “We are calling on the government to rethink cuts to housing benefit that will inevitably leave increasing numbers of people unable to pay the rent. We are also in desperate need of more social and affordable housing in order to rein in the soaring rental market.”
Sign up to become a Crisis campaigner.