A move by one London council to refer itself to the Regulator of Social Housing should be seen as a 'national scandal', says a private sector safety law expert.
Phil Turtle of Landlord Licensing & Defence says the Regulator should use its new powers and fine the council as much as the council itself would fine a private landlord - in this case, up to a startling £270m.
Turtle’s calls comes after Labour-controlled Southwark council, which has 36,000 council homes, found that it had not met a new regulatory requirement to carry out electrical safety tests in its properties.
That led to the self-referral to the Regulator which is an independent organisation for regulating the social housing sector.
Turtle says the council should be hit with a fine equivalent to one a landlord in the private rented sector would face.
He says: "Under the Electrical Safety Standards in the Private Rented Sector (England) Regulations 2020, any private landlord that failed to do an EICR every five years and who let a property without a valid EICR, would be fined by the very same local authority up to £30,000.
"In terms of the calculation of this fine, every Local Housing Authority has a civil penalty matrix with the axis of 'Harm' and 'Culpability'.
"The harm would be considered as being high as EICRs were introduced specifically because of the significant risks of electrical fires and electric shock/electrocution due to old fashioned, and now inadequate, circuit protection. The culpability would be rated on the landlord's experience and ability.
"A single property landlord may be rated as low to medium, but a portfolio landlord would have no excuse for not knowing and would be rated at the top of the culpability scale."
He adds: "A landlord the size of the local authority would expect a fine of at least £25,000, if not the full £30,000 As such, the local housing authority would be imposing fines of 10,000 properties, times - let's say £27,000 each - which would be £270m.
"Will the Regulator of Social Housing (RSH) impose such a fine? Of course not, the council will get a slap on the wrist and no one, particularly the incompetent staff will get away Scott-free."
Southwark says it is now carrying out the outstanding Electrical Installation Condition Reports (EICR).
All tenants will be contacted and council leader Kieron Williams says: "We take residents' safety extremely seriously and are determined to keep raising the quality of our council homes. Whilst we have made real progress – improving our repairs service, tackling damp and making our homes safer from fire – we also have work to do.
"This includes completing these important electrical tests. I apologise for this delay."
Want to comment on this story? Our focus is on providing a platform for you to share your insights and views and we welcome contributions.
If any post is considered to victimise, harass, degrade or intimidate an individual or group of individuals, then the post may be deleted and the individual immediately banned from posting in future.
Please help us by reporting comments you consider to be unduly offensive so we can review and take action if necessary. Thank you.
.jpg)
%20(002).png)
.jpg)
Join the conversation
Jump to latest comment and add your reply
Comrades: "All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others."
Thats the future, folks
One rule for those in charge , no rules at all
Lots of red tape for the rest of us
Keeps us in our place
I like how he called them “ incompetent “ 😂😂👍🏻👍🏻 Nice one.
In the unlikely event of the council receiving an appropriate fine they will simply jack up the registration charges on decent private landlords to claw it back!
Senior management in Councils earn huge salaries and should risk huge personal fines for incompetence.
The Council tax payers will be the ones paying any fine.
Yep- licence fees etc will increase. To pay for the Total Incompetence.
Nottingham City Council is just as bad - the recently had to admit that they have not inspected all of their social housing for more than 5 years so that means no EPC’s, no electrical & gas testing, no fire alarm testing - however they are extremely eager to prosecute any PRS landlord for not abiding with any breach of housing or licensing regulations- how unfair & hypocritical
Colin - Nottingham Council according to Leaders Debate last night is bankrupt. Keir Starmer said he was stopping no fault evictions so Councils didn’t have to provide temporary housing. Not sure how that works! Landlords don’t have empty properties. We are always housing someone. An absolutely idiotic statement by him.
Social housing should be maintained at least to the standard of the PRS, with all the same safety requirements. If they aren't doing this then it's either incompetence or lack of funds probably because the rents are too low. Either way this should be addressed before they come after private landlords. Get your own house in order.
Its funny you say that, because all the red tape that's been introduced is because some rogue landlords didn't meet the alleged social housing standards.
