A statutory instrument – The Civil Procedure (Amendment) Rules 2020 – has been laid, and it includes, amongst other things, amendments to CPR Part 55 on possession claims. These will be in force from 6 April 2020.
The explanatory memorandum says:
- Housing matters: the amendments to CPR rule 55.11 together with the substitution of a new streamlined rule 52.12 remove demoted assured shorthold tenancies and oral tenancy agreement cases from the accelerated possession process. Both sorts of case are now rare, and there is considered to be no justification for retaining them within the accelerated procedure.
And the amends do indeed do that. But they also appear to exclude assured shorthold tenancies that began between 15 January 1989 and 27 February 1997 from the accelerated procedure. Granted, there are not likely to be many of those left, but this is still worthy of note.
The requirements for a written tenancy agreement are also tightened. Now either there must be a written agreement, or the tenancy be a statutory periodic following a tenancy with a written agreement. So the current allowance that the tenancy
relates to the same or substantially the same property let to the same tenant and on the same terms (though not necessarily as to rent or duration) as a tenancy which was the subject of a written agreement;
has gone. No written agreement means no accelerated possession procedure.