Unlawful eviction damages: equality impact assessment

Executive summary

Scottish Ministers have committed to further reform of the rented sectors as part of delivering their vision and commitments for housing as set out in Housing to 2040^[1] and consulted on as part of our New Deal for Tenants: Draft Rented Sector Strategy^[2]. The reforms were also developed as part of the Cooperation Agreement between the Scottish Government and the Scottish Green Party Parliamentary Group, which was ended on 25 April 2024. The 2023-24 Programme for Government^[3] commits to a Housing Bill that will help to deliver the legislative changes required.

Chapter 3, Part 2 of the Bill includes provisions to change how civil damages for unlawful eviction are calculated. Changing the method for calculating the level of compensation will help to make it easier and more attractive for tenants to challenge an unlawful eviction and receive compensation where an unlawful eviction is found to have occurred. This would also help to make it more difficult, expensive and risky for a landlord to pursue an unlawful eviction than going through the correct routes, acting as a potentially strong disincentive.

There is no evidence to suggest that unlawful eviction is a problem in the social rented sector, however the current system applies to both the private rented and social rented sectors and the intention is that this position should continue.

This document sets out the results of our equality impact assessment on this change. It is one of a number of equality impact assessments carried out on the policy changes included in the Bill.

The EQIA is an ongoing process, and therefore will continually be amended as new evidence comes to light. We will continue to engage with our stakeholders and will regularly review the EQIA record and results following the data review and subsequent analyses.