Three brothers and a property management company have received fines and a confiscation order, and must pay costs, following what a court has called “the negligent and dangerous management of rented flats.”
The properties in question were above the former Thomas A Becket pub on the Old Kent Road, a famous building once used by British boxing champion Henry Cooper for training.
Southwark Council says there is a long history of council intervention at the property and there were two previous convictions linked to breaches of housing laws that are designed to protect tenants.
Council officers visited the property in August 2016; it was deemed a large high risk House in Multiple Occupation with three floors of accommodation above the pub. The fire protection in the accommodation was found to be poorly maintained: the fire alarm system didn’t work, the fire doors were not up to standard and the fire extinguishers had not been tested or maintained.
Further to this, flats within the property were found to be unlicensed and illegally over occupied. Additionally, a studio flat previously identified by the council as being unsafe for accommodation, was found to be occupied by a couple who were paying £730 a month for rooms that all fell short of the council’s minimum size and contained a bedroom that was internal, with no window, natural light or ventilation.
Three brothers - Baian Abdul, Kazi Abdul and Kashim Abdul of Stoke Newington - all pleaded guilty at hearings in 2017.
Kazi Abdul is also a director of a fourth defendant company in the case: KKB Financial Services Ltd of Whitechapel.
The brothers jointly owned the entire property until it was sold in August 2017.
The company was falsely claiming to be a member of NALS and using a SAFEagent logo when it was not a member of either organisation.
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the room size only recently became law but it looks like all the council are already enforcing it well before then without having any power to do so. this effectively caused some landlord to lose revenue. so who is going to pay up for the losses? anyway why does nobody even look into what power the council have before they even go into defence mode? i would have thought that is the basic of all court suit. what are their lawyers doing if not to determine whether the LA have the power in the first place before even saying the landlord that they are in breach. council can write and sue anyone base on their own notion of their unlimited powers, so to speak and there are no body or organisation to regulate them or inspect all the abuse of power in hmo licencing as much as council tax doing and charging whatever they like on anyone they fancy just because they said so and there are no recourse for appeal
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