Episode 1 The Housing Enforcers

The law says everyone has the right to a safe place to live.

-You've actually seen rats, have you?

-Yes, we have, yes.

-Right.

But, for thousands of people across Britain, the reality can be

more hovel than home.

We've got a nappy in the tree there.

I'm sure that that is pee.

In the battle between tenants

and landlords, it's local housing officers who are on the front line.

-I can smell gas.

-You are committing an offence under the Housing Act.

Are you having a laugh?

'I'm Matt Allwright.'

Damp, cold, dangerous.

They're trying to make me look bad.

Have you only recently become aware of planning permission?

'I'm back on the job once again,

'joining the ranks of the housing enforcers.

'They're tackling problem properties...'

It's a right old mess in there, isn't it?

..dealing with the consequences of nightmare neighbours...

I've had two tyres cut.

'..and doing their best to help those in need.'

-This is the first time I've had a smile on my face.

-Oh!

We just heard a squeak.

Today, things get serious, as I take part in an evening police raid.

-We're coming in.

-No, no.

-Erm... From the police.

-Excuse me. If you could just step aside.

It's not very nice busting into people's lives

and waking them up, but that's the last resort.

And a homeless couple finally get a roof over their head.

It's easy to miss something when you've got a better option there,

and of course when we look back it's going to be nostalgia rather

than the reality of the rats and the cold and strangers wandering in and out.

They say an Englishman's home is his castle.

But if that place is rented, it's the job of housing officers to

make sure it's a decent place to live.

They keep an eye on landlords

to make sure the property is up to scratch, and on some tenants

to make sure they're keeping their half of the bargain.

If there's one thing I'm learning, it's that being a housing officer

is definitely not a nine-to-five job.

As most people are calling it a day, we're heading to a rental

property in Oxford

that HOs Iain Lingard and Clive Salisbury

think may be dangerously overcrowded.

Any property with three or more people that are not related

-requires a licence.

-Right. Who else is coming along tonight?

We've requested the police attend

because we don't know what we'll find at the property.

As your apprentice and trainee, what should I know about this?

Just be careful. If there's any chance of any violence,

then we'll get the police to go in first.

With no idea what we're walking into, there is a real risk

the situation could turn nasty, so it's important

the police are here to stop things getting out of hand.

KNOCK ON DOOR

-Hello.

-Hello.

-From Oxford City Council.

We're here to inspect the property. We've got a warrant to come in.

Is it OK if we come in?

INDISTINCT

-Sorry?

-I now want to speak...

-Have you got the warrant?

-Yeah.

-How many people here?

-What's this?

-How many people live here?

-Just one family?

-Yeah.

-Can we come in, have a look?

-We've got a warrant. Yes?

-Just for a look?

-Yeah.

We'll wait here.

Yeah, OK.

Even though we've got a warrant, getting inside isn't

proving any easier than last time.

But Iain isn't giving up without a fight.

No, no, no.

No, no. No come in.

-You come in through my landlord.

-No, we're not, no, we're not.

-Yes.

-No.

-No, we're not, we're coming in.

-No, no.

The police...

Excuse me, if you could just step aside.

-If you could just step aside, please.

-OK.

-OK.

'Things turn ugly, and the police are forced to intervene so that Iain

'can find out whether the building is being used illegally

'or if the woman's claim that only one family lives here is true.'

-It's a bit gloomy.

-Yeah.

-Can we turn some lights on?

-It's on.

-That's it?

-They've just got a blue light on in the hall...

-Oh, that's it.

-Hello.

-Hello?

-From Oxford City Council.

We've got a warrant to enter the premises.

How many people live in here?

-In this room?

-Two people.

-Two people.

-Yes.

-And you are related to each other?

-Boyfriend.

-Boyfriend, OK.

-Can we have a quick look in here?

-Yes, please.

-Thank you.

'While I follow Iain to find out how many people are living in

'each room, Clive takes photos.

'It could be crucial if they decide to prosecute.'

Will you let us in your room?

-You have a dog?

-Yeah.

Is it a friendly dog?

Good.

We like friendly dogs.

-Hello. Oh!

-Oh!

-Sorry!

