Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham's message to rogue landlords is clear - 'change is coming'.
He took to the stage at the Housing 2023 Conference at Manchester Central to deliver a speech, announcing a raft of policies to fix rental woes. Mr Burnham wants 'a healthy home for all by 2038’.
Bad landlords could find themselves stripped of their properties if they don’t comply with new standards or face further enforcement action.
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The mayor called on the government to give Greater Manchester bosses the power to apply a mandatory standard to all rented homes - and a new set of tools to enforce improvements. One key aspect is a regional roll-out of inspection at all rented properties, which would also protect tenants from eviction if they report concerns about poor conditions such as mould and damp.
The changes follow the death of two-year-old Awaab Ishak. An inquest in 2022 found that mould and damp flat in Rochdale led to the toddler’s death in December 2020.
On Tuesday (June 27), members of the House of Lords approved the amendments for Awaab’s Law in a huge win for the campaign. The Social Housing (Regulation) Bill will now go for Royal Assent.
Mr Burnham, speaking about Awaab's case, said: "After the inquest verdict came in late last year, I met with the 10 council leaders [of Greater Manchester] and the general feeling was that ‘this is it’. This has got to be a complete line drawn on something that should not be happening in this day and age. It added an urgency to the conversation.
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“To be fair, Michael Gove responded in that way as well and we came together on this. We were saying 'yes, finally, it is so clear that this is an appalling state of affairs and it shouldn’t have taken something like that to require this'.”
Issues in social housing were already being tackled as as part of the ‘trailblazer' devolution deal, he said. Greater Manchester has already taken action to drive up standards in the private and social rented sectors.
The Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA) is working with partners and stakeholders to develop a Good Landlord Charter, with the aim of setting out clear, practical, and accessible standards to recognise good practice, empower tenants, and drive up the quality of renting in the region.
Decent landlords would receive recognition for their approach, while tenants would have a 'clearly defined expectation' from their landlord. Where landlords are not maintaining their properties to a decent standard, they will face action underpinned by a unique ‘Property Check’ system - a regular, independent inspection against a transparent set of standards.
The checks and subsequent certificates will provide tenants with more information about their homes, while landlords will be presented with 'tailored, practical improvement plans to address any health and safety hazards'.
“My message to those landlords is that 'you can’t carry on as you are, change is coming',” Mr Burnham added. “If they want to go on an improvement journey, we will help them and we will support them if we can.
“What we won’t accept is this unresponsive, absent response with the ‘we’re not doing anything’ attitude and renting out property not fit for human habitation. It is not on anymore, particularly when large amounts of public money are being spent on this issue.
“If there is a landlord that won’t comply, we have a more streamlined process for homes to be taken into the public stock.
"We have to be realistic about our ability to get around all of Greater Manchester at once, we couldn’t do every request at once. But we will prioritise people on Universal Credit who are often in the worst situation of all because they can be in the most dangerous private rented housing and can’t challenge their landlord.
“I think this turns the tables as people don’t have anywhere to go at the moment and try and complain but get nowhere. It’s not entirely clear and we’re trying to streamline the process and give simple information as to where to go.”
