Durham County Council’s selective licensing scheme is only three year old but now has 14,520 landlords signed up but has seen fines totalling £1.38m levied from five prosecutions and 95 improvement notices – and the Council says it wants more.

Durham claims it has helped tackle serious issues with local rental stock, including damp, mould, fire hazards and structural instability.

The fines levied by Durham are high by sector standards and for example in December last year, during the council’s most recent action, Gosforth portfolio landlord Kamran Adil was fined £25,000 after persistently failing to license many of his properties. And the first fine, of  landlord Sukhraj Singh Barham, was £15,000 after he failed to license two properties in Horden.

anti-social

In addition, it says the licensing scheme has reduced the overall rate of anti-social behaviour in the areas where it operates.

Councillor Bill Moist told the Northern Echo: “I’m a supporter of the scheme but I still find there’s a lot of ignorance from smaller landlords.”

The sooner all private landlords are members of the scheme the better.”

“I accept there has been a lot of publicity around this but is there a chance we can increase that? I would like to see a targeted publicity campaign. The sooner all private landlords are members of the scheme the better.”

And Ted Murphy, the council’s housing standards manager, shares his sentiments,  adding: “We would like to reach every single landlord in County Durham.

“The Renters’ Rights Bill brings in a property portal where landlords will have to sign up if they are renting out their property. That should make a difference to who we can contact and engage with.”

The Council is planning on doing a full review of the scheme later this year when its leaders must decide whether to extend the existing scheme, revise it or bring it to an end.