There may be a whole lot of angst from either side of the tenancy settlement about pets.
Many tenants wish to hold a pet however aren’t allowed. Many landlords are sad concerning the injury attributable to pets and wish to ban them fully.
Therefore the virtually common use of pet prohibition clauses in tenancy agreements and the despair of tenants in search of animal companionship.
Nevertheless, I’m right here to let you know that if you wish to have a pet hen or a rabbit – you might be able to accomplish that.
Enter the Allotments Act 1950
This largely forgotten act offers, in part 12, as follows:
12 Abolition of contractual restrictions on maintaining hens and rabbits.
(1) However any provision on the contrary in any lease or tenancy or in any covenant, contract or endeavor regarding the use to be made from any land, it shall be lawful for the occupier of any land to maintain, in any other case than by means of commerce or enterprise, hens or rabbits in anywhere on the land and to erect or place and keep such buildings or constructions on the land as fairly essential for that objective:
Supplied that nothing on this subsection shall authorise any hens or rabbits to be stored in such a spot or in such a way as to be prejudicial to well being or a nuisance or have an effect on the operation of any enactment.
So what does this imply?
You possibly can hold hens and/or rabbits
- As long as maintaining them shouldn’t be a part of your commerce or enterprise
- is not going to be ‘prejudicial to well being’, or
- A nuisance, or
- Have an effect on the operation of any enactment.
It doesn’t look as if s12 is proscribed to allotments because it talks about ‘any lease or tenancy or in any covenant, contract or endeavor regarding the use to be made from any land’
Giles Peaker wrote an excellent post on this here in 2011 when he identified (within the feedback) that the act continues to be good legislation however that it will not prolong to cockerels.
The act most likely stems from the times of rationing when individuals wanted to maintain hens and rabbits for meals. One thing which may additionally apply at this time with our present price of dwelling disaster – though I believe fewer individuals these days will probably be up for the unpleasant enterprise of getting hens and rabbits prepared for the pot.
Nevertheless, the legislation could properly apply to any ’emotional assist’ hens or rabbits that tenants could wish to hold. Hens, for instance, may be surprisingly good pets, as this article reveals.
What can landlords do about it?
So if you’re a landlord and, on doing all your property inspection, you discover rabbits and hens roaming round inside – what are you able to do?
You have to to ban the animal below the phrases of the act. So, for instance, letting rabbits run round free indoors could be a hazard as they tend to chew electrical wiring (I’ve private expertise of this from my childhood!). So one thing you could possibly legitimately, I believe, prohibit below the phrases of your tenancy settlement.
Nevertheless, if the animals are being stored in well-maintained hutches within the backyard or on a balcony – it could be laborious so that you can object.
Has anybody had any latest expertise with this act?
