FactCheck: Can councils ‘convict and evict’ rioters?
The claim
“If you live in a social home and you are caught rioting, your one night of madness could have disastrous consequences for the rest of your lives. Social housing is a precious resource, and the hard working taxpayers who subsidise it will be rightly wondering why anyone involved in trashing and looting our country should expect to enjoy the benefits of a social home.”
Grant Shapps MP, 11 August 2011
The background
There was tough talk from the Government today, with Housing Minister Grant Shapps backing councils that want to “convict and evict” rioters from social housing.
Even the parents of young people convicted have been threatened with eviction – with Nottingham City Council leader Jon Collins reminding people it’s a breach of their tenancy agreement to commit acts of anti-social behaviour.
Council chiefs in Manchester, Wandsworth, Westminster, Greenwich, Croydon, Southwark, Salford and Hammersmith and Fulham are all threatening rioters with eviction.
Certainly there is much support from the public, after a petition today secured more than 100,000 signatures of people calling for rioters be stripped of their benefits. The six-figure backing means it will be considered for debate by MPs.
But how easy is it to evict people from their homes, let alone strip them of other benefits? FactCheck investigates.
The analysis
The councils’ power is limited; they only have powers over those that live locally – so for example people from Manchester can’t be evicted from social housing if they committed anti-social behaviour in Salford.
This is a huge roadblock when you consider that of the rioters charged so far, just 23 per cent committed crimes in their own postcode, according to profiles of those due to appear at Camberwell Green Magistrates’ Court.
Which is why Communities Secretary Eric Pickles called for a change in the law today – the proposal will be added to an existing consultation on dealing with anti-social behaviour.
The Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) told FactCheck that last year of some eight million social tenants, 3,000 were evicted in England.
That’s a tiny fraction of those receiving social housing benefits – less than half a per cent – and the vast majority of the cases were drug related.
But the DCLG gives an example of one case – one of the first where drugs were not an issue – which took 18 months to complete, and cost the landlord more than £38,000.
Crucially however, councils do not have the ultimate say on whether someone is evicted – it is up to the courts. Councils cannot make someone “intentionally homeless” without court approval.
FactCheck understands that the law is in favour of the tenants, and very often the courts will rule in favour of a suspending order for possession (eviction) – which means people will only be evicted if they do it again.
The Government consultation proposes removing the courts’ power so that it is mandatory for the courts to approve evictions, which will speed up the process. It takes an average of seven months just to get a court decision at the moment.
Salford City’s Council leader John Merry said people must understand their actions have consequences, and “the consequences for some of them could mean they lose their homes”.
He added that: ”Anyone who can do this to their own city is not welcome in Salford.”
They might not be welcome, but people who are evicted don’t suddenly become someone else’s problem.
Evictees are served with up to four months notice, and will still be eligible for housing benefits after they’re kicked out (unless their financial circumstances change).
In fact, they will be very much on the council’s radar. Nottingham City Council, for example, puts people on an exclusion register – so that they don’t get social housing – and monitors their private rentals, which are set up on 28-day short hold tenancy agreements.
The verdict
Councils have always had the power to threaten people with eviction, but they have never had the power to make it happen. That power lies with the courts.
The public wants to see swift and robust action from the Government, but evicting people from social housing is a lengthy, costly solution to anti-social behaviour.
What’s more, with few rioters caught out in their own Local Authority, the vow to ‘convict and evict’ will be difficult to uphold.
So for now, the Government’s bark seems worse than its bite. And unless the law changes, there’s nothing to block rioters’ benefits.
Nothing, except prison. More than 1,200 people have been arrested, and the Ministry of Justice said on Monday that our prisons aren’t full – in fact there’s space for 2,500 more prisoners.
By Emma Thelwell
There are 24 comments on this post
One of the biggest issues here, which politicians seem to be ignoring, is that most rioters will not be individuals living in isolation. They will have families, and those families will not necessarily condone – or even be aware of – their riotous behaviour.
Imagine that you are a ten year old kid and your fourteen year old brother, who said he was going to a friend’s house, is caught looting. Imagine you are then told that, as a consequence of behaviour over which you had no influence, you and your parents are going to be out on the streets.
To evict families from council housing because of the actions of individuals is to treat other family members as chattel. It is to punish the innocent for the crimes of the few. It should be absolutely unacceptable in any civilised society.
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Parents are responsible for doing their best to ensure that their children grow up to be responsible law abiding members of society. All parents have a duty to try and ensure that their children obey the law and if they neglect their duty to the point that they permit their young children to engage in robbery and criminal damage then they must expect to face the consequences of their inaction.
