A new Govt report - Local Authority Enforcement in the Private Rented Sector - has highlighted significant capacity problems with private rented housing standards enforcement by resource strapped local authorities across the country.

The report was commissioned by DLUHC and carried out by the centre for regional economic and social research at Sheffield Hallam university and makes stark reading for those in the PRS who may think local authority enforcement and licensing are hammers being used to crack nuts. It's made clear that local authorities face significant barriers to effective enforcement and tackling poor conditions including a lack of detailed knowledge or data about the PRS in given local authority areas making it difficult to "inform strategic decision making" and "enforcement capacity was so limited in some teams that they described mostly fire fighting.".

One council officer quoted said "All the time you have to spend finding out whether an agent or landlord exists is time that you're not spending enforcing or advising a tenant or taking action against a rogue landlord.".

Of HMO and selective licensing the findings included the surprising fact that 19% of the responding authorities estimated that less than 50% of licensable HMOs were licensed at the time of the survey. And, whilst 88% of respondents did not have a selective licence scheme in place such schemes were seen "to be essential to efforts to tackle poor standards.

The report as a whole makes instructive reading for all those involved in enforcement of housing standards in the private rented sector as well as for private landlords who want to see better regulation of their sector but need also to understand the pressures local authority teams are under.