At the Conservative Party conference, the Home Secretary, Amber Rudd, announced that the provisions of the Immigration Act 2016 would be brought into force this December 2016.
We have previously written about the Immigration Act 2016 and the new changes it brings.
In summary this Act supplements the Right to Rent provisions in the Immigration Act 2014. It adds the following additional elements:
– As well as the existing civil penalties, new criminal penalties are added for more severe offenders including unlimited fines and up to 5 years in prison;
– The Home Secretary can serve notices on landlords informing them that despite the fact they have checked the right to rent status of individuals, that those persons in fact have no right to rent;
– When a notice is served a landlord is now obliged to evict promptly and can be prosecuted if he does not. Guidance will be issued on what is meant by prompt eviction;
– There is a new ground for possession on a section 8 notice and equivalent powers to evict for non-Housing Act tenancies;
– If notices from the Home Secretary show that none of the occupiers in a property have a right to rent, then the landlord can issue a 28-day notice to quit and then recover possession of the property without going to court at all.
This is a very quick introduction and illustrates the government’s continued determination to push ahead with the Right to Rent. As such, it is a further warning to landlords and agents to ensure that they understand and are complying with the requirements.
