Stuff Your Landlord: Landlord Harassment

Who does this guide apply to?

Private Renters: Y

Social Housing Renters - sometimes 

Lodgers: N

Squatters: N

Introduction

We are so used to landlords - and the power they have - that they can seem unchallengeable. They make profit from our need for a home, and using the courts and the police, can make us homeless. While the situation for tenants in the UK is dire - and looks to get worse under COVID-19 - we still have rights under the law and community power to protect us.

This sheet deals with Landlord Harassment. If you are having trouble with a Section 21 eviction or Rent Arrears check out our other guides. For ways to fight back without going through the courts, check our Stuff Your Landlord guide.

Stuff Your Landlord: Rent Arrears

Who does this guide apply to?

Private Renters: Y

Social Housing Renters: Y

Lodgers: N

Squatters: N

Introduction

We are so used to landlords - and the power they have - that they can seem unchallengeable. They make profit from our need for a home, and using the courts and the police, can make us homeless. While the situation for tenants in the UK is dire - and looks to get worse under COVID-19 - we still have rights under the law and community power to protect us.

This sheet deals with Rent Arrears. If you are having trouble with Landlord Harassment or have been served a Section 21 notice check out our other guides. For ways to fight back without going through the courts, check our Stuff Your Landlord guide.

Stuff Your Landlord: Section 21

Who does this guide apply to?

Private Renters: Y

Social Housing Renters: N* 

Lodgers: N

Squatters: N

*Some Housing Associations use Assured Shorthold Tenancies as an introductory tenancy for the first year, so it’s good to check.

Introduction

We are so used to landlords - and the power they have - that they can seem unchallengeable. They make profit from our need for a home, and using the courts and the police, can make us homeless. While the situation for tenants in the UK is dire - and looks to get worse under COVID-19 - we still have rights under the law and community power to protect us.

Stuff Your Landlord (doesn't want you to know)

We are so used to landlords - and the power they have - that they can seem unchallengeable. They make profit from our need for a home, and using the courts and the police, can make us homeless.

While the situation for tenants in the UK is dire - and looks to get worse under COVID-19 - we still have rights under the law and community power to protect us.

This guide is brief primer on what we do and how we win.

For more in-depth guides on different aspects of housing law, click the links below.

Links:

HOW TO FIGHT REDUNDANCIES AT YOUR WORKPLACE

Get organised

If you are facing redundancy it is important you get organised. You should talk to your co-workers and organise a meeting as soon as possible. If necessary meet outside to ensure social distancing. If your workplace is unionised you should contact your union branch. You should also collect phone numbers and other contact details of your co-workers. It is important that everyone keeps in touch throughout the dispute, so consider setting up a WhatsApp group or something similar. Remember, your employer will try to divide you by getting you to compete for any jobs that may be available. Be positive from the outset, stress the need for unity constantly and focus on the failing of the employer.

Get to know your rights

Manchster SolFed at demo called in support of migrants yesterday

Manchester Solfed supporting the demo against the hostile environment and detention of migrants, organised by Queer Support for Migrants, outside the detention centre at Manchester Airport Yesterday. The action was part of a series of decentralised, local actions taking place last weekend around the country, coordinated around the slogan ‘Solidarity Knows No Borders’

Solidarity with tea workers and BASF

Recently, the world has been shaken by the death of George Floyd, brutally killed by the police, unarmed, he pleaded for his life as the police suffocated him with their knee on his neck. This is just one of 1093 documented cases in the USA this year of police killing American citizens, more deaths go unrecorded. An epidemic of police violence, white supremacy that is rooted in the legacy of slavery, segregation and the de-humanisation of African-Americans by the state and its racist allies.

Fifty-one years after the Stonewall riots LBGTQ+ people still face discrimination and violence in all aspects of their lives

LGBTQ+ people in the UK and across Europe still face discrimination in all aspects of everyday life, according to a survey conducted last month by the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA). The survey, the largest of its kind ever conducted, focused on the social experiences of lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans and intersex people in 30 European countries, and found that little progress has been made over the past few years.

Compared with a similar FRA survey from 2012 the number of LGBTQ+ people in the UK who say they have been harassed in the past five years has risen from 55% to 62% - six points higher than the European average. The number of people in the UK who say they have been violently attacked at least once has gone up by nine points.

New Social Distancing Measures and How to Stay Safe at Work

The government has announced that social distancing can be reduced from two to one metre but only if measures are in place to mitigate the risk. Examples of measures that can be used to mitigate the risk include, consider if the activity needs to continue, working back to back or side to side, screens being fitted to protect workers, only working together at less than two metres apart for short periods and reducing the number of people each person has contact with.

If your employer is making you work within two metres of another person, with no mitigating measures in place, they are breaking the government guidelines.

The government has produced guidelines on what measures employers should be taking to protect workers for the following sectors