Major weaknesses exposed in ability of the Tribunal and Courts system to deal with rent appeals and possession orders as the Renters’ Rights Act comes into force

• Government confirms it holds no meaningful data on current processing times for rent appeals at First-tier Tribunal
• BPF sourced information from one Tribunal Chamber indicates that only 21% of cases were dealt with within 10 weeks, prior to implementation of the Act
• Government therefore unable to trigger its own Tribunal “overwhelm” mechanism in response 
• Length of process times for possession orders now stands at 27.4 weeks and no update on mitigation measures

Latest findings from the British Property Federation (“BPF”) have cast serious doubts on the ability of the Tribunal system to be able to effectively deal with the additional burdens placed on it with the implementation of the Renters’ Rights Act.

The findings come as provisions expanding use of the process for challenging rent increases through the Tribunal come into effect, and highlight both a severe lack of preparedness and little or no assessment being made on the capacity of the Tribunal system to deal with the envisaged workload.

In data obtained by the BPF, through Freedom of Information Act requests to the five individual Tribunal Property Chambers, a clear pattern has emerged which demonstrates the system’s inability to be able to deal with the additional burdens about to be asked of it.
In the request, the BPF asked each Chamber for the total number of rent appeal cases brought by tenants each year over the past three full years, and the average time for to consider, process, and rule upon these appeals. Of the five Chambers, four responded to the request – three with substantive data, and one to confirm that it did not hold the information.

Upon further analysis of the data, which recorded the total number of cases brought across three Tribunals over the last three years as being 2,944, concerningly only one Chamber confirmed that it held any data on how long it took to conclude these appeals. That confirmed that only 21% of appeals were currently being decided within 10 weeks prior to the implementation of the Renters’ Rights Act.

Given the implications for landlords in any delay in the appeals process under the new Act, the Government committed to introducing backdating of rent for unsuccessful appeals where there is evidence that the Tribunal is ‘overwhelmed’, to provide more certainty for landlords.

However, Ministers have now admitted through Written Parliamentary Questions that the Government does not hold centralised data on appeal volumes or processing times, making it impossible to establish a reliable baseline from which to measure ‘overwhelm’. A situation which has now been confirmed through the BPF’s own investigation.

Alongside its commitment to introducing backdating where the Tribunal is ‘overwhelmed’, the Government also committed, as quickly as is possible, to undertaking a viability assessment of an alternative or filtering body to make initial rent determinations before the Tribunal, to relieve pressure on the Tribunal. Despite this, Ministers have been unable to confirm any further details on the new body or when it is likely to become operational.  Nor has the Government published, and is resisting the release of, its Justice Impact Test which assesses the Act’s impact on the Tribunal process.

In a further blow to the smooth implementation of the Act for landlords, further analysis of data conducted by the BPF has exposed continuing weaknesses in the ability of the courts to be able to deal with grounds for procession orders.

This is despite the Government commitment to ensure “court readiness” to align with the introduction of the new Act, including an undefined share of £50 million new funding, with the latest position being that the Government is unable to provide specific metrics, timelines, or definitions of what “court readiness” means.

This situation is compounded by recent data from the Ministry of Justice which shows that prior to the implementation of the Act the average time between the courts accepting a claim to repossession for private landlords using the grounds-based route had increased by three weeks over the last year to 27.4 weeks. Thus demonstrating that court timeliness has deteriorated since the Government committed to addressing it, not better.

Commenting, Kate Butler, Assistant Director, British Property Federation, said:

“As the Renters’ Rights Act and s 21 abolition comes into effect, and given serious concerns as to the stability of the market, many would expect that the Government would have, and be able to share, a basic understanding of the impacts of the Act on the judicial system and its detailed plans to mitigate these. Yet here we have new evidence which clearly demonstrates a clear and deeply concerning lack of consistent collection of rent appeal data within the Tribunal process, and evidence that 80% of current recorded appeals take over 10 weeks to decide. Expanding the use of the s 13 process to all tenancies will dramatically increase the number of appeals the Tribunal hears, and there is no evidence to suggest that it will be able to effectively deal with this, or that the Government will be able to undertake its commitment to measure ‘overwhelm’. This not only undermines the attractiveness of the PRS for new investors, but it will negatively impact existing landlords and incentivise their exit.”