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The Guild supports clampdown on rogue landlords

The government’s decision to invest an additional £4m in funding for local councils to tackle criminal landlords and letting agents has been warmly welcomed by The Guild of Property Professionals. 

The housing secretary, Robert Jenrick, announced on Friday that he has pledged new funding to be used to clamp down on rogue landlords, with the money set to be shared between more than 100 councils across England 

He commented: “Councils already have strong powers to force landlords to make necessary improvements to a property through the use of a range of measures, including civil penalties and banning orders for the worst offenders. 

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“The grants will support a range of projects to enable councils to make the best use of these powers. This will include trialling innovative ideas, sharing best practice and targeted enforcement where we know landlords shirk their responsibilities.”

There are more than 4.5 million households in the private rented sector in England, with recent statistics showing that 82% of private renters are satisfied with their accommodation, which although impressive, does suggest that there is room for improvement 

The Guild’s inhouse Compliance Officer, Paul Offley, said: “We fully support this initiative as it will ensure that rogue landlords and letting agents are punished for breaking the law and it will also ensure that more tenants are treated fairly. 

“With the funding providing councils with a means to crack down on illegal activity in the lettings market, tenants will have more protection and the standards of the rental sector will be raised.”

“An environment where exploitative landlords are stamped out will enable good landlords and letting agents to thrive,” he added.

 

But the government funding to root out criminal landlords has been described by the Residential Landlords Association (RLA) as inadequate to tackle the scale of the problem. 

David Smith, policy director for the RLA, said: “We welcome the government’s focus on rooting out criminal landlords. For too long the debate has been driven by ideological calls for more regulation of the sector. What is needed is better enforcement of the powers already available to tackle the minority who bring the sector into disrepute.

“The funding though is nowhere near enough. Instead of offering inadequate and sporadic pots of money, it is critical that the government provides proper, multi-year funding to enable councils to plan and prepare workable strategies to find the criminal landlords. This should be supported by councils having the political will to prioritise enforcement against the crooks rather than tying good landlords up in licensing schemes which do nothing to protect tenants.”

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Poll: Do you think the latest round of government funding to root out criminal landlords is adequate to tackle the scale of the problem?

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    • 06 January 2020 17:20 PM

    can we please just have National LL licensing!
    £50 per property for a 5 year licence.
    Anyone letting on an AST without a licence for the property immediate confiscation by the Council!!!
    That should concentrate a few rogue LL minds!!!

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    Trouble is , that licensing doesn't work, as the authorities are not pro-active enough in rooting out the rogues.
    We have licensing here in Wales and once a property is registered, then they couldn't give a damn.
    They don't follow anything up unless it is 'handed to them on a plate'.
    I have a property next to mine, which is in a shocking state of repair, but when I checked, it was registered with Rent Smart Wales.
    I told the local authority about it, who visited and they said that there was nothing that they could do, as the property was purely commercial with a private maisonette upstairs.
    It seems that they will ,make any excuse to not take action.
    Along with licensing, there should be a requirement of a minimum standard and inspections carried out to enforce compliance. However, they will probably say that there isn't enough manpower or resources to do this, so the landlord who falls well below the standard expected, just gets away with it.

  • Daniela Provvedi

    I don't care how much money the Government gives the local councils to root out rogue Landlords - the more the better, as far as I'm concerned. My conscious is clean. I'm a good Landlord.
    I'm just fed-up with all the bad publicity good Landlords get due to these rogues, so let the Government do whatever it takes....

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