Speaking as a Pimlico HMO I was somewhat amazed at the stupidity displayed by 4 of my Bristol Bretheren who seem to have just ignored their local authority, and their responsibilities to provide safe decent accommodation.
The knowledge and attitude of local authority Environmental Health Officers can be patchy – they can be helpful, skilled, trained, or sometimes they leave you shaking your head in disbelief. You have to take the rough with the smooth, and in general things will turn out all right. What you cannot do is ignore them, or believe that the regulations apply to everyone else, but not you.
Housing Officers from Bristol City Council, found a series of problems at an HMO including:
- Failure to provide adequate fire safety at the property.
- Failure to ensure the shared areas of the property were maintained in a good and clean decorative order.
- Failure to ensure the property was kept in good repair.
- Failure to provide lighting in many of the shared areas of the property.
- Keeping a property whose structure was a danger to the health of the occupiers.
- Failure to provide information about the property when required to do so.
Bristol can offer a range of advice and support to help landlords comply with legislation, however, where landlords refuse to co-operate and where there are serious breaches of the Housing Act (as in this case) local authorities can and will take legal action to compel them to bring improvements.
On December 21, the landlords were summonsed before Bristol Magistrates Court in relation to alleged offences under the Housing Act 2004 and the Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1976. They, failed to attend Court or have representation – talk about committing suicide! The defendants were found guilty on all charges, and the combined fines totalled £30,036.30 and combined costs totalled £5,199.60.
Private landlord prosecuted by council for Housing Act failures
Reminds me of someone I know in Weston S M.