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We are currently in a moral panic. Hopefully, once it wears off some of the more stupid & probably counter-productive suggestions will quietly be kicked into the long grass. After all, if you remove the benefits of someone who’s already shown they’re prepared to break the law, probably commit burglary, what are they going to do to for £££?
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Spot on, Jennie.
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Where would there go to when evicted? Council will still have the duty to rehouse them. This will also breed more social problems to the already marginalised group. The problem will then go on to affect society as a whole.
Both the COUNCIL and the STATE are responsible for this mess. The children no longer belong to parents, they belong to the state. A parent can no longer afford to punish or displine their own kids. If you do the council will come take them off you. So what do you do as a parent?? As a loving mother, my hands are tied!!!!
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This is one of those ideas that sounds great at first but starts to come apart at the seams the more you think about it.
What happens if a teenage girl goes against her parents wishes and riots just to spite them?
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I’m sorry, but if the “parents” suffer, they’ve brought it on themselves by allowing their offspring to behave in this depicable way.
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Its not just the parents/family who will suffer though is it?
If the state evicts them they will still need housing somewhere, and likely the taxpayer will cough up even more than before to place them in emergency housing.
Or lets say the even-harder-liners get their fetishy dreams realised and the council does not re-home them. Then you have a homeless family with no ability to get housing elsewhere. So they’ll end up on the streets and/or commiting crime to fund housing. Then the community suffers even more.
The lust for retribution needs to be thought through – not just on the impacts on the families of rioter but for the impact on the wider community.
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What about private owners – are there houses going to be taken away ? because if this type of action is good enough for council tenants then it should be applied the same to everyone.
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“The councils’ power is limited; they only have powers over those that live locally – so for example people from Manchester can’t be evicted from social housing if they committed anti-social behaviour in Salford.”
I think the power is even more limited than that – tenants can be evicted for anti-social behaviour if that behaviour occurs in the immediate vicinity or locality of the abode, and that can be is restricted as the estate or within 250m of the abode. So you can do something within the borough and still not be evicted under existing legislation. That is what government is proposing to change but that will take statutory legislation (ie it will take sometime) and even then it will still be a matter for a judge who must decide if the eviction is ‘reasonable’ or not … In my view it is very unlikely that we will see mass evictions – perhaps one or two for the most gratuitous cases but that’s probably it. Its mainly hot air, particularly from Grant Shapps, who never misses a chance to make political capital or get his face on the TV.
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This is a typical headline grabbing comment that politicians come up with in order to show how in tune with public opinion they are.
What they don’t think about are the consequences.
If they throw a few hundred looters and their families out into the streets, do they really believe that will help bring an end to this kind of criminal behaviour?
Wouldn’t it just increase feelings that they are not part of society, increase squatting and vandalism, and probably end up with more houses and shops being trashed?
This problem needs thought. Sadly, most of our politicians – many of whom cost the country more in fiddled expenses than most of the individual looters – respond with whatever they think will win them votes.
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Also, even if you could do it ; you are adding the problem of exclusion and the underclass. And also if it is one individual out of a household. Likewise removing benefits only pushes an individual into criminality. At the same time there needs to be some serious consequences. How about you will only keep benefits if you do 40hrs community service a week for a period of time – e.g make people work for their benefits – and make them the jobs that the cuts have created. So as a the same time as creating a punishment, also creating some positiveness. I know being liberal is a dirty word this week. I hate what these people have done to my city. I was brought up on a council estate, poor but importantly brought up not to expect everything as a right – but that it was my responsibility to better myself and contribute to society.
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And even if they change the law, I believe I’m correct in stating that under European law they cannot apply it retrospectively.
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That is only in criminal cases. The change of laws relating to council tenancy can be applied retrospectively.
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You can’t have extra-judicial punishments! It is the consititutional duty of the courts to try cases and when convicted, it is up to the judiciary to issue a sentence. Thank god we don’t have trail by politiicans and the media and public opinion. Also, why should parents be evicted because of the crimes of their children? Why should children be evicted because of the actions of their siblings or parents? These riots happened mainly becaus eof depriovation and inequality. If people grow up deprived in a society where there is prosperity and their aspirations are thwarted by poor education, disprupted lives and government cuts to vital services such as surestart, they will riot. We have a morally sick soicety because it is being shaped by market forces, and not the real needs of communities and people. We are just into an era of ultra-Thatcherism and sadly, I fear more riots.
