Starmer faces fury as promise to clamp down on damp and mouldy homes pushed back to 2035
Labor MPs and tenants’ rights campaigners have reacted angrily after Keir Starmer watered down his flagship plan to force landlords to provide decent homes.
The government has announced that decent housing standards, which require homeowners in England to provide their homes in a reasonable state of repair and free of damp and mould, will no longer apply until 2035; This is a situation that Labor MPs describe as a “betrayal” of the manifesto promise.
This comes after another pledge to cancel ground rents for leaseholders was also watered down, with the cap set at £250 instead.
The delay means Labor must win the next two general elections to oversee implementation of its manifesto promise while in government.
Senior Labor MP Barry Gardiner said: Independent: “This is shocking. I thought this should be the year of delivery so we don’t have to wait ten years.”
Richard Burgon, Labor MP for Leeds, added: “This means decent housing standards will most likely never be realized.”
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John McDonnell, Labour’s former shadow chancellor, said: Independent It is stated that the delay risks showing voters that the party “is in favor of leaving children in slums”.
“I argued recently that one of the problems facing the Labor Party is that people don’t know what the Labor Party stands for and who the Labor Party represents,” he said.
“After this announcement many people will decide that Labor is in favor of leaving children in slums and in favor of landlords.”
The government’s decision to give landlords until 2035 to implement a decent standard of housing on their properties has been met with anger by campaigners and charities who condemned it as “outrageous”.
“It is outrageous that millions of renters are being forced to pay hand over fist for poor quality homes that pose a real danger to their health,” said Shelter Chief Executive Sarah Elliott.
“Now, to add insult to injury, tenants are being asked to wait almost a decade for the basic protection of a decent home.
He added: “Let’s be clear, tenants cannot wait this long for decent homes. Building on vital changes to the Tenants’ Rights Act, the government must support councils in punishing those who break the rules by properly funding local authority enforcement teams and ensuring tenants’ homes are safe to live in now, not in 2035.”
Generation Rent said: “The government today announced that many private renters will have to wait ten years before their landlords have to make sure their homes are suitable.”
Ben Twomey, chief executive of the campaign group, added: “It is absurd to allow landlords to drag their feet for a decade, depriving us of the most basic standards in our homes.
“This will mean millions of tenants, including children, will be trapped in poor quality homes with nowhere to go.”
The government published a response to consultations with housing and planning minister Matthew Pennycook on the decent homes standard on Wednesday, saying “social and private landlords should act as quickly as possible to ensure their properties are affordable”.
But he added that the government was aware of the “significant challenges faced by landlords” as a result of the changes, and said: “We have therefore decided that all rental properties must meet the new DHS by 2035 at the latest, an implementation timeline that gives social landlords the time and certainty they need to increase the supply of housing in particular, as well as improve the quality of the homes they manage.”
Watered-down reforms follow Independent It reported last year that around 83 MPs earned a minimum of £10,000 from renting property, with Labor leading the majority of homeowners.
Labor has been warned the government cannot be trusted with tenants’ rights after it was revealed MPs are receiving at least £830,000 a year in rent.
Campaigners said the number of landlords in parliament was “shocking” and called for greater scrutiny of what they described as a “clear conflict of interest” in voting on legislation that would directly affect them.
High-profile ministerial hosts include Chancellor Rachel Reeves and foreign secretary David Lammy. Ms Reeves moved to Downing Street following her new role in government.
