Ban on residential evictions extended by two months
Housing Secretary, Robert Jenrick, has announced that the Government’s ban on eviction proceedings will be extended until 23rd August 2020. This is a two month extension which brings the moratorium on evictions to five months in total.
Mr Jenrick tweeted “Eviction hearings will not be heard in courts until the end of August & nobody will be evicted from their home this summer due to coronavirus”.
In practice, however, this means that many landlords find themselves unable to lawfully evict tenants for a five month period (or more) even in circumstances where there have been serious breaches of the tenancy agreement that preceded the COVID-19 pandemic.
Further, many commentators have been critical that the extension is simply delaying the inevitable, and does not resolve the underlying problem. Those who have fallen behind with rent arrears may find that the level of arrears is insurmountable when the moratorium is eventually lifted.
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