WITH the Commons returning on Monday Labour projects an impression of brisk activity.
It stresses an ambitious workers’ rights package is imminent and pledges to reform, though not abolish, the discredited Ofsted schools inspection agency.
But the scandal over tenants of new Ilford South MP Jas Athwal living in mouldy, ant-ridden flats, and even reportedly being threatened with eviction after complaining, will not blow over unless Labour shows it’s serious about confronting the power of landlords.
It will not escape notice that Athwal represents the constituency formerly held by Sam Tarry, a trade unionist MP dropped from the front bench as punishment for standing on a rail workers’ picket line, who was then deselected in a process involving the controversial Anonyvoter online voting system.
Few doubted Tarry’s removal, like that of other left MPs such as Mick Whitley or Beth Winter, was political.
Keir Starmer claimed what amounted to a sweeping purge of left candidates was simply the result of a vetting process to ensure Labour MPs were of the highest quality: that looks unconvincing when one of their replacements is embroiled in a slum landlord scandal within two months.
Athwal has apologised, blaming poor communication with a letting agency which meant he was in ignorance of the appalling state of the properties he lets out.
Even if true, such neglect is serious. Deadly serious. Exposure to mould was a cause of the death of toddler Awaab Ishak in 2020.
Labour is pledged to extend “Awaab’s law,” enforcing timetables for social housing providers to address reported health hazards, to the private rented sector.
Yet one of its MPs is exposed as a private landlord whose tenants were threatened with eviction for reporting health hazards.
The saga tells us a great deal about how weak tenants’ rights are in this country, from the casual use of eviction threats to browbeat renters, to the apparent discrimination exercised by Athwal, who told the BBC he does not rent to tenants on housing benefit — supposedly to avoid a conflict of interest with his position on Redbridge Council, though this sits uneasily with the Equality Act.
Labour is formally committed to redressing the imbalance of power between landlord and tenant. It promises a renters’ rights Act that would ban no-fault evictions, which would help stop unscrupulous landlords or agents from threatening renters who stand up for their rights.
But the Tories made repeated promises on tenants’ rights too. Legislation was delayed or diluted into insignificance because of the number of buy-to-let landlords in their own ranks.
Now the biggest landlord in the Commons is a Labour rather than Tory MP (yes, it’s Athwal) what guarantee do we have that the government will take the crisis in the private rented sector seriously?
Starmer’s pre-election suggestion as to how to stop landlords ramping up rents — to allow prospective tenants to “voluntarily” offer to pay more than the advertised rent — does not suggest an understanding of how punitive housing costs have become.
Nor, with Labour leaving house-building policy in the hands of construction firms that admit they rely on scarcity to keep prices up, will we see any significant increase in supply.
If we’re to get real reform, it will only be through extraparliamentary pressure.
When David Cameron and Nick Clegg announced an era of austerity, the Coalition of Resistance and later People’s Assembly formed networks to campaign against cuts, with many unions seeing support for community and street resistance as part of their political strategy.
Campaigns for renters’ rights and housing reform should receive similar backing from organised labour, while the broader role of the People’s Assembly in pushing for a real economic alternative is as relevant as ever.
Labour’s laws will be full of loopholes unless they are held up to scrutiny from outside Parliament, by organisations ready to take the fight to the government on the details.
