Tenants with poor property -the role of SLDC officers

I made contact with these officers by phone asking for the environment officer to do with housing.

 Jane Latham  then dealt with my enquiries .

They admitted their coverage  on their web site of their role in ensuring good quality rented accommodation, could be greatly improved.

The email to contact them is housingrenewal@southlakeland.gov.uk and is to be found here on their web site.

Their procedure is:

If requested by you, they will visit any property to determine whether in their opinion there is a problem caused by the condition of the building.

If there is , they will contact the landlord informally to get them to put things right.

If dampness, for instance is caused by the tenant, they will take no further action.

For instance if a lot of clothes are dried in a room without adequate ventilation leading to damp problems then this is the responsibility of the tenant. If on the other hand it is caused by the state of the building they will attempt to get the landlord to do this.

If the landlord agrees informally to put things right - fine. If not they will serve a formal notice for the landlord to do the work necessary.

If then the landlord still does not put things right they will step in and pay for the work themselves and recover their costs from the landlord afterwards.

I asked how much contact they had had in the last year, with the public from their area, which covers that of SLDC ie including Ulverston and Kendal. They said that they had about 25 to 30 requests which resulted in only one notice being served to a landlord. In this case the recommended work was done.

On this basis you would expect there to be no problem in this area.

So over to you.

If you need further confidential help come back to me.

If you are getting no satisfaction I am willing to come in and video the problem and put it on Youtube.

I can do this entirely anonymously so that no one need know which property I am referring to and your identity would be protected.

My next step could be to approach the police to see at what stage they would get involved.

I could also go to the various rental agencies to find out their policy regarding damp properties and landlords with poor property.

I don't plan to do any further work unless tenants contact me and are willing to do something for themselves.

This issue could feature in the coming elections in May to determine the prospective candidate's attitude if in fact we can establish that there is a problem.