Rights for Private Renters in Wales and England By Dr Victoria Leonard
Renting a home through a private landlord is a particularly important issue for single parents in the UK.
Single parent families are more likely to live in poverty than other groups and are more likely not to own the home they live in. 1
● 90% of single parents are women 2
● Nearly half of children from single-parent families (49%) live in poverty 3
● 71% of households affected by the Government’s Child Benefit Cap are single-parent families 4
How properties are rented privately in the UK is being reformed, which is changing the rights that tenants have. The Renters’ Rights Bill is going through the House of Commons at the moment, and the Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016 came into law on 1 December 2022. This Act changed the way all landlords in Wales rent their properties.
These changes in the law aim to make renting easier and provide greater security for tenants.
For contract-holders (formerly tenants) this will mean:
● receiving a written contract (now called an ‘occupation contract’) setting out your rights and responsibilities
● an increase in the ‘no fault’ notice period from two to six months
● greater protection from eviction
● improved succession rights; these set out who has a right to continue to live in a dwelling, for example after the current tenant dies
● more flexible arrangements for joint contract-holders, making it easier to add or remove others to an occupation contract
● Your landlord has to make sure that your home is fit for human habitation (FFHH). This includes electrical safety testing and ensuring working smoke alarms and carbon monoxide detectors are fitted
For further guidance on the changes to renting properties in Wales, see here:
https://www.gov.wales/renting-homes-tenants
And for the Renting Homes (Wales) Act 2016 itself, see here:
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/anaw/2016/1/contents
The Renters’ Rights Bill has not become law in England yet, but when it does it will give single-parent renter households in England much better rights when renting privately. The Government is aiming to pass the Act into legislation by August 2025.
The four main aspects of the bill that will improve conditions for Single Parents who are privately renting in England will be:
● The removal of ‘no fault eviction’.
● Limits to rent increases so they can only be increased annually, and in line
with market rates. Rental ‘bidding’ will be banned.
● Awaab’s Law will apply in privately rented properties as well as social housing. Landlords will be legally required to investigate and fix reported health hazards within specified timeframes. 5
● The Act will create a database of landlords operating in the private sector, meaning that the law can be enforced.
In Wales, housing is a devolved matter, which means that the Senedd can legislate on housing and the law passed by the UK Parliament does not automatically apply. 6
The Renters’ Rights Act will apply in Wales in the following ways: 7
● Discrimination against tenants will end. Landlords and agents in Wales will not be able to discriminate against a potential tenant if they have children or if they receive benefits.
● Discriminatory conditions in new or renewed mortgage or insurance agreements will be banned, and once existing agreements have expired, they won’t be valid. This means that your landlord can’t be made to discriminate against potential tenants by their mortgage lender or insurer.
● The Bill will enable the Welsh Government to ban discrimination against other groups, but this has not been pushed through yet.
Landlords in Wales must already give tenants at least six months notice to end a contract, unless the tenant has breached the terms of the contract. A landlord cannot issue notice to a tenant within the first six months of their rental agreement.
See this information from Citizens Advice on how the rules for renting properties in Wales have changed in recent years:
https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/wales/housing/check-how-the-welsh-renting-rules-are-changing/
Further Sources of Information
For more information on these changes in the law, see this episode of The Law
Show from the BBC: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0024p0k
1 https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/english-housing-survey-2021-to-2022-social-rented-
sector/english-housing-survey-2021-to-2022-social-rented-sector
2 https://www.local.gov.uk/parliament/briefings-and-responses/debate-support-single-parent-families-house-commons-tuesday-14th
3 https://www.local.gov.uk/parliament/briefings-and-responses/debate-support-single-parent-families-house-commons-tuesday-14th
4 https://www.jrf.org.uk/social-security/a-protected-minimum-floor-in-universal-credit
5 For more on Awaab’s Law, see here:
https://england.shelter.org.uk/professional_resources/news_and_updates/awaabs_law_upcoming_changes_to_the_law_on_damp_and_mould.
6 https://law.gov.wales/public-services/housing/housing-what-devolved-0.
7 https://www.nrla.org.uk/news/how-will-the-renters-rights-bill-impact-wales
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