New housing task force finds Blackpool residents forced to live in cold and damp homes

Around 150 inspections have been carried out during the first phase of the Blackpool enforcement project, which has received £1.2m from the Levelling Up fund.

The resort is among 20 areas of England chosen to take part in the pilot scheme.

Visits to 76 properties found category one hazards, which are the worst conditions to be living in and includes cold and damp rooms.

The project, being run from March this year to March 2024, has seen the council recruit an enforcement team to inspect private rented properties in the town’s most deprived areas – mainly the inner areas.

The findings will be used to shape a new national decent homes policy for the private rented sector with stronger enforcement powers which councils can use to put pressure on bad landlords.

A report presented to the council’s Levelling Up scrutiny committee said “a significant proportion of properties” inspected during the first quarter of the pilot scheme did not meet current standards or proposed tougher standards.

Support workers are also attending some properties alongside enforcement officers to help vulnerable tenants who are living in particularly bad conditions.

Vikki Piper, head of housing at Blackpool Council, told the meeting support included helping people living in overcrowded conditions, with mental health problems and in need of help finding jobs.

Councillors raised concerns that adding extra pressure onto landlords could lead to some selling up, leaving less property available for rent.

Ms Piper said: “We are already seeing the private rented sector shrinking a bit and rents going up.

“But saying that a sub-standard house is better than no house is not a place we want to be. If it’s a reduction of poor quality homes, then we have to face that.”

She said the way forward included replacing poor quality properties with new social housing which is being done with the construction of homes at Grange Park and Foxhall Village.

The Blackpool Housing Company, which is an offshoot of the council, is also working towards improving the rented sector by buying up rundown property, restoring it and renting it out at affordable levels.