'The dog is friendly, it just doesn't want to stick around.'

Very sorry. Hello. How many people?

-Very friendly.

-Where?

-Here.

-I wouldn't know.

-Two? Two people?

After her reluctance to let us into the house, the man who seems

to be sharing her room is also being less than cooperative.

He won't give us his name. HE LAUGHS

Only two rooms down and already there seem to be at least

four people living in the house.

It's looking like Iain's fears of overcrowding could be right.

All of these people's lives in very small rooms.

It's packed full of stuff.

I mean, there's just stuff everywhere.

HE KNOCKS ON DOOR

Can we come in, please?

My boyfriend's asleep, he's got work.

From Oxford City Council. We have a warrant to inspect these premises.

Inspect them? But he's asleep. And my room is a mess.

We have a warrant. I'm not bothered about the... We'll be two minutes.

-Two, three minutes.

-If you just let the man do his job, he has a warrant.

-Can I just let my boyfriend know?

-Yes, please. Yes, OK.

-OK?

-But we won't disturb him, he can cover up.

-All right.

-If you just give me one minute.

-OK.

Join us later when we'll find out why this overcrowded house

is putting the squeeze on the people who live there.

-You shouldn't be able to put somebody in here to sleep.

-No.

The job of a housing officer isn't always about sorting out

difficult tenants, confronting deadbeat landlords

and inspecting dismal dwellings.

In Salford, for Kingsley Ekolle,

it's all about getting tenants into a property

and then trying to make sure they stay there.

It depends how much the individual is able to put in

and how determined they are to make the tenancy successful,

rather than what the local authority or our team can do for them.

Kingsley works for Salford Council's supported tenancy programme,

helping vulnerable people get a roof over their head.

The local authority's there to support them to be successful,

and to move on to an even more successful life, in the sense

that we want that they should come back to the community

and lead a successful life.

Meet Andy and Jane. They look like any ordinary couple to me.

Every single one of us is a different person

with a different story, we're not all the same.

But where they live...

Yeah, we don't need to get everything, just get what we can.

..is very far from ordinary.

This is the mattress.

This was here when we came here.

All the bedding has been given to us by charity organisations.

We have to put bodies in the bed so that

when people do walk past and they look over, they'll think

that's us and they won't go through our worldly possessions.

There's the candles, the candles we keep on every night.

It deters the rats a little bit and it makes us feel a little bit safer,

that we're not sat completely in the dark, or lay asleep in the dark.

Because we never know who's walking up and down.

Our clocks, so that we can get up in time for appointments.

Cos, again, there's nothing in an arch. We had to buy them, obviously.

Hats and things, people coming out of clubs have given us.

Like...just cheery little things.

As Andy says, it makes you forget you're in an arch

if you've got something colourful to look at.

-It looks nice at night-time, doesn't it?

-It does look nice.

After problems with alcohol,

Andy's been sleeping rough for seven years,

while Jane's been on the streets for four,

having suffered with mental health issues.

They fell in love 12 months ago

and, like any couple, decided to set up home.

But they did it in this arch, alongside its existing tenants.

The food in the fish tank, to keep the rats away from it.

Andy made the shelf to keep the rats away from the food.

It was an ongoing battle with the rats for a good few months, wasn't it?

-This area here is ours.

-Yeah, we ignore that bit.

And that is the rat path. Like, we've come to kind of a truce.

-If we feed them at night-time...

-Away from the arch.

Yeah, away from it, they'll leave us alone.

While Andy and Jane were getting to know their new housemates,

all around them, this part of Salford was being transformed.

The way I look at it, of a night-time,

we can stand here in the snow and the rain will be coming straight at us,

but we can look up at really rich people in the Beetham Tower.

And I think of it as like back in medieval times,

you'd have the peasants and the lepers at the very

bottom of the hill, and at the top, they must have looked up and saw

the lords and ladies in the castle, and this is a modern-day equivalent.

We can stand here and look at the very rich people looking back down.

And I always think - well, I wonder - do they even know...

about the homeless situation here in Manchester, in Salford?

And if they just looked out, they'd be able to see the arch.

