By David Wood On 11 August 2026, a representative of Peabody Trust stood in Thames Magistrates' Court and pleaded guilty to a criminal offence: failing, without reasonable excuse, to provide a leaseholder with a written summary of service charge costs. Peabody was fined £1,000, reduced from £1,500 because of its guilty plea, plus £400 victim… Continue reading Peabody Was Convicted. It Took a Resident to Make it Happen
Social housing landlords are failing victims of anti-social behaviour (ASB) on a systemic scale, trapping vulnerable tenants in a endless cycle of administrative neglect while sitting on extensive enforcement powers. The full text of Dean's paper can be found here, and can be shared with your MP. After his own lived experience at the sharp… Continue reading Antisocial Behaviour and the Evidence Loop Trap
By SHAC and Lindsay Bush Bell Ribeiro-Addy MP and a cross-party group of MPs have blasted the Government's lack of housing association accountability, writing to the Housing Minister, Matthew Pennycook, on the 29th July saying: We strongly believe that residents in housing association (HA) properties across the country are being failed. They are being failed… Continue reading We Can End the Conspiracy of Silence: Join MPs’ Call for Action
By SHAC and Geri Girardi Notting Hill Genesis (NHG) has lost a First Tier Tribunal Case after attempting to recover historic major works costs by raiding the residents' reserve fund. The decision of the First-tier Tribunal raises important questions about how registered social landlords recover the cost of major works from leaseholders. But it also… Continue reading Notting Hill Woes: Residents Win Legal Battle Over Historic Repair Costs
Government's Two-Front Rent Failure Betrays British Tenants Housing Secretary Angela Rayner’s explicit decision to rule out private rent controls, coupled with the government's policy allowing social housing landlords to increase rents above the rate of inflation, represents a coordinated disaster for millions of tenants across England. In a blow to private renters, the Ministry of… Continue reading The Double Squeeze: Government’s Rent Failure
On Friday 10th July, SHAC received fresh communication from the National Audit Office (NAO), for the first time concurring with SHAC that there is a serious gap in regulatory oversight when it comes to service charges paid by councils using Housing Benefit, although they do not agree with all our conclusions. For some tenants, the… Continue reading Service Charge Abuse: Audit Office Validates SHAC Risk Evidence and Campaigners Win Landmark Ruling
By June Atkinson Last year I experienced a retaliatory eviction. It happened when the landlord and rental agency asked me to pay for repairs. It was illegal, but I had little protection because the Welsh Assembly kept the 'no fault evictions' provision when they changed other aspects of housing law in 2016. I wouldn't pay… Continue reading A Pensioner’s Fight Against Housing Injustice
Housing Campaigners Demand Council Action as Corporate Landlord BMR Group Targets More Than 100 Families Tenants on the St James Estate in the London Borough of Southwark are fighting mass evictions and unaffordable rent rises after corporate landlord BMR Group Ltd began trying to force residents from their homes. Campaigners understand that BMR Group plans… Continue reading A Community Under Threat: Southwark Families Fight Mass Evictions
By David Wood I became a banker in 2007. The lesson I took from the financial crisis was not that banks should cease to exist. It was that systems which appear robust on paper can contain weaknesses that only become visible when the system is stressed. Safeguards should be tested rather than assumed. Looking at… Continue reading The Three Closed Doors: A Stress Test of Leasehold Accountability
By Boz For all the noise of national politics, Britain is missing the collapse of something more fundamental: the ability of ordinary people to hold local power to account. Westminster, of all places, should be the borough that sets the standard. Instead, it has become a warning of what happens when a council stops expecting… Continue reading Westminster’s Accountability Crisis: A Call to Action
