A Birmingham MP is calling on the Government to act on rogue landlords after a flurry of complaints.
Selly Oak MP Steve McCabe has a final chance to get his Protection of Family Homes Bill through the House of Commons on Friday, November 25, after it was blocked by Government last month.
The Labour MP has drawn up the Bill after being inundated with complaints as large family homes are extended, often badly, and students crammed into them. Residents say they are being pushed out as the area, next to the University of Birmingham, has become ruthlessly targeted by student landlords.
If adopted the Bill would beef up the powers of planning departments to control the conversion of family homes into student flats as well as give councils more powers to enforce breaches of planning permission. It has cross-party support from MPs.
But last month a first attempt to get the law through was blocked when housing minister Marcus Jones talked it out of time. Now he is calling on the Government not to block the bill ahead of Friday’s session in Parliament.
Mr McCabe MP said: “I’m hoping to push my Bill through this Friday by hook or by crook. For far too long, rogue landlords have got away with misusing permitted development at the expense of local residents, this is a real problem in my constituency and across the country.
“I think the Government really need to address this issue which is increasingly getting out of hand. I’m hoping the Government will show more support for the hard working people who have saved up all of their lives to buy their family home only for some rogue landlord to devalue their property and show a total disregard for planning laws.”
He first introduced his Bill in Parliament in November 2015 after he was inundated with planning complaints about rogue landlords and cowboy builders, an issue that has plagued Selly Oak and other areas across the country with large student populations.
Frustrated by the lack of enforcement action to tackle breaches in planning law the Labour MP decided to take local residents’ planning plight to Parliament. If all else fails he is negotiating an amendment which could be added by colleagues in the House of Lords to another planning bill currently going through Parliament.
The Bill:
• Requires the Department for Communities and Local Government to produce clearer guidance for planning authorities on when enforcement action should be taken and it will make it compulsory for local planning authorities to publish a detailed enforcement plan
• Introduces a right of appeal to an independent body when a planning authority decides not take enforcement action against a breach in planning law
• Sets out the requirement for extensions built under permitted development to be independent checked against building regulations to ensure they are safe to live in
• Introduces new powers for planning authorities to fine developers who breach planning law as a deterrent when enforcement action is not considered ‘expedient’
• Levies fines to stop landlords like riding roughshod over the law and communities, the financial penalty will be applied to any developer who has misused permitted development or created a structure that adversely impacts the property or any property belonging to another person
