It shows that landlords and agents ARE being prosecuted and fined by the Courts – sometimes quite heavily.

R v Weston and Williams - Worcester Crown Court

Here the defendants ran a letting agency called Premier Places in Redditch and Worcester.  They were members of TDS but failed to ring fence tenancy deposit funds.  This eventually cost the  TDS scheme more than £63,000 when it had to pay out to the tenants.

Weston, who ran the business, pleaded guilty to four counts of fraud at Worcester Crown Court and Williams pleaded guilty to three counts of forgery.  They were given suspended prison sentences and ordered to undertake community service.

A report linked to from Destin states that TDS were furious at this sentance which they felt was unduly lenient.  However the Judge is reported as saying that Weston was bankrupt and the events had had a devastating effect on his family; also he exhibited genuine remorse.

R v Mathew Richard Tapper – Brent Magistrates Court

Here Tapper was a private sector landlord prosecuted by Harrow Council for failing to rectify ‘excess cold’ hazards at his property.

The total fine and costs came to £3,505

R v Christopher Stewart Andrews – Redhill Magistrates Court

Here the prosecution was brought by Reigate & Banstead BC after the defendant failed to carry out works to reduce the risks from fire in a basement flat at 58 London Road, Redhill.

He did not attend the hearing but in his absence was fined the maximum penalty of £5000 and ordered to pay  the  Council’s full costs of £1100.

A total of £6,100.

R v Martin Horsfall – Leeds Magistrates Court

Leeds CC declared a selective licensing area in part of its district (Cross Green and East End Park).  The defendant had four properties which he failed to license despite being asked to do so by the Council (although he denied recieving them).  The report on the Council website stated:

Council officers went to considerable lengths to engage with Mr Horsfall …. Mr Horsfall denied receiving any correspondence or having any recollection of any of the phone calls despite records of the conversations being made.

Mr Horsfall applied to have his case reopened after originally being prosecuted on the 17 of March 2011 in his absence. He claimed he had not received the legal summonses due to him moving address, despite seven of the summonses being opened and returned to the courts.

Mr Horsfall’s properties gave further cause for concern after visits were made to one of his properties by officers of the council which highlighted a serious lack of fire safety provision.

He was fined £14,000 plus costs of over £6,817.62.  Total £20,817.62.

R v Peter and Frances Kavanagh – Salford Magistrates Court

This is another failure to comply with selective licensing.  The report in Salford Online states

The Kavanagh’s failed to show at court and were found guilty in their absence. They were each fined £525 for every property they failed to get a licence for – amounting to £5,250.

They were also ordered to pay £580 towards court costs and £30 in victims surcharges.

So that is a total of £5,860

R v Blue Square Projects - Nuneaton Magistrates Court

This is prosecution for failure to comply with an improvement notice relating to a dangerous property.

Blue Square Projects of Edgbaston were renting out a property in Dordon to the tenant, her partner and four children. Following the tenant’s complaint to North Warwickshire Borough Council, the Environmental Health Team visited the property to find rotten windows, mould in the bathroom, bedroom and living room, faulty radiators and overloaded electrical sockets. The Council then advised Blue Square Projects to rectify the damage, which they subsequently failed to do.

However, surprise surprise, the work did not get done.

Assistant Director: Housing, Angela Coates explained : ” This was a catalogue of disasters, with contractors turning up when the tenant was absent or not turning up at all when promised. “

As the property was still a risk to the health and safety of the tenants, the Council decided to take the matter to court, and to carry out the works themselves and recharge Blue Square Projects.

The company was fined  £2,093 after his solicitors pleaded guilty on his behalf by post.

R v Bis-Mil-Lah Enterprises Ltd – Luton Magistrates Court

Here the defendant owned  two detached outbuildings of a property at 50 Brook Street which were being used as self-contained dwellings without planning permission. An enforcement notice was served by Luton Council because the buildings were being let for accommodation without planning permission and were unsuitable as residential premises.

Needless to say, the company failed to comply with the notice.  Taking account of the benefit derived from the letting, the company was fined £15,000 for non-compliance and ordered it to pay a £10,000 contribution towards the Council’s costs.

Total £25,000.

R v Karen Gamon – Bodmin Magistrates Court

This case involves breaches of the House in Multiple Occupation Management Regulations by the defendant landlord Ms Gamon.

Miss Gamon was informed of the HMO Management Regulations breaches by the Council but failed over a significant period of time to carry out necessary works to improve the standards in her property to an acceptable level.

Works specified included the requirements to remove stored combustibles restricting safe use of the means of escape in the property, make safe the loose and cracked concrete tiled entrance pathway steps, remedy penetrating damp to the ground floor porch and remove large accumulations of refuse to the rear of the property.

She was fined £1,700 with costs of £173.67 and a £15 victim surcharge – total £1,888.67.