Next under the developer's sledgehammer is this railway arch

which Andy and Jane have, in the absence of anything else,

come to consider as their home.

We were discussing this last night, I think we will.

But it's easy to miss something when you've got a better option there.

Of course, when we look back, it's going to be nostalgia rather than the reality of the rats

and the cold and strangers wandering in and out.

Andy and Jane face imminent eviction.

Which is, for once, not necessarily a bad thing in my book.

And that's where Kingsley comes in.

They're moving in here now.

We're happy to support them,

but the success of the tenancy depends on what they wish to

achieve, and whether they're willing or not to achieve those things.

Kingsley has secured a temporary flat for the couple,

but the big question is, will they be able to stick it after living

such a tough, but free, existence?

Some of the things that can happen include the fact that

they might not be able to cope in the tenancy and that can fail.

Especially when people have been on the street for a very long time.

We were actually nervous about coming here.

Just because it's such a massive change.

-We're really grateful, we're really happy...

-But we're both scared.

Instead of being happy, we're scared.

We'll find out how Andy and Jane settle into their new home later.

-Hot water! Can I give it a go?

-Yeah, you can.

SHE LAUGHS

Back in Oxford, I'm joining a raid to try and establish

whether a property's being used illegally as bedsits.

And after some difficulty gaining entry...

-The police...

-Excuse me, if you could just step aside.

..it definitely seems that the house is seriously overcrowded.

He won't give us his name.

Well, a headcount so far - we've got two people downstairs,

in this room we've got two, next door, we've got two.

In this house, which is supposed to be for...

A maximum of four, for the facilities.

They have one bathroom, they can have four people to one bathroom,

-four people to one kitchen.

-This is not licensed.

-So, over three, it would need a licence anyway.

-It would, yes.

And it seems like we've got a lot more than three.

Licensing was introduced for three or more people, was to try

and control things like this.

Overcrowding, poor conditions.

You can hardly stand up in this room

because of all the things that are in here.

And that's foodstuffs, cosmetics, clothes,

everything is just jammed in here.

You can see what happens

when you're in a house that's not big enough to cope.

'It's looking less and less likely that the woman at the front door's

'claim that the house is occupied by one family is true.'

So, we've got a couple in there with their dog.

-I've already established that he pays the rent.

-On behalf of all of them?

Yeah. He is the tenant. The landlord comes here,

or his wife comes here, to collect the rent every month.

I've got six names, I haven't got the name of the person who lives in that one.

It feels like we're finally getting to the bottom of what's going on.

And it seems it isn't a straightforward case

of a landlord with an unlicensed house in multiple occupation.

Iain's found out there's a good reason why the man sharing

a room with the woman who opened the front door refused to give his name.

It appears he's been renting the house from the landlord

and then illegally subletting the rooms to the other tenants himself.

What's happened is, they're paying £115 a week,

and the rent's £1,000 per month for the whole house.

So, he's living for free

because he's piling these people into the same house.

-And making a profit.

-And making a profit.

-Yeah.

When you see the economics of it, set out like that,

you kind of understand why it happens.

So, actually, there are two things to show here - one is there's that

couple in the first place who are making free rent and money from it.

But then you have to demonstrate, or try and demonstrate,

whether the landlord is complicit in that, and knows what's going on.

Because ultimately, the responsibility for this house,

and licensing it and keeping it, managing it properly,

-still goes back to the landlord, regardless.

-It does, yes.

If the tenant has created the multi-occupancy here,

then he is also liable.

-Really?

-Yes.

-So we can go back and hold that...

Effectively, as you would a landlord, say, "Well, actually,

"you've made yourself a landlord by subletting in this way,

"so you have to take some of the responsibility as well."

But in real terms, that tenant will just disappear.

OK, so what can we do about this? What happens next?

The owner and the tenant who we believe is subletting will be

invited in for an interview under caution.

I don't know if we're anywhere near to a stage where we need to say,

"This place needs to be radically changed, you need to move out."

Can we avoid that? Can we avoid making people homeless, effectively?

What we would do is serve an order on the owner to reduce the numbers.

But that's done by natural wastage, rather than evicting people.

So, it doesn't make the people homeless,

-it's just when they naturally move on to alternative accommodation.

