Accrington landlords lose court battle over carbon monoxide detectors

Housing chiefs from the authority had taken Paul Brown and John Barron to a Lands Chamber hearing over conditions imposed under one of the council’s selective licensing schemes.

Mr Brown owns a property in Dowry Street and Mr Barron another in Avenue Parade, the court heard.

But Mr Brown had successfully appealed, before a lower court, against a condition requiring him to maintain an alarm at the Dowry Street property he rents out.

The pair had also both lodged similar successful appeals regarding a condition which would see both houses covered by a valid electrical report, and its recommendations.

Land Chamber judge Nigel Gerald, allowing Hyndburn Council’s challenge, ruled the conditions represented the ‘perfectly normal, straightforward and sensible management of a house which is let out to third parties’.

Jonathan Manning, for Mr Brown and Mr Barron, argued that the conditions went beyond the remit of the Housing Act, under which the selective licensing scheme in Accrington had been drawn up.

The landlords didn’t want to be responsible for either the future maintenance of the detector, in Mr Brown’s case, and the implications of the electrical report in future, in both matters.

Matthew Paul, for Hyndburn Council, said the requirements were clearly not in conflict with any reasonable interpretation of managing a home, under the selective licensing criteria.

Allowing the appeals, Judge Gerald said: “In this case it would seem both respondents themselves accepted and recognised this as both had installed carbon monoxide detectors and carried out EICRs.

“On analysis, therefore, all the local housing authority was doing was regulating, or reinforcing, that which was already in place. Had neither been in place, there could have been no sensible objection to the imposition of conditions that both be provided to ensure that the management of the house was properly regulated.”