The UK homelessness minister, Rushanara Ali, is facing calls to resign after claims she evicted tenants from her east London property before increasing the rent by almost £700 a month.
Four tenants who rented a four-bedroom house owned by Ali were given four months’ notice in an email last November and told their lease would not be renewed because the property was due to be sold, according to the i Paper.
After the tenants left the property, which they had rented for £3,300, they said it was seen relisted at nearly £4,000 a month, the paper said. It reported that the property was relisted for rent after no buyer was found.
The renters’ rights bill, which is due to come into force next year, will ban landlords who have ended a tenancy in order to sell a property from relisting it for a higher rent.
Ali has been widely criticised for apparent hypocrisy. She has spoken out against private renters being exploited and said the Labour government would “empower people to challenge unreasonable rent increases”.
Labour, Conservative and Scottish National party politicians have called for her to resign. The shadow housing secretary, James Cleverly, said Ali should consider her position. He told the i Paper the allegations “would be an example of the most extreme hypocrisy and she should not have the job as homelessness minister”.
Kevin Hollinrake, the Conservative party chair, said: “I think it shows staggering hypocrisy. Rushanara Ali has been somebody who’s obviously a government minister in charge of homelessness. She’s spoken out about exploiting tenants, about providing more protections to tenants.
“You can’t say those things, then do the opposite in practice, as a landlord. She’s got to resign.”
Peter Wishart, the SNP’s deputy leader at Westminster, said: “Once this shameful story broke, Labour’s homelessness minister should have immediately resigned. The fact that she still hasn’t means this is now a direct test of Keir Starmer – he needs to sack her immediately.”
Jess Barnard, a former chair of Young Labour and a member of Labour’s national executive committee, said: “Seems an appropriate time to reiterate MPs should not be landlords, and landlords should not be Labour MPs.”
Martin Abrams, a Labour councillor in Lambeth, posted: “You couldn’t make this up! Rushanara Ali should resign #LandlordsOutOfLabour.”
The house, near Ali’s Bethnal Green and Stepney constituency, is listed for sale at £894,995. The property was reportedly put up for sale last November and the price was reduced in February.
Mairi MacRae, the director of campaigns and policy at Shelter, said: “It beggars belief that after months of dither and delay, the government’s own homelessness minister has profited from the underhand tactics the renters’ rights bill is meant to outlaw.
“This story serves as a damning reminder that the cards are fundamentally stacked against renters. Unscrupulous landlords cannot be allowed to continue the practice of ‘fire-and-rehire’ evictions, where they slap renters with a section 21 only to hike up the rent a few months later and relet the property at a higher price.”
A source close to Ali told the BBC that the tenancy had a fixed-term contract and that the house had been put on the market while the tenants were still there.
They said the tenants had been told they could stay on a rolling basis while the house was on the market, but they had chosen to leave. The house was relisted for rental only because it had not sold.
Ali’s spokesperson said: “Rushanara takes her responsibilities seriously and complied with all relevant legal requirements.”
