Camden's motion on Private Rents

Camden's Labour Group will be proposing this motion at the Full Council meeting on 26th June 2012:

The Council notes: 

- Camden has the 4th highest private rents in the country, averaging in excess of £590pw;

- Recent projections by the Resolution Foundation and Shelter that suggests that the number of people renting in London will soon outstrip the number of people who own their own homes and that a third of families will not be able to buy;

- Rising numbers of households on modest incomes are increasing priced out of Camden by high rents caused in part by high demand from investors, and a boom in buy-to-let properties; 

- Camden is already unaffordable for young people and many families;

- that the private rented sector is currently under-regulated and beset by market failures, and that rent controls and rent stabilisation are more often than not the norm in industrialsed cities, such as New York, Paris and other major European cities;

- that the Joseph Rowntree Foundation has suggested that the Government intervenes in the market to ensure more affordable rents with tax breaks for landlords who offer secure tenancies;  

- the last investigation into the Private Rented Sector in Camden was a scrutiny panel in 2005;

- Camden’s private rented sector is larger than other areas of Inner London;

- More than two thirds of privately rented homes in Camden were built before 1919 and less than 20% built after 1945.  Many are in need of modernisation and green improvements, but there is limited or no incentive for private landlords to do this;

- The national Housing Benefit payment scheme is paid to private landlords regardless of whether their properties are of 'decent' standard or not, or whether they have invested in energy efficiency measures to assist in carbon reduction and lower tenants heating and energy bills.

This council believes that national government policies governing the private rented sector offer limited help to a new generation of modest and middle income earners in Camden.  We believe that private renting should be subject to price moderation and incentives just as other fundamentals - water, energy and transport - are.  

It asks the Leader and the Camden Scrutiny system to investigate local policy interventions and develop, in conjunction with representatives from the private rented sector, the key changes in law Camden should lobby for to create a fairer and less wasteful relationship between tenant and landlord.