A council is running a pilot project to manage litter issues associated with HMOs.

All homes in parts of Coventry were given a range of information on tenants’ rights and responsibilities and enforcement action was also taken where necessary.

Existing legislative powers were used to tackle unlicensed HMOs, bins on footpaths, contaminated recycling bins, excess side waste and inadequate bins. 

In two streets HMOs were identified and visited. 

Five properties in the two streets were found to be unlicensed HMOs and four received penalties of more than £100,000.

Enforcement officers also made visits to monitor waste issues and to check that there were enough wheelie bins for the number of tenants. Advice was also given about the problem of leaving excess waste and overflowing bins.

Landlords were also reminded that a breach of the licence condition was a criminal offence and landlords were invited to contact the team should the licence holder be unsure of any of their legal duties.

A spokesperson for the council says: “This has been a real success, but we need to continue this approach where we can.

“Local people are fed up with overflowing bins, and we needed to use a combination of education and enforcement action. We wanted to make the neighbourhood better, and reduce the amount of waste building up on the kerbside.

“Part of our approach was to link different services together and talk to landlords and highlight the need to keep the neighbourhood cleaner. Licences for HMOs help us to maintain better standards because everyone understands their responsibilities.”