The landlord of an unlicensed HMO in the Harrow area of London has been convicted at Willesden magistrates court of breaching a council prohibition order for the second time (he was originally prosecuted and found guilty of the same offence in 2019).

During a property inspection by officers from Harrow council the landlord was found to have been housing 5 tenants plus himself in the 2 bedroom property which had been "banned from use" by the council. Magistrates ordered the landlord to pay a £1,477 fine with £2,035 costs and a £148 victim surcharge.

According to Harrow council "The house was in severe disrepair so bad that one plug in the loft was serving a network of daisy chained extension leads powering electric fires, TVs, music system, [and] lamps to the eves in the loft [which was] sectioned off as small bedrooms." In addition, in order to access the loft (which had no fire safety protection) the tenants had to use an illegally installed staircase and the loft itself had had it's load bearing capacity removed. A large first floor window was held in place simply with tape and, on top of that, was installed the wrong way round with the handle on the outside.

The landlord blamed the covid pandemic for his not making any attempts to make improvements to the property following his first conviction in 2019 (despite the carrying out of repairs not being banned under covid 19 restrictions so long as the correct safety procedures were carried out by landlords/contractors beforehand).

Given the seriousness of the litany of issues highlighted above (and the fact that this was a second offence) the low level of his fine seems to sit oddly with the generally higher fines imposed on other such landlords (especially in London) and it remains to be seen whether Harrow council will seek to place the landlord on the rogue landlord register. As Cllr. Anjana Patel, cabinet member for environment and community safety, said: "Not only did [he] ignore the conditions of the protection order but he thought he was above the law and could get away with housing tenants in his death trap property."