I think the noble Lord is being disingenuous on this point. There has never been a power of possession applied to owner-occupiers in such cases as there is no landlord-owned property to possess; it is the property of the person living in the house. We have already debated the mechanisms whereby that sort of anti-social behaviour is dealt with both by individuals who might consider themselves victims and by authorities whose job it is to enforce those mechanisms. I do not accept the premise behind the noble Lord’s question.
Existing grounds for possession for anti-social behaviour under the Housing Act 1985 are discretionary. This means that the court may grant possession only if the ground is made out and it considers it reasonable to do so. In practice, this means that a significant amount of time is required for the court to consider the matter, leading to extensive delays. This prolongs the suffering of the victims who have to continue living next door to the perpetrators. Indeed, the evidence
we have suggests that it can take an average of some seven months from application to the grant of a possession order, as the noble Lord said. The provisions in these clauses seek to short-circuit that process by removing the requirement on the landlords to prove to the court that it is reasonable to grant a possession order where criminal or anti-social behaviour has already been proven in another court.
Under the new absolute ground, the court will be required to grant possession, subject to any human rights defence, if any one of five conditions is met. These all relate to anti-social or criminal behaviour. The offence or anti-social conduct must have been committed in the tenant’s property or in the locality of the property, affected a person with a right to live in the locality, or affected the landlord or a person employed in connection with the landlord’s housing management functions. I would like to emphasise that it is not our intention or belief that the new absolute ground will increase the number of evictions for anti-social behaviour. The available evidence shows that eviction for anti-social behaviour is an exceptional course of action. There are, on average, some 2,000 each year in the context of 4 million social homes in England. Overwhelmingly, landlords look to alternative remedies and tools to address the anti-social behaviour and its causes before resorting to possession proceedings. However, where landlords do seek eviction, it will avoid duplication and delay in the process.
The noble Baroness, Lady Young of Hornsey, was concerned that these new arrangements might lead to an increased number of evictions. The noble Lord, Lord Rosser, also asked about that. I wish to cite a few examples from evidence that was given to the House of Commons. Angela Mawdsley, Anti-Social Behaviour Manager at Leeds City Council, said:
“It takes a significant period of time to get possession orders through the court. For a lot of these crimes or offences, we would be looking to take possession action anyway, so I do not think it will increase the amount of possession action that we take. I agree with my colleague that it is about the amount of time it is taking to get through the court, and it is very difficult to keep witnesses on board while a court case goes on for more than 12 months”.—[Official Report, Commons, Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Bill Committee, 18/6/13; col. 32.]
Chris Grose, anti-social behaviour adviser and senior consultant at the Chartered Institute of Housing, said that,
“although we see the proposed absolute ground for possession, we do not necessarily see that there will be a lot more evictions. As I said before, we are really good at nipping things in the bud and getting in there early with early intervention work”—[Official Report, Commons, Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Bill Committee, 18/6/13; col. 31.]
People want to sustain their property. These are just the points that have been made by my noble friend Lord Deben.
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I will address the specific amendments tabled by my noble friend Lady Hamwee. Amendment 56AA and Amendment 56AG seek to amend the provisions of Clause 86(1) and Clause 89(1) to make explicit that, when the court is considering whether or not to grant possession under the absolute ground, it may do so only where it considers this to be proportionate. We
have been here before in Part 1 and Part 4 of this Bill. I do not think these amendments are necessary. The Bill already provides that the granting of a possession order by the court under the new absolute ground is subject,
“to any available defence, based on the tenant’s Convention rights, within the meaning of the Human Rights Act 1998”.
It is clear, therefore, that the tenants of public authorities will be able to raise proportionality under Article 8 of the Human Rights Convention. It means that public authority landlords will need to consider carefully which cases to bring under the absolute ground. As we have made clear in the draft guidance, we expect it to be used selectively for serious anti-social behaviour only.
My noble friend went on to speak to Amendments 56AB, AC, AD, AH, AJ and AK—the first ones relating to secure tenants and the second to assured tenants. These seek to amend three of the conditions that must be met for a court to grant possession under the absolute ground so that the anti-social behaviour of a visitor to a property could not be considered. These amendments would mean that the absolute ground could be used only when the anti-social or criminal behaviour was done by the tenant or by a member of the household. The provisions for the absolute ground are in line with existing grounds for possession. They make clear that tenants are responsible for the anti-social behaviour of visitors to their property as well as that of members of the household. This is a well established principle, based on the fact that, in practice, there is sometimes very little that differentiates a regular visitor to a property from a resident. Landlords have indicated that excluding the anti-social behaviour of visitors from the absolute ground is unhelpful when they are seeking to take action against persistent, serious anti-social behaviour by those who spend much of their time at the property, but where it is not clear whether or not they are strictly members of the household. We would not expect a landlord to seek possession as the result of the behaviour of an occasional visitor. It is important to remember that public authorities will need to ensure that any decisions they make to bring possession proceedings under the absolute ground are proportionate.
