Selective licensing scheme for private rented houses consultation

Nottingham City Council Selective License Consultation Response

January 2017 - March 2017

• Andromachi Tseloni – Nottingham Trent University
• Rich Pickford – Nottingham Civic Exchange

Executive Summary

Crime reduction for private renters is an important issue for Nottingham residents and we believe more should be done for this group of citizens. We support the idea of a selective licensing scheme across the suggested area but make the case for expanding the range of conditions that should be imposed on the scheme to help reduce the risk of crime victimisation for this group. In this paper, we outline the reasons why additional conditions should be imposed to strengthen security measures and make a call for the re-evaluation of the Security Standards in HMOs and Rented Properties documentation following a review of the available evidence.

Professors Andromachi Tseloni – Nottingham Trent University

Professor Tseloni is Professor of Quantitative Criminology with expertise in victimisation theory, applied social statistics and econometrics. Her work revolves around five broad themes: criminal victimisation inequalities, the crime drop, crime perceptions' social capital and cross-national comparisons.

Her current role involves leading the Quantitative and Spatial Criminology Research Group; supporting research related activities in the Division and the School and working on research projects informing crime prevention and community policing.

Rich Pickford – Nottingham Civic Exchange

Rich manages the strategic direction of NCE and leads on facilitating connections between researchers, communities, business and citizens and maximising the impact of Nottingham Civic Exchange's work. He has a passion for research on labour market exploitation (submitting to REF 2021 where his work influenced national and local policy), the way civil contingencies operate in the UK (seconded to the C19 National Foresight Group through the pandemic) and health and wellbeing of emergency service colleagues (having supported a research and policy programme to pave the way for the next Fire and Rescue Wellbeing strategy across the UK with the NPCC). Rich has a background in outdoor education and youth work, and prior to working with NTU he was based with the RSA supporting their work across Wales and the Midlands.

Nottingham Trent University: Social Science Department

The School of Social Sciences is a nationally and internationally recognised centre for the study of engaged social science. We offer a wide range of courses, which address the key social issues of today.

Nottingham Civic Exchange

Nottingham Civic Exchange is Nottingham Trent University’s think tank, established to maximise research, policy and practical impact by bringing together university expertise with partners seeking to address the needs of people, communities and organisations. Nottingham Civic Exchange acts as a resource to look at social science focused issues in new ways. This means facilitating debate, acting as a bridge between research and policy debates, and developing practical projects on a local, city and regional level. Since our launch in 2017 we embraced evidence, created debate and inspired change. We offer exciting new perspectives on historic issues. To find out more about the work of Nottingham Civic Exchange and how we do this click the link to explore our current and previous projects, our offer to partners and colleagues across NTU and our news pages.

Summary

We are submitting evidence to the consultation on the implementation of a selective licensing scheme. Professor Andromachi Tseloni and her team at Nottingham Trent University supported and verified the evidence for the report Exploring the role of private rented households on rate of crime and anti-social behaviour in Nottingham submitted by Caroline Keenan from the Nottingham Crime and Drugs Partnership in 2016 (PDF, 2.5MB) which helped inform the introduction of this scheme. Whilst the risk of being burgled has been reducing in the UK, domestic burglary is still a high volume crime affecting many households. Recent research has shown that certain groups and areas are not benefiting from this reduction equally; these groups include inner city dwellings, households with non-white residents and those without a car [1]. Our research has highlighted that private renters experienced roughly 40% more burglaries (including attempts) and household thefts as well as experiencing 40% more personal crimes than owner-occupiers [2]. Our research also shows that an areas poverty factor also increased the risk of being a victim of such crimes. Current work undertaken with colleagues at NTU also confirms that social and private renters have significantly lower installations [3] of the WIDE suite of burglary prevention devices recommended in our research and subsequent Neighbourhood Watch guidance [4]. Through our research, we modelled security protection factors that show the impact each individual and grouped set of burglary prevention measures has. (See table below) By ensuring your property has window locks, internal lighting, door locks (double or deadlock) and external lights (on a sensor) you can increase your protection from burglary by 49 times. (Compared to having no security.

In summary:

• Certain types of security devices reduce crime and the WIDE array has the most effective impact. See table below.
• Certain types of household and personal makeup within household increases risk.
• HMO and houses with 3+ adults higher risk regardless of socio economic geography.
• Areas of Nottingham with higher rates of private rented households and increased poverty factors should be targeted first due to increased risk outlined in our research.

Individual security measures

Combinations of security measures

In light of this, research and following a review of the proposals (PDF, 520KB) supplied to Nottingham City Council Executive Board in November. We believe stronger conditions are required to promote more secure and burglary resistant private rented properties. As seen in Point 17 of the conditions for this scheme there is no provision or recommendation for external lighting or internal lighting. Both measures are shown to have a positive effect on reducing burglary. Internal and external lighting rank as second and third in security projection factors behind only window locks in our analysis and project. Failing to include these as conditions in the new scheme will reduce its impact on burglary rates and will not lead to the improvements sort through this programme of work.

Furthermore, we also recommending the reappraisal of guidelines set out in Security Standards in HMOs and Rented Properties, which continues to recommend the use of burglar alarms. “Burglar Alarms can act as a deterrent – telling the burglar that preventative measures have been taken to secure the premises, and to act as an alarm warning in case the security is breached.” This recommendation is counter to the evidence uncovered through our research and may well be leading to increased burglaries across properties in the city [5].

Recommendations

• Take forward selective licensing proposal for private rented properties across Nottingham.
• Review recommendations regarding security measures for private rented households to strengthen security measures for private rented properties.
• Adopt the use of WIDE security measures for all properties under consideration to reduce risk of burglary and further develop systems to promote this combination across the city.
• Ensure specific requirements for HMOs and households, which contain three or more adults due to xx-increased risk of victimisation.
• Revisit Security Standards in HMOs and Rented Properties documentation and remove/reduce recommendations for use of burglar alarms, which have been shown to have a negative impact on burglary prevention.

References and Further Reading

[1] Hunter and Tseloni, 2016.

[2] Tseloni 2006 + Tseloni and Pease 2015.

[3] Hunter and Tseloni 2016.

[4] Tseloni, Thompson, Grove, Tilley and Farrell, 2014 & WIDE (accessed 20/03/2017).

[5] See evidence from Tseloni and Thompson + forthcoming report in Crime Science p.17.