Eviction of tenants in the social rented sector: Protection of tenants with rent arrears

Shelter Scotland believes that eviction for rent arrears should be a measure used only as a last resort. Currently 95% of all evictions are for rent arrears and in many cases more could be done to resolve the dispute before it goes to court.

While eviction as a last resort may happen in some cases, it often costs more to carry out than the tenants' arrears and can compound social and financial hardship for individuals and families.

- The Scottish Government has identified significant variation in eviction policy and practice across Scotland. With around 3,200 evictions for rent arrears in 2008/2009 and disparate rates of eviction in different areas, there is no consistency in the interpretation of 'last resort' across all social landlords.

- We have pushed for reforms to eviction policy to give tenants in the social rented sector the same rights and protection as home owners through the introduction of Pre Action Requirements (PARs) in the Home Owner and Debtor Protection (Scotland) Act 2010. We propose similar PARs for social tenants.

- PARs would be a series of steps that landlords would have to take in order for an eviction decree to be granted and would ensure early action has been taken to resolve the conflict in the best interests of the landlord and tenant.

- Shelter Scotland firmly believes that the introduction of Pre-Action Requirements would reduce the number of evictions and potentially reduce local authority expenditure on unnecessary court hearings and eviction proceedings.

- While the introduction of PARs would mean an amendment to the existing Housing (Scotland) Bill, it only seeks to reflect existing good practice and ensure there is a consistent response to potential evictions from all social landlords.

- We welcome the range of options laid out in this consultation and believe they are far from mutually exclusive. We support these reforms as part of a package of modernisation and believe they put emphasis on early intervention and the avoidance of eviction wherever possible.