POLICY BRIEF 3: Empowering tenants to unlock decent, healthy and safe homes

Our Latest Policy Brief - Empowering tenants to unlock decent, healthy and safe homes, was launched on Friday at our 'Decent Homes for All' event at Ascension Church in Hulme.

Everyone should be able to live in a home that is free of cold, damp and mould, fire risks, trip hazards and disrepair. However, across England, despite decades of improvement, this basic human right is still being denied to over 1.4 million households living in rental accommodation. In Manchester, the worst conditions are concentrated in the Private Rental Sector (PRS) where 1 in 4 households are denied a basic decency standard.

The crisis of poor quality housing is particularly acute for the most vulnerable households living in temporary accommodation. However, it is of deep concern that around 1 in 10 social rented homes are also non-decent and include life-threatening hazards that pose a serious and immediate risk to tenants’ health and safety.

Poor quality rental housing is more likely to affect those with a long-term illness or disability, and racialised communities.

As the government finalises its new Decent Homes Standard for the social and private rental sectors, we propose five measures that would strengthen regulation, rights and enforcement in relation to rental housing conditions, and transform the power of tenants to not only gain improvements to their homes and environments, but to influence the wider politics of decent, safe, secure and affordable housing.

1. Re-empower tenants through a new deal of individual and collective rights and representation enshrined in a National Tenants Charter.

2. Strengthen and consolidate all housing standards in the new Decent Homes Standard.

3. Combine new funding with tougher conditions to help landlords raise their game.

4. Revolutionise regulatory enforcement through a new national Housing Standards Agency.

5. Reform the welfare system to enable low-income tenants to afford to heat, furnish and stay in their homes.

You can download the full policy brief here