A DISAPPOINTING “FIASCO”
A ‘well-intentioned’ attempt to produce national fire safety guidelines for rented property has turned into a fiasco – according to a leading association for professional landlords.
Because many local authorities, throughout the UK, already have higher standards - which will take priority.
So the new LACORS guidance leaves landlords no wiser, says the Residential Landlords Association - whose members own over 100,000 private rented properties throughout the UK.
“It’s no good trotting out routine praise for an undeniably well-intentioned report,” says chairman Lee Dribben. “Let’s be honest and tell it like it really is - the thoroughness of the LACORS guidelines is to be commended but they are a missed opportunity because many local authorities will simply overrule them in favour of their own higher standards.
“What the private rented sector really needs is a definitive blueprint – a `level playing field’ to help us comply with new housing and fire safety legislation. We still haven’t got that … so we’re no wiser.”
The just-published joint report comes from the Local Authority Co-ordinators of Regulatory Services (LACORS), the Chief Fire Officers’ Association and the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health.
“Firstly – it does not give landlords clear direction on the fire safety requirements of a particular building in a particular town,” says Lee Dribben. “These are still subject to local requirements.
“Secondly – each regional fire service has its own interpretation of ‘risk’.
“Thirdly, therefore - local authorities still have the discretion to apply their own prescriptive standards to local housing stock.
“How hard can it be to decide on a given set of standards that are consistent across England and Wales? Property is not vastly different from one area to another - but many local councils and fire authorities are - and this will cause problems and confusion.
“Feedback from major cities, so far, suggests that many consider the LACORS guidelines are lower than their existing standards for private rented properties and they have no intention of lowering these.
In Leeds fire safety standards for private rented properties “are higher than those proposed by LACORS – so the guidelines are little use to either the local authority or our local landlords” says RLA director Chris Town.
Manchester property developer and landlord Mark Butterworth adds: “The carefully researched up-to-date LACORS standards are clearly what’s needed. Higher local requirements should now be relaxed in recognition of both this and the less hazardous fire-resistant materials used in modern property construction.”
So the whole LACORS exercise, says Lee Dribben, “adds up to a recipe for wholesale prosecution - for offences that may not even be offences in the next town.
“Unless the largely commonsense guidelines of this report are adopted wholeheartedly by local authorities and regional fire authorities throughout the country then the whole exercise has been a complete waste of time and money”
“Property owners are entitled to better than this. They need a totally professional level of advice and guidance. Individual interpretation is just not good enough in this day and age.”
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