The UK government is to extend the ban on commercial evictions introduced during the pandemic until March 2022, the Treasury has confirmed.
Chief secretary to the Treasury, Stephen Barclay, said the moratorium for business tenants will not expire at the end of this month, as planned, and will instead continue until 25 March 2022 – two years after it was introduced.
Restrictions on landlords using laws permitting them to recover rent arrears by selling a tenant’s goods will also be continued.
In a recent statement to the House of Commons, Mr Barclay said:
We will introduce legislation in this parliamentary session to establish a backstop so that, where commercial negotiations between tenants and landlords are not successful, tenants and landlords go into binding arbitration.
Until that legislation is on the statute book, existing measures will remain in place, including extending the current moratorium to protect commercial tenants from eviction to 25 March 2022.
To be clear, all tenants should start to pay rent again in accordance with the terms of their lease or as otherwise agreed with their landlords – as soon as restrictions are removed on their sector if they are not already doing so.
“We believe this strikes the right balance between protecting landlords and supporting those businesses that are most in need.
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