At last, the current government have acknowledged that they will be looking at the possibility of re-instating the choice for tenants receiving local housing allowance to have their rent paid directly to their landlords and the shadow housing minister has confirmed that, if the Conservatives are successful at the next election, they will ensure that all local housing allowance will be paid directly.
In my opinion, this is a must. At Landlord Action, since the rule change in April 2008, we have seen a huge increase in possession actions against tenants who have withheld rent and not passed on to the landlord. On average we deal with 250 tenant eviction cases per month, of which around 10% are directly linked to housing benefit not being passed over by the tenant.