In Scotland, where the Scottish Government introduced a ban on evictions for all rented housing, the private rental sector has contracted and caused serious shortages of accommodation for students.
Gosh, who could have thought that possible? The market will react to enforced changes in contractual terms…..
We have a modest property which we rent out. After tax and repairs, we are lucky to get £9k a year from it, but every little helps, of course.
Once we had a bad tenant living there. He stopped paying the rent, and caused a lot of damage including taking out an entire window, wooden frame and all. The only thing which would have made it worse is the knowledge that he could have stayed there and done still more damage.
And students? No chance.
The Renters (Reform) Bill does include an exemption for purpose-built student housing, but opponents of the new law point out that there are too few blocks to accommodate all students
The Slythy Gove strikes again inspired by 40 years of EU corporatism that favours large commercial enterprises over small individual providers. The answer will be to forbid the sale of properties that were previously available to rent and mandate three bonus booster shots for all recalcitrant landlords.
Given that British universities are just reselling Home Office visas at a considerable markup while pretending to be “world class centres of teaching and learning”, good.
It’s a bloody nightmare up here. It took me months to find a place, and I had to pay six months’ rent up front with another six held in escrow. One agent wanted three years. And forget housing associations; they’ve got nothing.
‘British universities are just reselling Home Office visas at a considerable markup’
Thought we Aussies were the only ones stupid enough to do that, Steve.
It’s a plot, I suspect. Guardian types claim that all landlords are double plus ungood and that therefore tenants must be granted part of the ownership rights for the property.
That will, inevitably, bugger up the market and produce a great shortage of property to let. This will be used as justification for further confiscation of property rights until we are back to the problems that spawned that nice Mr Rachman.
If my tenants what any ownership of my property, they can damn well buy them from me.
The Scottish Government think they they are exempt from the ECHR. Being unable to evict a tenant who damages the property and/or does not pay the rent is effectively stealing the landlord’s property.
I wonder whether Scottish Courts will convict a landlord whose tenants use the property for a cannabis farm? Will they require him to use the key, that he should have in order to facilitate repairs, to enter the property and then spray Round-up on the cannabis plants?
…to enter the property and then spray Round-up on the cannabis plants?
That would lead to the arrest of the landlord for using glyphosate which is currently (or about to be) forbidden under EU environmental regulations and Scotland will want to adhere to these rules in the run-up to hoping to aspire to conclude a pre-accession agreement in anticipation of the possibility of independence and joining the EU. Hurrah with saltires. (Incidentally it is a proven fact that a lack of saltires can be fatal for Scots).
@ TMB
In view of the US DoJ suing Elon Musk for adhering to the rules forbidding “export” of rocket technology by not hiring foreign nationals (and cannabis, unlike alcohol, being acceptable for Muslims), I expect that Humza Yousaf would wish to do so. However Scotland is not currently required to adhere to EU regulations adopted afer Brexit.
Not just Scotland, local case where a landlord was selling property, had a buyer make an offer so gave tenants standard 3 month notice as the buyer had stated they intended to live in the property and not rent it, this is allowed under local law. They left early rather than wait and then the deal fell through so he rented it out again to cover costs. They sued for unfair eviction and won, the $27k they were awarded was against the buyer who pulled out of the deal not the landlord selling the property as it was deemed they were responsible for the eviction, the landlord evicting them on behalf of the new owners. Had they ruled the offer was a sham and an excuse to evict that would be one thing, but that wasn’t the ruling.
Bboy – it’s like they’re all on the same page, wherever you are in the Anglosphere.
John77 – and cannabis, unlike alcohol, being acceptable for Muslims
No, grass is haram in the Saracen religion and I doubt you’ll find a single Muslim country that doesn’t harshly punish the possession, use or sale of the Pipeweed of Peace.
john77 However Scotland is not currently required to adhere to EU regulations adopted afer Brexit.
Yes indeed, but in the interests of sucking up (aka alignment with the acquis communautaire) it could be subliminal legislation of which there’s a growing body day by day.
@ Steve
Since when?
The origin of the word “assassin” relates to the consumption of hashish by Muslims
Mass production of narcotics by Muslim countries such as Afghanistan…
@ Sam Duncan
It’s a bloody nightmare up here. It took me months to find a place, and I….
Relative lives in central Edinbugh, near Uni. Reports many properties previously rented have been empty for well over a year. Seems landlords have decided cost, risk of renting out too high
@TMB
It’s difficult to find glyphosate weed killers in retail. All now labelled glyphosate
free, inc Roundup
https://www.homebase.co.uk/roundup-speed-ultra-ready-to-use-weedkiller-1l/12822374.html
@john77, August 27, 2023 at 7:08 pm
+1 Hashasin
@Pcar – Ah, the joys of environmentalism! Creosote used to work well, one now has to get environmentally emasculated creosote and cut it with sump oil to get an effective product.
Scottish landlords with cannabis farm problems can get lots of glyphosate from Amazon!
