Most Councils Have Not Issued Any Penalties Against Private Landlords

Over half of local authorities in England have not issued any civil penalties against rogue or criminal landlords in the last three years according to a new survey. Since April 2017 councils across England have been able to issue civil penalties of up to £30,000 for a range of housing offences. Income received can be re-invested by local authorities to help finance further enforcement against criminal operators who cause harm to tenants and give private renting a bad name. Despite this, between 2018/19 and 2020/21, only 130 local authorities in England out of 275 replying to the survey (47 per cent) had issued any civil penalties. Read more on the NRLA website.

https://www.nrla.org.uk/news/most-councils-have-not-issued-any-penalties-against-private-landlords 

Stamp Duty Fuelling Housing Crisis

Stamp duty is making the UK’s housing crisis worse by distorting the market and harming long-term development, the head of one of the world’s biggest property groups has warned. Christian Ulbrich, global chief executive of Jones Lang LaSalle (JLL), said homebuyers were “paying for nothing” in a system that penalised landlords and second homeowners while doing little to address a lack of housing supply.  Britain has the highest property taxes of any developed country. Mr Ulbrich said the current system, where stamp duty jumps from 5pc to 10pc of a property’s value above £925,000, was “politically motivated”. Read  more on the Daily Telegraph website.

Rough Sleepers Threatened With Fines

Rough sleepers in an affluent suburb have been threatened with £100 fines. Rushcliffe Borough Council said rough sleepers had been "causing a nuisance" in West Bridgford, a suburb of Nottingham nicknamed Bread and Lard Island because of its large houses. Local MPs criticised the measures, with one saying they "punish victims of the housing crisis". Rushcliffe Borough Council said the fixed penalty notices would be used as a "last resort" .If people fail to pay the initial £100 fixed penalty notices they may be prosecuted, with the maximum fine being £1,000. Councils in  other areas, such as Hackney in London, have backtracked on similar plans following campaigns. Read more on the BBC website.

Landlords – Parliamentary Written Answer

Jon Trickett:  To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what steps he is taking to help strengthen local authority powers to deal with rogue landlords.

Gavin Barwell: The Government introduced a package of measures in the Housing and Planning Act 2016 to help local authorities crack down on rogue landlords. They comprise civil penalties of up to £30,000 as an alternative to prosecution, the expansion of Rent Repayment Orders to cover a wider range of offences, a database of rogue landlords and property agents and banning orders to prevent serious and prolific offenders from being involved in the renting out or management of private rented properties. In addition, over the past five years, we have have made £12 million available to a range of local authorities to help them tackle acute and complex problems associated with rogue landlords. This has resulted in the inspection of over 70,000 properties with more than 5,000 landlords now facing further enforcement action. 

Generation Rent: London To Become A City Of Renters By 2025

London will become a city of renters, with just 40pc owning their own home in 2025, according to new research from PwC. This is a reversal of the situation in 2000, when 60pc of Londoners owned a house, either outright or with a mortgage. PwC's forecast of the continuation of 'generation rent' will come as bad news to many, including the government, which has been attempting to create a nation of homeowners by artificially boosting the market with schemes such as Help to Buy. George Osborne is also penalising landlords by raising stamp duty on buy-to-let properties from April. Locked out by high prices and unattainable deposits and mortgages, young people will be the hardest hit: just 26pc of those currently aged 20-39 will own their own home by 2025. This compares with 64pc of households born in 1960 and 1970 who owned a house by the time they were 35. Read more on the Daily Telegraph website.

Slow Housing Developers Should Face Penalties

Developers that fail to swiftly build properties when planning permission is in place should face stiff penalties, the Local Government Association says. Council tax should be paid on homes not built before initial planning approval expires, said the body representing English and Welsh councils. It said 475,000 homes with planning permission were not completed in 2014-15, but councils were not to blame. The government said building had started on more than half of these. The LGA said that in 2012-13, the total of "unimplemented planning permissions" was 381,390, but in 2013-14 it was 443,265, rising to 475,647 homes in 2014-15. Read more on the BBC website.