My noble friend Lady Hamwee spoke to a number of amendments which were tabled by my noble friend Lord Greaves—Amendments 56ABA, 56ABB, 56ACA, 56ADZA, 56AH, 56AHA, 56AHB, 56AJA, 56AJB, 56AKA and 56AKB. The amendments seek to amend the first, second and third conditions so that the anti-social behaviour must have taken place in the vicinity of the property instead of the locality. I do not think that these amendments will improve the Bill. “Locality” is a well established term in local housing law. Existing provisions for possession under anti-social behaviour require the anti-social behaviour to have taken place in the locality of the property. Landlords and the courts are therefore familiar with this term and its meaning in housing actions. The amendments would simply reinvent the wheel and create new confusion over what area is covered by the term “vicinity”. In addition, they would create inconsistency with existing possession provisions, which are based on the offence being committed in the “locality” of the property.
The term “locality” in this context dates back to the Housing Act 1996. Parliament preferred it then as suggesting a wider geographical area than “vicinity”, while still maintaining the link between the tenant’s behaviour and the area in which they live. Vicinity might, for example, capture just close neighbours, while locality could capture the impact of a tenant’s behaviour on an estate more widely. I think that that argument still holds good today.
My noble friend also spoke to Amendments 56ACB and 56ACC. These amendments seek to amend Clause 86 by redefining the second condition for the absolute ground; namely, that an injunction to prevent nuisance or annoyance has been breached. The amendments would mean that this would relate to conduct,
“intended or likely to cause”,
nuisance or annoyance instead of “capable of causing” as currently drafted. Given that this provision relates to the injunction under Part 1, it is essential that the definition here mirrors the test for the issuing of the injunction. We have already debated in detail the test for the injunction and it will be no surprise that I believe that the language of the IPNA test should be retained here.
The noble Baroness, Lady Young of Hornsey, and my noble friend Lady Hamwee spoke to amendments which would mean that tenants evicted under the new absolute ground would not be considered to have made themselves intentionally homeless. I am afraid that I believe these amendments are misconceived. They imply that tenants evicted for anti-social behaviour are the innocent victims of circumstances when quite the reverse is the case. The type of tenant that we would expect to be evicted under this new ground would be someone who, as described by my noble friend Lord Deben, had been given many chances to change their behaviour, on the understanding that failing to do so could result in their being evicted, but had repeatedly refused to do so, choosing instead to keep making their neighbours’ lives a misery.
Quite properly, the decision on whether someone is intentionally homeless rests with the local authority. I see no good reason for creating special rules in relation to the absolute ground which do not apply in relation to the existing discretionary grounds for possession.
I assure my noble friend that, in making decisions about whether an applicant for homeless assistance is intentionally homeless, local authorities must be satisfied that the act or omission that led to homelessness was deliberate. Applicants must always be given the opportunity to explain such behaviour. Therefore, they will look not simply at the fact of the eviction alone but at what led to this action and take that into account.
In addition, where tenants have been evicted for anti-social behaviour and have been found to be intentionally homeless but are in priority need—for example, because they have children—the local authority has a duty to provide temporary accommodation for such time as to allow them a reasonable opportunity to find their own alternative accommodation. This is typically for 28 days but it could be longer depending on the circumstances.
I now turn to Clause 87, which ensures that tenants are given adequate notice of the landlord’s intention to take action to seek possession, are told the reasons why possession is being sought and are informed of how they can access advice. It relates to tenants with secure tenancies. Clause 89 introduces corresponding notice requirements for possession of assured tenancies under the new absolute ground. Amendment 56ADD, in the name of my noble friend Lord Greaves, seeks to remove the requirement that the tenant receives information about where advice can be sought. I believe that this is an important safeguard to ensure that the tenant is given every opportunity to get necessary help and advice about the landlord’s action.
My noble friend also spoke to Amendment 56AE, which relates to Clause 88. This clause provides tenants of local authorities with a right to seek a review of any decision by the landlord to seek possession on the new ground. That is a sensible safeguard for the tenant, which will not introduce undue delay because of the timescales specified. The amendment would require that the matters my noble friend sets out are included in regulations made in respect of such reviews. I assure my noble friend that that is unnecessary. We have already published draft regulations, which cover both her points about who should carry out the review and the arrangements for an oral hearing.
Amendment 56AF seeks to prescribe that the regulations should make provision for the landlord to grant the tenancy of the property to another individual. That is entirely unnecessary. Social landlords already can decide to whom they grant new tenancies on properties that become vacant as a result of the previous tenant being evicted, in line with allocation policies locally.
There is no absolute right to social housing or to accommodation in the private sector. Tenants have responsibilities that are enshrined in the terms of the tenancy. They are duty bound to comply with the terms of such agreements and that includes not engaging in crime or anti-social behaviour, particularly where that makes the lives of their neighbours a misery. Where they do engage in such behaviour they have to expect there to be consequences, including, potentially, having their home repossessed. Where a court has already passed judgment—for example, finding a tenant guilty of breach of a criminal behaviour order—the landlord should be able to take swift action to seek repossession. These clauses provide for just that and I commend them to the Committee.