31st
Aug 2023
A website is claiming the real reason why local authorities are not serving Banning Orders on private landlords is because of government funding cuts.
Open Democracy states that across England a paltry 17 landlords have been issued with a banning order “because cash-strapped councils can’t afford to take them to court.”
The site lists the councils that have issued Banning Orders with Welwyn Hatfield council handing out 2, another seven councils have issued one banning order each have handed out one banning order each - Cornwall, Telford & Wrekin, Wirral, Cambridge, Leeds, Bristol and Bournemouth. Across London in total eight Banning Orders have been handed out which includes the latest one from Brent Council, currently not listed on the website’s Scores on the Doors.
The article cites an anonymous “local authority enforcement officer” (the authority is not named) that some banned landlords continue to let properties, while other authorities do not consider applying for Banning Orders because of the associated legal and officer time and costs needed to achieve an order.
The article also includes comments from Giles Peaker a “leading housing lawyer” saying that councils are cash strapped, which makes seeking Banning Orders a non-essential.
“It involves prosecutions, which is time-consuming and costly to local authorities. There are disincentives to use it when local authorities are cash strapped … It is very, very complex, very, very time-consuming to put together all the evidence to the standard criminal tests. It is not straightforward. You really do have to do a lot of background work and investigative work. People hide behind different companies, changing names, spellings.”
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