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Fire safety breaches by private landlords will be included in the mayor of London’s upcoming database of rogue landlords, Sadiq Khan has pledged.
In response to a question from Caroline Pidgeon, a Liberal Democrat member of the London Assembly, the mayor assured her that legal cases brought by the London Fire Brigade (LFB) against landlords would be included in the database.
Mr Khan had announced earlier this year that he would create a new database of landlords who had been subject to legal challenges. Initially, however, it was slated to include only legal actions brought by local authorities, and not those brought by the LFB.
In Mayor’s Questions last week, however, he promised that actions from the LFB would be included in the database from day one.
Ms Pidgeon said: “I welcome the creation of a London Rogue Landlords database to help private tenants. It is long overdue that tenants and prospective tenants can find out about landlords. Such information will be vital to allow people to find a safe and secure home and avoid the exploitation from rogue landlords.
“However it is amazing that at the time of making a grand announcement about a rogue landlord database, the importance of vital information about breaches of fire safety legislation was overlooked by the mayor.”
The mayor’s office has been contacted for comment.
Inside Housing is calling for immediate action to implement the learning from the Lakanal House fire, and a commitment to act – without delay – on learning from the Grenfell Tower tragedy as it becomes available.
We will submit evidence from our research to the Grenfell public inquiry.
The inquiry should look at why opportunities to implement learning that could have prevented the fire were missed, in order to ensure similar opportunities are acted on in the future.