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Monthly Archives: December 2017

Banning Orders for Residential Landlords and Agents from April 2018

Back in April we wrote about the introduction of new measures to tackle “rogue landlords”. Rent repayment orders and financial penalties have already been introduced. From April 2018, the government intends to bring in banning orders for landlords and agents who have been convicted of certain “banning order offences”.

What are the Banning Order Offences?

Draft Regulations have set out the list of banning order offences. If a landlord or agent is convicted of one of these offences, the local authority will be able to apply for a banning order against that person. The list of offences, including Housing Act offences and other serious crimes, can be found here.

What Effect will a Banning Order Have?

A banning order will prevent a person from letting or managing a property or carrying out agency work for a period of at least 12 months.

Database of Rogue Landlords and Property Agents

There will also be a new database of rogue landlords and agents. The database will include the names of people against whom a banning order has been made. It may also include people who have been convicted of a banning order offence but who are not the subject of a banning order.

Access to the database will be for the government and local housing authorities only. It does not appear that the public will be able to access it.

What Should I Do?

If you are a responsible law-abiding landlord, you don’t need to worry about banning orders. Banning orders are designed for landlords who deliberately and persistently fail to comply with their legal obligations. Their introduction gives local authorities one more tool to use in the fight against rogue operators.

A Tough Gig?

Time to deliveroo some über-important rights to gig economy workers?

Many of us have been there. You whip out your smartphone to book a taxi to take you home and, on the way, you order up a tasty takeaway to be sped to your house in a large box strapped the back of a student riding a bicycle. It’s convenient to be sure, but many (not least our drivers and box-backed riders) can’t help but notice that many legal protections bestowed upon employees are conspicuous only by their absence.

The gig economy has grown considerably in recent years and it can be highly beneficial, not only for businesses, but also for workers who value the flexibility inherent in the business model. Such benefits notwithstanding, however, the House of Commons Work & Pensions, and Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy Committees recently called on the government to close loopholes in employment law that currently allow gig economy businesses to force workers to be self-employed, denying them key entitlements such as holiday and sick pay.

This follows on from the Taylor Review, commissioned by the government in October 2016 and lead by Matthew Taylor, Chief Executive of the Royal Society of the Arts. The Review’s report (available here) was published in July 2017 and, at the time of writing, is yet to receive a full response from the government.

Shifting the Burden

There have been a number of court cases concerning the status of gig economy workers, including some which the persistently-embattled Uber has lost, but the default position for such workers remains mostly unchanged.

The Committees argue that “the current situation puts an unacceptable burden on workers to address poor practice through an expensive and risky court case while the companies themselves operate with relative impunity.” Under the new proposals, gig economy workers would benefit from a new presumption of worker by default, shifting the burden onto the companies who would have to either provide basic standards, rights, and benefits to their workers or prove that their workers’ true status reflected self-employment. Furthermore, the proposals include tough new penalties designed to outweigh any gains that companies might stand to make from unlawful practices.

Wage Premiums

The Committees’ proposals also include measures to compensate workers for the uncertainty inherent in gig economy work in the form of a wage premium for hours where work cannot be guaranteed. Not only would this help to balance out a situation in which the flexibility benefits can become quite one-sided, but it may also encourage companies to provide more clearly-defined hours or staff rotas.

A Good Gig?

Pleasing everyone may be difficult, of course. While it would be difficult to argue against improving the rights and protections afforded to gig economy workers, a trade-off that may stand to reduce the flexibility in the system may not be so welcome. Gig economy businesses, of course, maintain that everyone working for them loves the flexibility, and they most likely do, however the lack of protections and rights must surely be addressed in some manner that allows the flexibility in working hours to be preserved.

Do you work in the gig economy? Does your business take on staff on a self-employed basis like this? If so, how would you respond to a change in the law that required you to provide increased rights and benefits to workers while retaining the flexibility inherent in the gig economy of today? As ever, we value your input on the subject!

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