The Deregulation Act 2015 is a United Kingdom statute that made changes across many areas of law with the stated aim of reducing unnecessary burdens on businesses, civil society, individuals, public bodies and taxpayers.
The Act is broad rather than single-purpose. It touches housing, transport, regulatory functions, insolvency, company administration, business rates and other technical areas. Some parts are minor tidying provisions, while others have had practical effects for landlords, tenants, regulators and local authorities.
Background
The Act received Royal Assent on 26 March 2015. Its explanatory notes describe it as legislation intended to remove or reduce burdens and repeal provisions considered to have little practical use.
Because the Act covers many subjects, it is best understood as a package of amendments rather than a single new legal code.
Housing and Tenancy Deposits
One of the best-known parts of the Act concerns private rented housing in England and Wales.
The Act amended tenancy deposit rules under the Housing Act 2004. It dealt with problems that had arisen around older deposits, statutory periodic tenancies and the information that landlords or agents had to provide.
In practical terms, the Act made the deposit rules more explicit after court disputes about how the original scheme applied to tenancies that had changed from fixed-term to periodic arrangements.
Retaliatory Eviction
The Act introduced provisions aimed at preventing retaliatory eviction in certain assured shorthold tenancies. The concern was that a tenant who complained about poor housing conditions could be served with a section 21 notice instead of having repairs dealt with properly.
The protections were linked to local authority involvement. If a tenant complained in writing, the landlord failed to respond properly, and the local authority served a relevant notice, the landlord's ability to rely on section 21 could be restricted for a period.
Smoke and Carbon Monoxide Alarms
The Act sat alongside later regulations on smoke and carbon monoxide alarms in rented homes. Government guidance at the time linked the wider housing reforms to requirements for alarms in private rented property.
For tenants, the practical point is that housing safety rules are not limited to rent and deposit paperwork. Fire and carbon monoxide precautions can also be part of a landlord's legal duties.
Growth Duty
Sections 108 to 111 created the "growth duty". This requires specified regulators, when exercising certain functions, to have regard to the desirability of promoting economic growth.
The duty does not remove the regulator's main protective role. It is meant to sit alongside other statutory objectives, such as consumer protection, environmental protection, safety or competition. Updated statutory guidance was issued in 2024.
Other Areas
The Act also made changes to:
- Business and company administration.
- Insolvency law.
- Transport and taxi regulation.
- Local government and planning rules.
- Public authority duties and reporting.
- Repeal of some old provisions considered obsolete.
The detail of each change depends on the part of the Act being used. A reference to the Deregulation Act alone is usually not enough; the relevant section matters.
Practical Examples
Tenant Complains About Damp
A tenant complains in writing about serious damp or disrepair. If the landlord ignores the complaint and the local authority later serves a relevant notice, the landlord may face restrictions on using a section 21 notice for a period.
Deposit Paperwork
A landlord who took a deposit before a tenancy became periodic may need to check whether the deposit was protected and whether the prescribed information rules were satisfied. The Act clarified some of these older problem cases.
Regulator Sets Enforcement Policy
A regulator covered by the growth duty may have to consider economic growth when deciding how it communicates rules or allocates enforcement resources. That does not mean ignoring breaches; it means balancing the duty with the regulator's main statutory functions.
Criticism
The Act has been criticised as uneven because it bundles many unrelated changes together. Some measures were welcomed as practical tidying, while others were seen as limited or politically framed.
In housing, the retaliatory eviction provisions were useful but narrow. They depended on process, written complaints and local authority notices, so not every tenant facing a poor landlord received practical protection.
See Also
References
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