Pay-To-Stay’s “Fair Rents” May Penalise Lower Earners

The Government’s ‘pay-to-stay’ proposals could penalise people on low incomes by making their rent too expensive for them to afford, if it is not implemented with care, the Chartered Institute of Housing (CIH) has warned. Under a proposal put out for consultation by the CLG, higher earning households would have to pay a higher rent to remain in their social home – either the local market rate or close to it. Households in social housing with a total income of more than £40,000 in London and over £30,000 elsewhere would be affected by the ‘pay-to-stay’ proposal. The Government claims that by paying conventional social rents, they benefiting from “taxpayer-funded subsidies of up to £3,500 per year”. Read more on the CIH website.

Rogue Landlords: New Measures - Including Jail - Needed, Councils Say

Tough new measures – including jail sentences – are needed to tackle rogue landlords, councils warn. In response to a government consultation, the Local Government Association (LGA), which represents more than 370 councils in England and Wales, has called for stronger sentencing guidelines for magistrates and a wider range of penalties so that the small minority of rogue landlords who exploit their tenants are properly held to account for renting out sub-standard accommodation. LGA research found it can take up to 16 months to prosecute a rogue operator. In almost three-quarters of cases, the average fine for a criminal landlord – many of whom are accruing large profits every year while tenants live in dangerous conditions – was £5,000 or less. Read more on the LGA website.

Power to Penalise Owners of Empty Homes Goes Unused

Powers to penalise developers who leave homes empty for years are not being used, a BBC investigation has revealed. Councils are empowered to use the Empty Homes Premium to charge home owners 50% extra council tax if they leave properties empty for two or more years. Yet Freedom of Information requests to all 32 London boroughs discovered that seven councils did not apply the charge to a single property. There are currently more than 80,000 empty homes in the capital. The power to penalise property owners for leaving homes unused came in last April. Read more on the BBC website.

Barrister Predicts Bedroom Definition 'Will' Go Before Court Of Appeal

The question of what constitutes a bedroom for the purposes of welfare reform ‘will’ go before the Court of Appeal this year, a leading housing barrister has said. Dean Underwood, head of the housing team at Hardwicke Chambers, said he believed some of the first-tier decisions reached on the bedroom tax so far were ‘wrong’. Mr Underwood also predicted an unsuccessful appeal against the policy made by a group of disabled people would reach the Supreme Court. Several first-tier tribunals have overturned decisions to penalise tenants for under-occupying, after ruling spare rooms should not have been classified as bedrooms. Read more on Inside Housing.

Campaigners Voice Outrage at DWP’s Regime of Destitution

The DWP is operating a draconian sanctions regime that often penalises claimants for the department’s own mistakes, leaving people at risk of severe hardship and even homelessness, claims the charity Crisis. The charity spoke out against the DWP’s sanctions regime after the department released new figures on the number of sanctions imposed on those claiming Job Seekers Allowance (JSA) and Employment and Support Allowance (ESA). Crisis made its claims with the publication of new report, ‘Dashed Hopes, Lives on Hold’, which has gathered the experiences of the charity’s clients placed on the Work Programme. It claims that many of the sanctions imposed were “unfair” or made in error.  Download a copy of the report from the Crisis website.

New Council Tax Cut for Families Staying Together

Eric Pickles has announced new government plans to remove an unfair Council Tax surcharge on family annexes and home improvements, to help support extended families. In total, 3 taxes are being cut on home improvements to increase provision of local affordable housing for families both young and old.  Many families benefit from living in properties with self-contained annexes that allow them to house or care for extended family members. The current Council Tax system unfairly penalises those with family annexes through double taxation - householders are billed a second time for the annexes in addition to their payment for their main property. Mr Pickles is proposing a new national discount for all family annexes (not just those for older people), as a quick and easy way to remove this Council Tax surcharge from the system, saving an average £485 a year on a typical £2,427 combined yearly bill. Read more on the Govuk website.

Why the Bedroom Tax Penalises Council Tenants in the North

Social housing tenants in the north of England are being unfairly penalised by the bedroom tax, critics say, as many areas have "no local need" for tenants to downsize to smaller properties.  The government says the policy will encourage tenants who are under-occupying to downsize and free up larger homes for those who need them.  Some say the blanket policy means many tenants in the north are being told to find one of those scarce properties unnecessarily.  "The mismatch between people living in overcrowded homes who need to swap with those who have a spare room works only on paper and nationally. In the north of England, you've not got a huge issue with overcrowding," stated the National Housing Federation.”  Read more on the Guardian website.