BENEFITS claimants will find it easier to rent homes under new laws announced today.
Landlords will be banned from flat-out refusing people on housing benefits, as well as families with kids.
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And dodgy owners will further be banned from chucking out their tenants for no reason at short notice.
The notice period for rent increases will be doubled to stop greedy landlords suddenly whacking up prices.
The crackdown is the centrepiece of the Housing Secretary’s “New Deal” for renters being launched in a White Paper.
Housing Secretary Michael Gove said: “For too long many private renters have been at the mercy of unscrupulous landlords who fail to repair homes and let families live in damp, unsafe and cold properties, with the threat of unfair ‘no fault’ eviction orders hanging over them.”
Tougher standards for private rentals will be imposed to save thousands of families from living in squalor.
More than half a million renters live in dingy homes that pose a serious health risk.
Councils will be handed tougher powers to dish out harsher fines for the worst landlords and to claw back money for short-changed tenants.
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And landlords will no longer be able to point blank ban their tenants from keeping pets
They cannot refuse a request for an animal friend without a good reason.
Labour’s Lisa Nandy said: “The Government still has no long-term plan to fix problem of unaffordable rents.
“In government, Labour will rebalance the power between tenant and landlord to make tenancies secure and affordable, and to give people more control over their homes.”
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