MSB’s Social Housing Highlight – November
Bringing you all the latest updates from the world of Social Housing.
We were deeply saddened to hear of Awaab Ishak’s tragic death. Our thoughts are with Awaab’s family and friends at this time.
The latest at MSB
Earlier this month, Andrew Fairman and Andy Moore delivered our free monthly webinar, “Tenancy Fraud and Sublet”. Keeping busy, Andrew also joined Julia Michalczyk to deliver the first in-person training event hosted at our Manchester Office, which we would like to thank everyone who came along for the ‘Coffee and Compliance’ event.
Also this month, the team have been out delivering bespoke training to organisations; if you and your organisation are interested in partaking in training sessions with the team, please get in touch with dominiqueowens@msbsolicitors.co.uk.
Exciting news announcements! This month we celebrate as Tom Stockton was promoted to Senior Associate at MSB; the team is very proud of his achievements to date and wish him luck in his new role. Building on the success, we kickstarted the month with a high as MSB were recognised in The Times Best Law Firms 2023 list.
Ahead of the Christmas period, we are currently collecting pyjamas at all our Liverpool offices to support Liverpool-based charity, Pyjama Party. Pyjama Party is a community-led campaign to collect pyjamas for children who are homeless or in need, and ensure they receive a new pair of pyjamas this Christmas Eve. We are always keen to get involved and support impactful causes, so if you have any projects you would like us to get involved with, please reach out to Thomas Stockton at thomasstockton@msbsolicitors.co.uk.
We’ve also been excited to get out and about this month, with Louise Murphy attending the CIH Housing Camp sponsored by MSB where housing professionals shared ideas for tackling some of the primary issues faced by Registered Providers. Some of the team also attended the law fairs taking place across Manchester and Liverpool to share insight with future lawyers about what our team does. Louise Murphy, Phillip Coburn and Andrew Fairman attended the Pro-Manchester Property Lunch. Amy Tagoe, Fariyad Saeed along with Paula Mansfield from our family team represented MSB at the Women in Law Empowerment Conference, and Amy Tagoe and Rachael Payne attended a seminar on Value for Money with Women in Social Housing North West.
Our recommended Book Club read this month is ‘Daisy Jones and the Six’ by Taylor Jenkins Reid. Read the latest newsletter, here.
Updates and insight
As always, the team have been keeping their fingers on the pulse and have written some useful blogs. Andrew Fairman and Andy Moore discuss the new Smoke and Carbon Monoxide Regulations on the team’s latest Podcast. Check out the latest episode over on our YouTube channel. Watch here.
Andrew Fairman discusses when breach of tenancy injunctions can be made on a without notice basis. Read More.
Phillip Coburn summarises the most recent Housing Complaint Decisions by the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman in his recent blog. Read More.
Louise Murphy shares her top tips on Notices Seeking Possession. Read More.
Beth McKeown discusses the differences between disrepair claims and Environmental Protection Act prosecutions in her latest blog. Read More.
Housing Law News
Rent Cap
The Chancellor confirmed that social rents in England will be capped at 7% from April 2023. Supported Housing Providers may be exempt from the rent cap and may be allowed to increase rents by CPI plus 1%.
Fixed Costs
The extension to the fixed costs regime which will have an impact on costs in disrepair cases was expected to be introduced in April 2023. This month it has been announced that this will be put back to October 2023.
Exempt Accomodation
The DLUHC have published a report on exempt accommodation which contains a number of recommendations to improve the system. Read more.
Housing Ombudsman
The Housing Ombudsman’s quarterly report announced it had issued 45 complaint handling failure orders between July and September 2022, which is the highest number since they came into effect.
Upcoming events
7th December 2022
Our next free webinar, ‘The Year in Housing: Housing Law Updates from 2022’, will take place on 7th December 2022 via Zoom. Please email dominiqueowens@msbsolicitors.co.uk to secure your place. If you want to receive updates on free training and events hosted by MSB, please get in touch to be added to our mailing list.
8th December 2022
MSB are excited to host the Women in Social Housing (WISH) North West Christmas Drinks event at our Manchester office in December. It is a great opportunity for networking, festivities and a Selfridges gift voucher up for grabs in a raffle. Find out more.
2023
Our free monthly webinars for 2023 are now available to book, the full timetable can be found below.
Case of the month
Kensington & Chelsea RLBC v Airbnb Payments Ltd (2022) EWHC 2209 (Ch)
This month, Kensington sought an order against Airbnb Payments Ltd for disclosure of whether there were bookings for flats in specified blocks owned by Kensington. The order was granted as any short let of those flats was likely to be a criminal offence under the Prevention of Social Housing Fraud Act 2013.