-OK.

So there you have it. It's a house stuffed with people,

stuffed with stuff as well.

And, really, not protecting or serving

the people that are in there.

It's not very nice, busting into people's lives

and waking them up to try and find out how they're living.

But that's the last resort. So, uncomfortable, but job done.

In Stevenage, I'm working with the emergency accommodation team...

-Hi, Matt.

-Hello.

-You all right for a chat?

..on a case led by housing officer Sarah Morley.

Today, we're going to go and meet a lady who we are going to be

putting from emergency accommodation into her own property.

Sandra's been living in single-room emergency accommodation

for the last three months, after the death

of her husband meant she couldn't afford the mortgage on her house.

But multiple health issues have left Sandra reliant on family

and carers to help her try to live a normal life.

She's bedbound, she uses a lot of equipment.

She's not going to get any better than she is.

So we need to find somewhere that's going to be comfortable

-and permanent for her to stay.

-Good stuff.

The good news is a bungalow's become available that should suit

Sandra's needs. She's happy, and agreed to the move.

So today Sarah and I are going to talk her through the paperwork.

Hello! This is Matt.

-I'm Matt, nice to meet you.

-Hi, Matt.

-Hi.

-Hi.

'Sandra's nephew Stephen is here to lend a supporting hand.'

So, today,

I've got about ten forms with me, sorry.

I know you don't like forms. But I'm afraid they're unavoidable.

'Having the stability of a permanent home is something most of us want.

'But it's clearly especially important for someone like Sandra.'

The plan for the next place, then, is that you've got somewhere you can

be secure and safe and know you're going to be there for a while.

And you can concentrate on getting the care that you need.

Yeah, it'd be nice to have a final place where I'm going to stay

and not going to have to move again and worry about things.

'One thing she won't have to worry about is the decorating,

'cos that's going to be Stephen's job.'

We've got a decorating voucher for £150.

Should be you having this, Stephen,

seeing as you're going to be the one doing all the work, shouldn't it?

Is this the wallpaper you've chosen?

-Yes, that's going in the living room.

-Oh, wow, that's nice.

And that one behind you, that's going in the bedroom, that one.

-Here we go, there's the keys for your property. All yours.

-All mine.

-Is that it, then?

-Right, that's it.

-Fantastic.

Sandra's all signed up, it's her property.

What's it like to have your keys in your hand, finally?

It's great to finally have my own property again.

Between losing my husband

and then not being able to keep the property on,

and then to actually lose that home, it was very, very hard.

And then being uncertain where I'm going to go, as well.

To actually have the keys to... you know,

and know I'm going to be there, it's fantastic. Absolutely great.

-How long were you in your property with your husband?

-About 19 years.

-It's a long time.

-Yeah, it was very hard.

A lot of memories.

-Now you've got a place where you can start making new memories.

-Yeah.

Yep. Fresh start.

'It looks like Sandra now can finally say goodbye

'to living in one cramped room.'

It must be one of the more satisfying parts of your job there.

-Yeah, it is.

-Seeing that happen.

Yeah, cos I know how much it means to her to get somewhere that's hers.

-Yeah.

-Cos she's a really anxious lady and she was worried

when her bungalow went.

Hopefully, she'll be happier now and she'll start making plans

for the future now cos she hasn't done many of them lately, so...

Yeah, that'll be good.

-Anything for me to do?

-Yes, there is.

-I thought so!

Stephen's going to go to the property, he hasn't seen it yet

so he hasn't kind of made any plans of where anything's going.

But if you can try and encourage him that the larger room

would be a good room to be stationed in, that'd be really nice.

We need to look at that property and just sort of plan out exactly

how Sandra's life is going to work in there once she's move in.

-To suit her the best so she gets the best of both worlds.

-OK.

Bed and the sofa and time in her chair.

'Well, it's good to be given some responsibility at last.

'Find out if I succeed a bit later on.'

Back in Salford, and home is where the heart is,

or so the old saying goes.

In the dark, if you kind of squint your eyes,

and the candles are on, you can't see all that mess in the back -

you can kind of fool yourself into thinking it's a little bedsit or something.

Maybe don't look too deeply.