R v Darren Harrison – Burton Magistrates Court

This is another case involving breach of the HMO regulations.

when council officers inspected Mr Harrison’s property in Elizabeth Drive, Tamworth in November last year, the smoke alarm system was not working, he failed to provide the local authority with gas and electrical safety certificates for the property, the bathroom and shower areas were poorly maintained and unhygienic, the light fitting in the ground floor toilet was defective and could not be used, the kitchen was in an unhygienic condition and there was no notice on display providing contact information to the occupants of the premises.

Harrison (who operates as Staffordshire Lettings) failed to provide the council with gas and electrical safety certificates for the property.

He was fined  £4,965 and ordered to pay prosecution costs of £2,400, plus a £15 victim surcharge.  A total of  £7,380.

*****

Nine cases with nine different penalties.  They seem fairly variable to me, but at least it shows that successful prosecutions are being done.

Empty properties in Cornwall

There was an interesting article in the Observer yesterday about bringing empty homes back into use, in particular in Cornwall. With the current shortage of properties, it is a scandal that there are some 920,000 properties empty nationwide.

Given the estimated £10,000 investment per property to bring it back into use compared to £90,000 subsidy to built it from scratch, it makes very good sense. For example on those figures, the £2 million set aside by Cornwall to get some of its 3,597 properties back into use, would give 200 properties as opposed to about 22.

However Cornwall seems to be doing better than that, as the article reports 131 having brought back into use so far with a further 350 by the end of 2013. Well done Cornwall! Mind you, still some way to go though.

Other areas taking action

However, Cornwall is not the only county taking action. According to the article Kent and Bristol are making respectable efforts to deal with the problem.

I hope the efforts succeed, and that compulsory purchase orders WILL be made against recalcitrant property owners.

Some questions

Incidentially, the article only mentions compulsory purchase orders and not the Empty Dwelling Management Orders which came into force a few years ago.  Are these not being used?

One problem mentioned by the article is MOD military bases which have been shut and the houses left to rot. This seems on the face of it, unacceptable. Can nothing be done about them?

It also seems unhelpful to say the least, that mortgage companies are unwilling to lend on homes which have been empty for more than six months.

It would be great to learn what other local authorities are doing about empty properties, and how successful they have been.

Here’s what happened on the blog:

Sunday

The Estates of Man in Norman England

Another one of my History Spot posts – Taking a look at the different ways people could ‘hold’ land in Norman England, bearing in mind that only the king could own it. See why this was here …

Monday

Landlord Accreditation – a way to stand out from the crowd

Discussing accreditation and what it is, and also how you can find out about it.  However some readers in the comments are  doubtful about its ability to change the world.  I still think its a Good Thing though.  Find out why here …

Tuesday

Ben Reeve Lewis does the washing up to the Tenancy Agreements Audiobook

A great title for a great post – a glimpse into the home life of our own Friday columnist.  Glad he liked the audio book anyway.  Find out what he said about it here …

Wednesday

Bad landlords – three successful prosecutions

Councils seem to be criticised a lot for their lack of enforcment action.  Here are a few cases where they suceeded in getting a Result.  Read all about it here …

How do you allocate money from the deposit when then are rent arrears AND damage?

A question from the heart from Mark, seeking guidance from the Blog Clinic.  Find out what the advice was here …

Thursday

New Gas Safety report finds a 50% greater risk in the private rented sector

Looking at trends from the figures of gas incidents since 1997 – we also learned that the elderly are 5 times more likely to have problems – find out why here …

Friday

Ben Reeves Friday Newsround #24

Here we learn a bit of Ben’s social history before he launches into a discussion about planning, ending up with looking at a few exciting but possibly far fetched ideas.  See what you think of them here …

Extra reading

If you have read and enjoyed all of those why not:

• Read about proposed amendments to the tenancy deposit protection rules in the DPS Blog
• Read some of the excellent news posts on the Landlord Today site
• Let me have your feedback on this blog (and get a free pdf with my ten top tips for landlords), and
• Find out more about my Tenancy Agreements Audiobook (special discount offer ends on Monday)

Tune in for more updates next week!

In addition to all the legislation discussed in the previous parts of this series, there are a lot of regulations which landlords (and tenants, but mostly landlords) need to comply with.

These include regulations governed both by the criminal and the civil law. However the best known are within the criminal jurisdiction, and deal with health and safety issues.

Regulations governed by the criminal law

The Gas Safety Regulations

These are perhaps the best known of the regulations. Gas and improperly maintained gas appliances can be very dangerous, and therefore to protect tenants the Gas Safety (Installation and Use) Regulations 1998 were passed.

These provide for landlords to get all gas appliances checked annually with a gas installer registered with the Gas Safe Register and provide a certificate to this effect to tenants when they first go in and then every year after that.

The regulations are enforced by local Heath and Safety Executives. This is the organisation tenants should contact when their landlords fail to obtain and provide them with a gas safety certificate. However the HSE has been criticised for failing to prosecute diligently, and there are relatively few reported cases.

The Furniture and other product safety regulations

The furniture regulations are also reasonably well known. These require landlords to provide only furniture and furnishings which comply with fire safety standards and to ensure that all items contain the proper labels.

