ONLY 2 per cent of illegal evictions result in a prosecution, analysis by campaign group Generation Rent has suggested, prompting calls for police to do more to protect tenants from criminal landlords. 

It is a criminal offence for a landlord or letting agents to evict tenants without following the correct procedure or for them to harass renters into leaving. 

But landlords overwhelmingly escape facing charges because often police officers called to incidents wrongly treat them as civil disputes rather than a criminal matter, Generation Rent says.

The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government recorded 1,040 cases of homelessness caused by illegal eviction in England in 2019-20, up from 810 the previous year.

But Ministry of Justice figures show there have been an average of just 24 prosecutions for unlawful eviction per year between 2016 and 2019, the most recent period for which data is available.

The group also found that there was an increase in unlawful evictions for 2019-20 compared with the previous year, caused by landlords breaking the eviction ban imposed during lockdown.

Generation Rent is calling on police to do more to protect renters, urging candidates standing in upcoming police and crime commissioner elections to improve training of their forces in eviction law. 

It also wants candidates to pledge to work with councils to prevent unlawful evictions and bring criminal landlords to justice. 

Generation Rent director Alicia Kennedy said the May elections are an opportunity for police forces to reset their attitudes to illegal evictions.

She said: “We have legal protections for renters for a very good reason, but when the police fail to enforce these and we end up with a tiny minority going to court, renters lose confidence in the law and criminal landlords act with impunity.”