Any landlords found to be failing in their duty of care towards their tenants could face tougher punishments, including jail sentences, if plans from the UK’s local authorities go ahead.
The Local Government Association (LGA), the representative body for councils across England and Wales, said that the fines given to rogue landlords are not sufficient enough to act as a deterrent to stop them from continuing to breach housing rules.
Currently, a fine is the toughest penalty that landlords can face for ignoring legislation, and though they can technically be unlimited the average amount stands at £1,500.
The LGA has claimed that magistrates consider numerous factors before sentencing, such as a landlord’s financial situation, primarily because there is a lack of clear guidance they can follow.
In a BBC 5 live interview, the vice chairman of the LGA – Gerald Vernon-Jackson – said: “For a landlord who owns hundreds of houses and he gets tens of thousands of pounds every month, it’s like giving a premiership footballer a speeding fine of £1,000 – it makes no difference.
“We have to have some things available to the courts to use in the most serious of circumstances.”
Richard Lambert, the chief executive of the National Landlords’ Association, recently highlighted the issues surrounding “enforcement of the existing legislation”.
He added: “The only way you’re really going to have an impact on those [rogue landlords] is to find some way of really tough sanctions”.
In a bid to help tackle the issue, the LGA has also proposed the implementation of a landlord blacklist, meaning that repeat offenders could be flagged up by local authorities.