Squatting will become a criminal offence tomorrow

Squatting becomes a criminal offence in England and Wales on 1^st September 2012.

Section 144 of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 creates the offence of ‘squatting in a residential building’

A person commits an offence if:

• the person is in a residential building as a trespasser having entered it as a trespasser,
• the person knows or ought to know that he or she is a trespasser, and
• the person is living in the building or intends to live there for any period.

The offence is not committed by a person holding over after the end of a lease or licence (even if the person leaves and re-enters the building).

The maximum penalty will be six months in jail, a £5,000 fine, or both.

If you own an empty shop, factory or office (and there’s plenty of those around at the moment) then you’d better take precautions now as the law doesn’t apply to non residential property and there's going to be quite a few homeless people looking for somewhere to live. I suspect the police are going to be pretty busy over the forthcoming months!