Social housing should have better checks in place, after all look at the kind of people they rent to
And this is why the cry for more social housing is pointless. Councils don’t, or will say they can’t, resource the stock they already have. If they can’t afford an inspection or to implement a basic EPC then they can’t afford to lay a new brick. We need a radical solution - and destroying the PRS ain’t it….
Or, on the other side of the coin: whatever fine pro-rata, per property is imposed on this diabolical Council should set a president for Private Landlords.
It is the Councils that need an overhaul - not the small private landlords whom they are beating with a stick!
If the councils can't afford to maintain the requirements of the new safety standards then they should have to re-assess their business model. As it's their claim they cant afford it, then they should either sell off their housing stock and let the professionals do it, or raise the rents of their properties so they can afford it, and also making staff cuts and redundancies for the incompetent staff. They could turn the whole stock over go a charity and let them run it, or a housing association even.
Sell their housing stock was Thachers solution, and many people bought their own council house. It seemed to work for many at the time.
The other idea is to sell the properties to the PRS at a discount, remove section 24, remove the stamp duty or substantial reductions, lower the tax rate for housing providers in the PRS and
Remove all the anti landlord legislation introduced in the last 20 years, to encourage the PRS to invest in property, thereby providing housing for the many.
A list of tenants who stop paying rent should be black listed with antisocial behaviour types.
Eventually you'll get people behaving in a civilised manner, or they will be buying their own home. That will free up the courts to provide real justice and our civilisation and the tax payer will all benefit.
Sounds like utopia Frank?
South Norfolk council have handed all their housing stock to a housing assoc, now that housing assoc are busy selling all these homes in auctions
Ive worked in Public sector housing for 30 years (Council & Housing Association). Its beyond laughable what they do/get away with. But they do like there high salaries. They are incompetent, have zero experience in managing money, let alone staff & not monitored enough (Back handers). They are a joke/useless - hence going bankrupt! Only ones who get the blame/expense is the private landlord.
Even if Labour get in, how can they undo 14 years of damage/corruption, etc.
Renting your property out is a massive gamble now!
The crux of the matter is this: social housing providers and the staff working for them have no investment, either monetary or emotional, in their housing stock. They can go home at night, not giving a ****, because tomorrow they'll be back in their air-conditioned offices, eating hob nobs and flicking through their lease car brochures or checking how much they've got in their pension pot.
Things get too tough? No problem. Plead work life balance problems or apply for another cushy job at a different housing association.
The same malaise that has spread through all public service areas and the NHS afflicts these people.
And Keir Starmer is their cheerleader in waiting.
The 'responsibility' of the public sector, has little-by-little, been pushed onto the private sector, without the tax benefits. Clever eh!
The pathetic Government need landlords, but there is clearly no incentive. Its like they want landlords to feed, house, pay for damages at their expense, but the government take all the good credit landlords do. There are decent tenants, but for the majority, let the Government open up their homes to them! Watch this space. No such thing a profit in the Private Sector, unless you are in Government & have bog pockets for back handers!
I've an empty property on the market. I won't rent it out as it's too much hassle and unquantified law changes on the horizon. Then that's me out.
some how the rental charges will not cover the ripoff Government/Council charges, let alone bringing the property back to its original standard. On top of that is it worth all that stress & ill health!!! Dont think so! Let the scummy government sort out there own mess! High time they took responsibility for the constant Screwups/Fraud.
Bet the press don’t give this much coverage…and I doubt we will ever hear about the stiffly worded memo saying ‘lessons have been learned’ - which is probably the only penalty applied in the end
No profit in this from them. All they do is stir trouble!!! Landlords on your own - Dont rely on ANY GOVERNMENT! I rented my house once which was managed by a useless agent! Cost me more than what I received in 9 months! watch this space after the GE!!!!!
Frank the hypocrisy is unbelievable Councils says they can’t afford to maintain their houses.
This is not allowed in the Private Rented Sector you are required to afford it whether you got the money or not, one rule for them another for us and they don’t even pay tax or have to pay for license. Ah when was the last time you made a License Application one of the conditions is have you got funds for maintenance and up keep. So if you put down no then you won’t be getting a license or allowed to be a landlord,
don’t you think it’s strange since they are the very people that robbed your funds for themselves .
Please login to comment