John77 – The origin of the word “assassin” relates to the consumption of hashish by Muslims
Yes, but no:
from Arabic hashīshīn (12c.), an Arabic nickname, variously explained, for the Nizari Ismaili sect in the Middle East during the Crusades, plural of hashishiyy, from the source of hashish
They were a fanatical Muslim sect in the mountains of Lebanon at the time of the Crusades, under leadership of the “Old Man of the Mountains” (which translates Arabic shaik-al-jibal, name applied to Hasan ibu-al-Sabbah). In Western European minds 12c.-13c. they had a reputation for murdering opposing leaders after intoxicating themselves by eating hashish, but there is no evidence that the medieval Ismailis used hashish
So there was allegedly a small tribe of mountain loonies in Lebanon circa 1,000 years ago who may or may not have gotten high to murder people. From this, you infer the Mohammedanites must be a bunch of tie-dyed sk8er bois, but it is not so.
Muslims being aware of the existence of “hashish” doesn’t mean it’s considered acceptable in Araby. Alcohol is another word we got from the Muslims, doesn’t mean you can expect a great pub crawl in downtown Karachi.
“O You who believe! Indeed, intoxicants, gambling, [sacrificing on] stone alters [to other than Allah], and divining arrows are but defilement from the work of Satan, so avoid it that you may be successful.” [Quran: 5:90].
As with sodomising young boys, it is haram, but lots of them still do it. Ask any squaddie who served in Afghanistan.
Addolff – As with sodomising young boys, it is haram, but lots of them still do it.
Sure. But do we assume British people generally approve of pederasty, just because we have the BBC? Are we a nation of murderers, just because we have the NHS? Are we all into autoerotic asphyxiation, just because the Conservative Party exists?
Muslims are ‘sinners’* just like everyone else. I know Moslem lads who enjoy a smoke and a drink, it’s not something they want their Mums to know about, because mainstream Islam isn’t cool with it.
I’m not defending Islam, btw.
I’m defending weed.
*There is no actual sin in wackity baccy, or indeed booze, both of which are natural medicines given to us by God. The sin lies in getting selfishly wankered and neglecting your responsibilities, or in any way allowing your habits to dominate and control you.
Steve,
“Muslims being aware of the existence of “hashish” doesn’t mean it’s considered acceptable in Araby. Alcohol is another word we got from the Muslims, doesn’t mean you can expect a great pub crawl in downtown Karachi.”
They’re doing it, it’s just not public. If you get caught you just give the cop some money and he forgets he saw it. I mean, sure, the government have to do some high profile arrests to give off the image that they’re Doing Something but busting people for drugs in these places is about as successful as it is here.
Update:
Demonisation of landlords is putting middle classes at risk
says building society boss
The toxic mix of rising costs, taxes and red tape that is exacerbating the property crisis is also threatening social stability
Telegraph
Germany plans three-year rent freeze for tenants
Country’s landlords face a lock on payments and prospect of paying back ‘usurious’ rates
In the UK, Labour’s shadow housing secretary criticised rent control policies this summer
Lisa Nandy said: “When house building is falling off a cliff and buy to let landlords are leaving the market, rent controls that cut rents for some, will almost certainly leave others homeless”
Telegraph
@TMB
Yep. Everything that is cheap and works is banned and replaced with more expensive that are worse. One of latest being staws – paper worse for evironment and health
Freedom of choice banned
@ Steve
Dunno where you got your quote from but it’s pretty unimpressive.
Most scholars point out that there are no verses in the Qu’ran forbidding or condemning cannabis/hashish and that it is not haram.
@ Pcar
On Saturday I saw a packet of stainless steel straws for sale proclaimed to be eco-friendly as they are reusable. I certainly do not expect to use enough straws in the rest of my life to justify the resources consumed in making a packet of stainless steel straws rather than using disposable paper straws (even excluding the resources used in washing them). In fact I doubt that all the straws I have ever used would consume more resources than one packet of stainless steel straws.
John77, have you encountered the writings of Farhad Daftary? His researches might be more reliable than the rumours spread by Marco Polo. As wpda says “it is significant to note that similar legends have not been found in any of the mediaeval Islamic sources, including contemporary histories of Syria. Indeed, educated Muslims, including their historians, did not fantasise at all about the secret practices of the Assassins, even though they were hostile towards them. Similarly, those few well-informed occidental observers of the Syrian Assassins, such as William of Tyre, who lived in the Latin East for long periods, did not contribute to the formation of the Assassin legends”
@ Diogenes
I did not cite any of the rumours spread by Marco Polo.
Are you mixing up Steve and myself?
@john77
Straw report was paper straws Worse than plastic for environment and health. Agree about SS straws. Plastic was better and cheaper because less energy required and could be reused if one wanted top. More green “feel virtuous” stupidity
On Hash, remember RoPs are allowed to lie. They didn’t grow cannabis and opium plants 1,500 years ago for export