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TODAY'S OTHER NEWS

Shelter and tenants’ group set up city Fair Renting campaign

Shelter and tenants’ group in a major city have mobilised to set up a campaign called Fair Renting.

The campaign is focussed on Bristol, where some 30 per cent of households are now believed to be in the private rental sector, accounting for around 134,000 people according to a Shelter figure.

In blogs and publicity material the campaigners claim that there are three major themes driving their activities.

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First that local rents are ”out of control and disproportionate to incomes”; secondly that “disrepair and poor, unsafe conditions are a common issue for renters”; and thirdly that “many of us are locked out of private renting, due to the discrimination we face based on our age, sex, race, disability, type of employment or type of income.”

A Shelter blog goes on to accuse the city’s “unfair private renting system” of “driving poverty and homelessness and breaking up communities.”

The campaign claims that since 2011 rents in the city have risen by an average of 52 per cent, whereas wages have risen 24 per cent.

Ahead of next week’s local elections for a Mayor and councillors, the campaign says it wants all candidates to take a zero-tolerance approach to discrimination in the private rented sector, and, if elected, to make this a formal remit of Bristol council’s Rogue Landlord and Letting Agent Unit.

 

It also demands that local mayoral candidates “acknowledge that private rents are out of control, and state what you will do to tackle high rents” and wants the council to lobby the Westminster government to develop long-term solutions to make private rents more affordable, including giving local authorities power to impose rent controls. 

It also wants the council to be more pro-active in enforcing legislation against landlords and agents, and back tenants who take complaints about agents to The Property Ombudsman or the Property Redress Scheme.

Want to comment on this story? If so...if any post is considered to victimise, harass, degrade or intimidate an individual or group of individuals on any basis, then the post may be deleted and the individual immediately banned from posting in future.

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    'Shelter and tenants' Groups' seem to forget that the PRS is just that - Private. They should focus their attention on getting more social housing built as this will not only stop rents rising but also create LLs with a social duty. The PRS is a profit making sector and due to the extra costs heaped on LLs by the Govt their costs, and so their rents, keep rising. Many LLs are not hugely rich and just trying to supplement their pay or pension. They do not have a duty to house people or to offer low rents - that is for the Social Housing Sector. Only when we invest in that area will rents stabilise - although there is no guarantee these will be decent houses, well maintained if recent revelations are to be believed!

    Andrew McCausland

    What an excellent reply - well said Tricia Urquhart!

     
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    I just want to echo part of what you have said as I could not agree more.we do not have to house the public at low rents. When will people wake up and accept that this is a fault of government. Buck passing and bashing a group of people with the power of the state.

     
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    Hear, hear, well said!

     
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    I thing its wonderful all those knocker groups continuously attack Private LL's while supply no Housing themselves its a bad joke. Private LL's House millions of Tenants in good quality affordable accommodation in the main, so how can they now turn around and accuse private LL's of locking they out ?. When they are in complain so not happy if not in complain that they are not in. The market decides the rent or the property sits vacant is that simple enough. London have a glut of housing but not to worry Build more & more, property is selling but not enough or not quick, some sitting there. Build to rent Flats many vacant can't shift despite all the help & push even with the destroy traditional LL policy who have houses with gardens, so those Flats are not required never mind keep Building more convert Industrial and Commercial as well, we now have a fake Mayoral election in London where each Candidate is going to Build more than the other, so we wont be voting no one worthy of a vote its ridiculous we can't have people with proper policy,s.

  • Mark Wilson

    local rents are ”out of control and disproportionate to incomes''.

    This is a problem that isn't going away.

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    Maybe it's the incomes that need to increase and not the rents reducing, high rents have been caused by governments policies .

     
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    • 27 April 2021 10:23 AM

    That's market forces at play. Nothing is "out of control". The price is the price, take it or leave it.

     
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    Shelter the biggest confidence trick in all of the housing sector or should I say (non supplying housing) If properties were cheaper to run ie less interference from tax and legislation rents would be cheaper think about it. More houses need to be built. This shameful organisation is blatantly ignoring this important fact blinded by its mission based on the politics of envy to persecute the landlord. Sum result will be less homes for tenants and the tenants themselves are beginning to realise that organisations like Shelter are causing them a problem.

    P.S Need to buy a load of material today and it won’t be from B&Q

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    As we like to say Jahan . Shelter the charity ( business) that houses no one.

     
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    Don’t agree Mark, many of my rents are less than 8 years ago.
    I also know there’s a big disparity between rents in similar properties in the same areas or even the same roads as much as £600. pm, don’t know how to call this but it’s the way it is.

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    • 27 April 2021 10:29 AM

    What is wrong with those parasites? Private sector rent prices are driven by market forces. End of. That's my opinion and I'm free to say it.

  • PossessionFriendUK PossessionFriend

    Its Demand that's out of control, caused by the equally 'Out of control reason - Immigration.
    Of course lots of other factors too, like Tricia said, additional costs levied at the campaign of. - yes, so-called Tenant support groups that are raising rents !
    ( But they don't tell tenants that ! - None so blind as them that cannot see )

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    Shelter £15m Government Grant to help make up £60m pot. It seems 45 in-House Solicitors 25 legal Advisers, 30 support staff to interfere & fight against LL evictions on Court, 21p in the £1 collected to raise further funds, what chance have we got, we are up against a massive legal team. They say they follow fund raising codes to be fair open honest & legal, so that’s what it must be then ?.

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    Spot on

     
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    For fairness, and equality, PRS LL’s Demand that Shelter pays the govt grant of £15m to All tenants who have lost income during CoVID19, and are facing an eviction.
    My point:
    It’s unlikely that this money will be paid to LL’s, but as a Landlord,
    I will certainly like to see how Shelter’s solicitors and legal advisors would recover it from those tenants. Popcorn🍿ready.

     
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    Shelter fair renting campaign?

    They can campaign to rent as many fairs as they want, but I'll decide on the rents for my properties based on market forces, which I think is the fairest method.

    Incidentally, I thought Shelter supported rent evasion, not rent payment?

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