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Fire is a terrible killer and fire alarms and fire safety measures are always a good idea. My 'beef' with this proposal is it's a case of one rule for one and one for another. If the proposal was that all home owners should ensure that a smoke alarm is installed that would be fair. But can you imagine the public outcry as homeowners were prosecuted for not having a working fire alarm in their home. As it stands the proposal clearly discriminates against private landlords.
The other problem that the politicians haven't answered is what happens if the tenants disable the alarms because they keep going off every time they burn their toast (my experience). Who is responsible for making sure that the alarms are working? I can only imagine the tortured bit of regulatory text to try ensure all blame rest with the landlord.
Labour doesn't like landlords. As if we needed anymore proof that Labour are after the cheap populist tenant vote, this surely is conclusive evidence of their relentless push.
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I think that ALL homes should be mandatory fitted with smoke alarms, regardless of whether they are Housing Association, private landlord or council owned. I already thought that part of the Building Regulations clearly stated that new homes must be fitted with 240v driven alarms that are linked to each other, but I rarely see them installed in the real life. Fire is a wonderful slave but a terrible master, and there are enough deaths each year to warrant their installation.
However, their installation by landlords should be tax exempt and chargeable against expenses. I bet Labour will soon moan about that.
This is much the same as all landlords needing to have a gas safety record done every year. That is about duty of care to your tenant. So I don't accept the view that this proposal discriminates against landlords any more than the gas safety requirements do. But certainly labours knowledge of the private rental sector is poor and largely misinformed. They are being led a dance by the "well-meaning" charitable Shelter who are on a narrow minded campaign which has forced rents to rise in Scotland aparantly under the guise of saving tenants money on "excessive" application fees. Concentrate on helping homeless people and stop feeding tabloid junk about the rental market to labour.
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