A council in the westcountry says it’s going to come down hard on rogue landlords and has identified ‘high risk’ properties where tenants require protection.

A report on the Bridport News website says that Dorset Council has additional funding to adopt a more aggressive approach towards shortcomings in the private rental sector, and it is already trialling this in the Weymouth district of the county.

In Weymouth council officers have apparently identified so-called ‘high risk’ properties in the town centre, where landlords are having their properties inspected proactively without the council waiting for possible complaints from tenants.

A Dorset Council meeting has heard that other activity in Weymouth had been around the energy efficiency of private lets “an issue some landlords were initially not keen to address because of the additional cost.”

In the 2019-20 financial year the authority had over 300 issues raised by tenants about private rented properties which has resulted in 42 legal notices being issued.

You can see the full local media story here.