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I agree with Jennie. We have a legal system to deal with these issue. If we do not think this system is up to scratch then we need to change it.
As for the bureaucracy involved in this task, I dread to think the time and money to be spent, in what will effectively be a re homing (We are really just going to make these people homeless??!). So we are paying money and losing time in a service that is understaffed and under budgeted to complete a task which wont affect the problem at all. It stinks of chesty rhetoric.
And to anyone suggesting that removing benefits for people involved then try to think. Many of these people were comfortable committing crimes of theft. So then you take away their means of living. How do you think they might go about getting that money back?
Our society needs radical change in many ways. For one, we should not hand out free benefits. If anything right now we learn there are so many public services that we cannot afford to supply budgets for. Manning libraries, cleaning, buildings maintenance such as electrical work or plumbing. Why not stop JSA and pay an allowance in return for 16 hours of public service in relation to a claimants…
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I appreciate you need to focus on the narrow point can Government deliver its woolly headed promises here, but the intention is to make people homeless! Yet you don’t clarify who might be affected (doubtless nor has government). Receiving social housing benefit and being a social housing tenant isn’t necessarily the same thing. So which is it, both or just social housing tenants? Will it apply to a tenant rioter or a tenant with a family member who rioted? Beyond this, what extra special way will ruin be visited on rioters not receiving benefits or was there no imbeciles of this type? These proposals are unfair and discriminatory, an example of why so many don’t recognise government only authority which is all too easy to despise. Should they succeed, the belief our system is rotten to its core will receive yet another boost. Contrived evictions they will say, designed to allow allocators to give properties to their friends.
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Why should parents of misbehaving kids suffer? After all Tony Blair made policies that make it hard for parents to discipline their children e.g. no slapping and the social services are watching us like hawks. So it should be Tony Blair who should be thrown out of his home or even better out of the country, because it is him who messed up today’s society!
Also in this country there is one law for the rich and one law for the poor. That’s the real reason why people are rioting. Fr example, the police are posting pictures of rioters they want to question. How about Kate Middleton, she was caught on camera driving whilst talking on her mobile phone but was not questioned by police, why, tell me why? There is no true democracy in the UK,that’s a fact and I would challenge anybody to prove me wrong!
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Who says no slapping? It’s not illegal to slap your child.
I wouldn’t advise it myself for so many reasons, but it’s not against the law.
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Any so called ‘public support’ for dictatorial regime tactics of human rights abuses will soon dwindle when they realise the implications of such measure reach much further than ‘punishing’ children rioters. It came as no surprise that a poll asking if people if the government should block Twitter and other social sites was no popular. This kind of deliberate censorship is a tactic the government have been longing for for ages in it’s attempt to silence its critics. A tactic we’d expect from China or Iran.
The media frenzy perpetrated by the BBC & SKY in particular has brainwashed and spawned a gullible public into approving regime type of law changes and Police brutality tactics against UK children. Heavy handed human rights abuses being promoted for political manipulation.
It’s so easy and predictable to single out youths as ‘yobs, thugs, anarchists, thieves, gangsters, etc, etc. yet ignore the CAUSE of these kids actions.
To threaten denying housing benefit and promoting evictions truly beggars belief. The mentality of these people suggesting such draconian measures are at the very heart of societies ill and division.
These PM speaches are about his own…
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It is all just “Tough Talk” with empty rhetoric and hot air.
A common way for the politicians to make it seem like they are acting on issues when all it really is is a “mob metality” attitude.
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Can we evict Cameron from his tax-payer funded housing for trashing a restaurant with Boris?
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Probably not for another 4 years, although people are claiming that he is in over his head and will not last the distance. Probably get pushed by a lib revolt over policy
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When is the government and media going to talk about the pressures on families. Parents having to hold down 2 and 3 jobs to keep a roof over the head of their children.
When do assumptions stop!, children out on streets late at night could be because parents are working late, or single mothers working a shift at a garage forecourt, local late night opening shop, cleaners, in fact all the low paid jobs you can think of which they have to work in after all the 9an to 5pm lot have gone home.
When do employers stop demanding employees work overtime when they should be at home with their children.
When you always assume what is wrong, as Government and media has done, instead of evidence, it is a very dangerous place to be in. REVENGE is also a dangerous thing, calling for rioters to be hung, drawn and quartered, punished by removing the roof over their head is not the answer.
The answer is to ASK THE QUESTIONS and develop policies based on the answers.
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