Glasgow books double time in court for arrears offensive

Court time allocated to rent arrears cases in Glasgow has doubled in a month as the city's main social landlord cracks down on mounting bills.

Glasgow Sheriff Court is now setting aside two days each week, instead of the usual one, to deal with the deluge of such cases brought by Glasgow Housing Association.

The court arrangement began last month and is set to remain in place until April. It could continue if a backlog of cases remains.

Last month the GHA revealed that its rent arrears had risen to more than £12.1m, close to 5% of its total rental income.

The extra court time has raised fears that the number of evictions will also rise. Sandra White, Scottish Nationalist MSP for Glasgow, raised the issue last week at the Scottish Parliament. She said: "This is a worrying development. People will be watching closely to see what kind of effect this has on evictions."

Mike Dailly, solicitor at the Govan Law Centre, said he could not remember extra court time being laid on for such cases at any time in the last 10 years. The association is being more "legally aggressive" than the city council in pursuing the problem, he added.

The GHA is pursuing more than 7000 potential rent arrears cases. Many were inherited from the council when the city's 85,000 council homes were transferred in March 2003.

People will be watching closely to see what kind of effect this has on evictions

Sandra White MSP

Some have already gone to court, but the actions have become inactive, or "sisted", after tenants staved off eviction by signing up to repayment agreements to clear the arrears.

Where tenants have failed to keep up repayments, the GHA is beginning to reinstitute proceedings.

However, a spokesman for the GHA denied that more evictions would follow as a result of the extra court hearings.

He said: "We have put in place a rent payment campaign including publicity, as well as setting up a task force to tackle this issue. GHA has also established a team of welfare benefit support officers to provide back-up to tenants who need it."

He also defended the GHA record on eviction: "Since the date of transfer [March] to November, we evicted 69 tenants who persistently failed to pay rent.