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Issue - meetings
Review of HMO Licensing Fees
Meeting: 03/02/2020 - Cabinet (Item 236)
236 Review of HMO Licensing Fees PDF 273 KB
Decision:
1. That Cabinet approve the revised fee structure for HMO licensing to take into account a ‘Hemmings’ (two part) fee structure.
2. That the revised fee structure in appendix 1 is introduced on 1 April 2020
Minutes:
Councillors Forward and Lee left the room for the discussion of this item due to prejudicial interests.
Other Councillors who were watching from the public gallery were also asked to leave if they also had a declared prejudicial interest.
The Assistant Director Housing and Built Environment presented a report to inform Cabinet of the high court case of R (Gasking) v Richmond-upon-Thames London Borough Council has held that licensing schemes made under the Housing Act 2004 are authorisation schemes within the meaning of the EU services directive. This has necessitated a re-assessment of the fees charged for the council’s HMO licensing scheme.
The proposal is that the current single fee scheme is split into two. This will not apply to the selective licensing scheme. The cost of the scheme is unlikely to change for landlords, and it is simply the structure that is changing.
Councillor Batsford, Portfolio Holder for Housing, Leisure and Community Engagement stated that the new HMO scheme gives more transparency, which has been a criticism in the past. Councillor Batsford also acknowledged that processing two invoices rather than one, would put extra stress on the officers, and that this extra processing may cause price rises in the future.
However, overall, the change in the scheme is a positive thing and HMO licensing in general has proved very successful.
Councillors agreed that it was important to be open and transparent, and also shared concerns about extra pressure being put on officers.
Councillor Batsford proposed the approval of the recommendations of the report. This was seconded by Councillor Rogers.
RESOLVED (Unanimously)
1. That Cabinet approve the revised fee structure for HMO licensing to take into account a ‘Hemmings’ (two part) fee structure.
2. That the revised fee structure in appendix 1 is introduced on 1 April 2020.
Reasons for Recommendations
In order to comply with the provisions of the services directive housing licence fees are required to be charged in two parts. As the Council is presently consulting on a new Selective Licensing scheme (Housing Act 2004 Part 3) to replace the existing scheme in October 2020 which includes details on two part fees for this scheme this report only proposes changing the HMO Licensing Scheme (Housing Act 2004 Part 2) fees in April 2020.
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