Scottish Greens urge landlords to stop evictions during winter

The Scottish Greens are demanding that ALL landlords halt evictions during the winter months to show “compassion and kindness.”

The party, which was in a coalition with the SNP, previously supported an eviction ban that lasted until March this year, pausing evictions for six months.

The Scottish Green Party claims that the end of this eviction ban will leave more tenants at risk of homelessness.

Urge every landlord to be compassionate this winter

Scottish Greens spokesperson for housing Ariane Burgess MSP, claims the eviction ban will hurt tenants.

She said: “We brought in a rent freeze and evictions ban in 2022 to ease the financial pressures and stress of insecure tenancies for people during the pandemic.

“Now, both the freeze and ban have ended. The forthcoming Housing Bill should offer stronger rights for tenants, but I fear that what we will get is a watered down version of the bill by the Scottish government.

“This winter there is a real threat of more tenancies ending abruptly and more people facing homelessness as a result. That is why we need robust and permanent protections.

“In the meantime, I urge every landlord and others across the rental sector to be compassionate this winter; to avoid evictions and ensure that everyone has a warm, safe place to call home over the festive season and beyond.”

Number of tenants facing eviction was more than double

Critics have called the Scottish government’s previous eviction ban and rent cap a “sham,” pointing out that the number of tenants facing eviction was actually more than double the usual amount while the ban was in place.

David Alexander, the chief executive of DJ Alexander, said of the eviction ban: “Unfortunately this situation was entirely predictable but is terrible news for thousands of tenants who have been let down by a policy which has never been shown to work anywhere and is always detrimental to the renters.

“No country in the world has been able to make a rent freeze and eviction ban work because such policies always result in a reduction of the available number of properties resulting in greater demand and higher rents.

“Anecdotally the rent freeze coupled with an eviction ban may also have led some tenants to believe that they no longer needed to pay rent as they could not lose their home.

“This is not the case as so many hundreds of people are finding out.”

Despite clear evidence that rent controls don’t work, the Scottish government plans to introduce a new rent cap system through the Scottish Housing Bill, which passed its first reading earlier this year.

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