These regulations are enforced by local authority Trading Standards Offices, along with other product safety regulations relating to electrical and other appliances in the home. Landlords wanting to know more about their obligations here should contact their local Trading Standards Office as they generally have useful information leaflets.

Regulations enforced by Local Authorities

Local Authorities have a big part to pay in enforcement of standards. These are the main areas covered:

The Housing Health and Safety Rating System

This is set out in Part 1 of the Housing Act 2004 and is a system used now to assess the safety of all residential accommodation although it is mostly used for rented property, in particular Houses in Multiple Occupation (HMOs). Inspections are carried out by Environmental Health Officers.

Properties are assessed against 29 hazards and where ‘category 1’ hazards are found, officers are supposed to serve an improvement notice and enforce this by bringing a prosecution in the Magistrates Courts if not complied with.

However as discussed in the Battersby Report, relatively few prosecutions are being done nationally although standards are known to be very poor in many areas.

The main reasons for this are believed to be the difficulty and cost of bringing prosecutions, and lack of local authority staff to do this (many staff have been made redundant recently as part of Local Authority cost cutting exercises).

This, combined by the low fines awarded by the courts which tends to disincentivise officers from bringing claims in the first place, means that these regulations are not being used as effectively as was presumably intended.

HMO Regulations

There are many additional requirements placed on landlords of HMO properties as these are believed to pose greater risk to tenants.

Regulations include management regulations and amenity standards, plus the larger HMOs needs to obtain a license. The actual standards vary across the country as some Local Authorities impose additional requirements, so landlords wanting to know what their obligations are should consult their local authority.

Energy Performance

These regulations were brought in, in 2008 and require landlords to obtain an energy performance certificate and provide a copy of this to tenants before the property is let to them. The intention behind the regulations is to encourage landlords to actually follow the guidance in the certificates and improve the energy efficiency of the property.

However the regulations do not seem to have been particularly successful and it is reported that most tenants neither know about the regulations nor care about receiving the certificate.

Other regulations

Of course landlords also need to comply with other relevant regulations such as the building regulations, regulations regarding fire safety, smoking and the like.

Regulations governed by the Civil Law

The Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations 1999

These regulations come from a European Directive which all EEC countries are obliged to incorporate into their legislation. They are designed to protect consumers from harsh contract terms in contracts between businesses and consumers.

Their main application so far as landlords and tenants are concerned is tenancy agreements although they also apply to agency agreements between letting agents and landlords (where the landlord is a consumer).

These regulations are enforced by the Office of Fair Trading (assisted by local Trading Standards Offices), who have issued guidance on unfair terms in tenancy agreements most recently in 2005.

Where they find that businesses are using contracts including unfair terms, the OFT will first request that the terms be changed. If the business refuses to do this, they will then issue proceedings for a declaration and an injunction restraining the use of the offending terms. As happened in the Foxtons litigation of a couple of years ago.

Tenants (or consumers generally) can also use the regulations as a defence in ordinary court proceedings where the business is seeking to enforce a contract clause which is unfair under the terms of the regulations.

The main problem with this however is that as an ‘unfair’ clause is generally one where the tenants rights are being breached, you need to have a good working knowledge of landlord and tenant law in the first place, to be able to recognise when this is happening. Knowledge which most tenants do not possess.

The tenancy deposit regulations

These came into force in April 2007 and require landlords to protect all deposits with a government authorised tenancy deposit scheme and serve a notice on tenant giving prescribed information about the scheme used.

The most effective penalty for non compliance is the fact that section 21 notices served will not be valid unless the deposit has been protected, so the landlord will be unable to evict. However this is of little use to tenants who have moved out and want their deposit money back.

The regulations were intended to provide tenants with the right to claim a penalty of three times the deposit sum if landlords fail to comply, but drafting deficiencies have resulted in Court of Appeal decisions which render the regulations virtually toothless, save in a few circumstances.

Unlike the other regulations discussed above, there is no organisation charged with overseeing and enforcing these regulations and therefore tenants whose landlords just refuse to comply, have nowhere official to turn to for help.

Regulation of landlords and letting agents

But what, gentle reader, you may be asking, about regulation of landlords themselves?  And regulation of letting agents?

At present there is no regulation of either. Anyone can rent out property, or set up as an agent. There are no standards they need to comply with or regulations they need to adhere to in order to be allowed to rent out property or act as a letting agent.

Indeed it is not known how many landlords or agents there actually are, as there is no official way (other than perhaps via taxation records held by the treasury) to find this out.

I will be looking at this next week in the concluding part of this series.

(See the index to the whole series here)

The following are links to items referred to in the article:

• The BBC news item on decent homes on 16 September 2010
• The revised definition of the decent homes standard published in June 2006
• The Housing Act 2004 - part one sets out the HHSRS
• A list of the 29 hazards on the HHSRS (provided by East Midlands local authorities)
• National Landlords Association article regarding the housing benefit survey
• My post on the Channel 4 Landlords from Hell program, and follow up post
• My post on the Battersby Report and the report itself
• Two posts on housing reports, one on a parliamentary report and one on housing in Wales
• News item on Newhan Council’s plans