MPs back our call for better rented housing
Bad landlords crackdown plea
A SUNDAY Mirror fight to make rented homes safer has been backed by MPs.
A Commons debate led by Labour’s Ian Byrne piled pressure on the Government to stop dithering over moves to hit bad landlords.
Our Safe as Houses campaign demands a national landlords register and an end to “no-fault” evictions and death-trap houses. Mr Byrne acted after we reported the plight of two of his Liverpool constituents. Alexa-Leigh Blakemore, seven, has brain damage after a fireplace a landlord refused to fix fell on her. And mum Claire Wanless, 29, faces a no fault eviction for complaining about a cannabis farm left in her loft. Other furious MPs told of rental scandals – from cockroachinfested cots to a mum in a mouldridden flat with no heating or hot water.
Since 2019, when the Tories vowed to scrap no-fault evictions, 25,000 families have been kicked MP Ian out. Labour’s angry Ellie
Reeves said a wrongly evicted constituent had thought of suicide. A no-fault ban is expected in a delayed Renters’ Reform Bill. Mr Byrne, set to meet housing minister Stuart Andrew, said: “We must remind ourselves it is 2022, not 1822.” Shelter said: “The Bill must be brought forward.”