Legal protection to ensure that families across Scotland are only evicted as an "absolute last resort" must be put in place by the Scottish government as a matter of urgency, the charity Shelter Scotland has said.

The call comes as a Shelter report released today shows that social landlords evicted 3,297 tenants during 2008-9. The majority of these were for rent arrears.

The housing charity's 2nd annual report on evictions – Evictions by social landlords in Scotland 2008-09 – shows overall progress has been made on reducing the numbers of people affected by eviction. But it argues more must be done to protect social tenants from the trauma of losing their home.

Shelter Scotland is urging the Scottish government to make sure that families facing eviction from social housing have the same legal protection as struggling home owners. The charity wants to see a pre-court protection for social tenants, as part of a recession-fighting package of legislation aimed at keeping people in their homes.

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This pre-court protection would set out all the actions social landlords must take before an eviction can call in court.

The charity is also urging other councils and Registered Social Landlords (RSLs) to 'follow in the footsteps' of pace-setting landlords, like Stirling Council and Glasgow Housing Association (GHA).

Major achievements on reducing evictions over the past year have included: Stirling Council being the first council in the UK to ban evictions for rent arrears, GHA's revised rent arrears policy resulting in a 24% drop in evictions and the Scottish government-led Evictions Summit recently examined whether protection for social tenants is adequate.

Gordon MacRae, Head of External Relations, Shelter Scotland, housing and homelessness charity, said: "Since we put the spotlight on evictions in last year's report, we've been heartened by the progress that has been made on reducing eviction for rent arrears, with overall evictions by social landlords down nearly 8% on the previous year. However, with nearly 3,300 tenants still evicted from their homes in 2008-9, more still needs to be done.

"We know that eviction for rent arrears remains a crude and ineffective way of dealing with debt problems. This is highlighted by GHA's new approach and the fact that, while local authority evictions have dropped, the overall arrears bill for councils, has increased.

"All social landlords must continue to focus on keeping people in their homes and follow in the footsteps of good practice."

Mr MacRae called on the Scottish government to bring in legal protections for social tenants, similar to those being proposed for homeowners, which would ensure eviction really is a last resort.

The Shelter Scotland report, which covers 2008-9, shows that local authorities took 13,323 tenants to court last year, eventually evicting 1,773 tenants – a drop of 15% from last year.

Registered Social Landlords raised 6,385 court actions, evicting 1,524 tenants – a rise of 3% from last year.

(GK/KMcA)