Legislation announcement

In Plenary on Tuesday, Rhun ap Iorwerth announced new legislation, which included the following statement

“the value my Government places on fairness has motivated us to take action to strengthen the rights of tenants in the private rented sector. We will initially bring forward legislation focusing on strengthening our enforcement framework and the regulatory role of Rent Smart Wales, as well as requiring the sharing of rent data. This will lay the groundwork for more substantial changes that will improve housing affordability, make rents fairer, and limit no-fault evictions, to be brought forward later in this Senedd term. We’re also developing proposals to legislate for the right to adequate housing, because nobody should be forced to suffer the anxiety and unacceptable stigma that so often comes with having nowhere to call home.”

Looking back at the first 100 days manifesto, there are no great surprises here.  We get a bit more about “making renting fairer” through the equally eliptical “strengthening our enforcement framework”.  However, if that means civil penalties and revolutionising enforcement, I am all for it.  We will need to wait and see what it means.  The sharing of rent data actually is the least sexy but probably the most impactful proposal because it will have a significant impact on rental markets (at least potentially, and it rather depends how it is handled).  It is equally interesting that that the “more substantial changes” including making rents “fairer” and “limiting” no fault evictions have been put back to later on.   Given the ramifications of rent regulation/control, it seems sensible to put that back.

He emphasised that he was seeking consensus and working together.  As he put it in debate on the proposals: “There is further legislation that this Government would wish to introduce to protect renters further, but I think it’s important that we keep an eye on how we can build consensus on the need to protect renters in this key sector”.  This is a developing programme – he said that Tuesday’s announcement was for the first 18 months.

One other equally unsexy part of that announcement, but one which will be of interest to housing law nerds, is that Tribunal law reform is promised to bring procedures in line with each other and a more coherent/consistent set of practices.  That will have an impact on the enforcement of the landlord and tenant legislation potentially.

[Do forgive the slightly shorter post this week – I’m just back from a couple of days leave]