Housing Minister announces £5M cash boost to tackle rogue landlords

Housing Minister Brandon Lewis has announced a £5M cash boost for councils to tackle rogue landlords in their area.

A total of 48 landlords will share £5M of funding so that they can take on irresponsible landlords that force tenants to live in squalid and dangerous properties.

The funding will also help councils to clamp down on “beds in sheds”.

Since 2011, there have been nearly 40,000 inspections that have taken place, with over 3,000 landlords facing further enforcement action or prosecution.

The £5M will help ensure that properties are of reasonable living standards by allowing local authorities to carry out more raids, increase inspections of property, issue more statutory notices, survey more streets and to demolish sheds and prohibited buildings.

The funding is part of a package of measures to ensure that tenants get a better deal when they rent a home. The extra funding shows significant progress had been made, with a total of £11.7M distributed to councils to crack down on the issue.

Protection for tenants against retaliatory eviction where they have a legitimate complaint, has been introduced, along with the stopping of landlords from serving an open-ended eviction notice at the start of the tenancy.

Housing Minister Brandon Lewis said: “Many private rental tenants are happy with their home and the service they receive, but there are still rogue landlords that exploit vulnerable people and force their tenants to live in overcrowded and squalid accommodation.

“We also want to raise the quality and choice of rental accommodation across the sector. The funding will ensure tenants know what level of service they can expect and have confidence to get help and take action if things go wrong.”

The new measures will not affect any respectable and legitimate landlords.

Poor quality, overcrowded and dangerous accommodation can lead on to wider problems within the community, such as anti-social behaviour, unemployment, and sanitation issues for whole roads, greater fire risk and fraud.

From 1 February 2016 landlords in England will have to carry out Right to Rent checks to ensure potential tenants have the right to rent property in the country.

The funding comes as part of an ambitious package of proposals in the Housing and Planning Bill to give tenants the confidence to demand better standards. Measures in the Bill include a database of rogue landlords, banning order, introduction of civil penalties, extension of Rent Repayment Orders to cover illegal eviction, breach of a banning order or failure to comply with a statutory notice, and more stringent fit and proper person test for landlords of licensable properties such as Houses in Multiple Occupation.

 

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