I don't know how you can do that!

OK, it may just be a railway arch in Salford,

but this home has got a lot of heart.

And it's got the roots of something very special.

I really believe now, if I hadn't had met Jane, I'd be dead.

They've lived here for the past year, but eviction's looming,

so not for much longer.

-We've had some good times, though.

-Yeah, I was just going to say, we've had some laughs here,

but as soon as winter kicked in, the laughs just went away.

Today, housing officer Kingsley Ekolle is showing them

around their new temporary home.

Feel the heat soon as you walk in, can't you?

-This is your new living room, guys.

-That's lovely, that.

-Chairs! You don't have to sit on the floor!

-Oh, man.

-So, you've got a table, chairs there in the diner.

-Yep.

-Here's the settee.

-Is it all right if I sit down?

Oh, yeah, that's fine, you can sit down.

We've lived the reality of the streets for so long, and now,

to have what normal people can have, it's like, somehow, I feel...

It's not normal, is it?

..yeah, like I don't deserve it, or it's going to be taken away.

Like, I'm just going to be sent back onto the streets.

It's home.

-There's your kitchen.

-Yeah.

-This is the cooker. This is a fridge-freezer.

That's your sink, you've got hot water there.

-Hot water! Can I give it a go?

-Yeah, you can.

SHE LAUGHS

Jane looked extremely thrilled. She was smiling all along.

I could see Andy's face beaming with smiles as well.

So, yeah, it was very successful.

HE LAUGHS That's good to hear.

Normally, we have a bin bag full of clothes that we hide

-towards the back of the arch.

-Right, whole wardrobe now.

They'll stay here for the next three months.

And with the help of Kingsley and the supported tenancy team,

it'll give them a chance to get back on their feet.

-This is to kick-start what we both need.

-Yep.

Like I say, I'm not getting any younger.

I need to do something now or never.

What we're looking towards

-is Andy wants to go to college in September, don't you?

-Yeah, yeah.

He says that'll make him feel loads better, to be able to go to college.

And I want a job again.

Hopefully, Andy and Jane will now start building a new life.

Although some people in their position can struggle to

adjust to a settled environment.

We're so grateful to have the opportunity,

just to be able to live a normal life.

It actually feels like I'm a member of society again.

The main challenge here is to make sure that you're able to

-function as effectively and efficiently as possible.

-Yep.

-In your own words, to lead a normal life once more.

-Yeah.

-Yeah.

-Is that OK?

-That'd be great, yeah.

And we'll be with you all the way, to support you

-until you've settled in.

-Thank you.

-Thank you very much.

-Yeah?

-Yeah.

Fingers crossed everything works out for them.

Back in Stevenage, bedbound Sandra spent three months

living in cramped single-roomed emergency accommodation.

Between losing my husband, then not being able to keep the property on,

and then to actually lose that home, it was very, very hard.

But thanks to the council's housing team,

Sandra's now been offered a bungalow.

-So, this is it.

-Oh, right.

'But before she moves in, I've come with nephew Stephen

'to make sure her new home will be right for Sandra.'

And a massive kitchen.

This is big, isn't it?

This is a nice-sized kitchen, it's bigger than my kitchen.

There's plenty of room in here for the cooker, fridge,

whatever she needs and more.

We think of this as being a house for one person. In fact, it isn't,

because you've got carers there for a big part of the day,

so her house is very rarely just herself.

-STEPHEN LAUGHS

-You can never get that lady by herself.

-There's always a carer there, district nurse there...

-Family.

Family, you know, it's almost ongoing, it's constant.

One stops, the other starts.

It's going to make their life a lot easier cos, you know,

they're preparing meals, getting her meds ready

-and this is a bright, clean, big, spacious kitchen.

-It's ideal.

Absolutely ideal.

'And things look promising in the bathroom, too.'

It's a walk-in shower.

Yeah, they're going to put a special shower chair in here

so she can be brought in here, sit down her chair

and they can actually wash her in the shower rather than a bed bath,

which isn't the nicest thing for anyone, let's face it.

So, again, this is about giving back your aunt a fuller life.

So, not everything revolving around the bed but actually semblance of...

You know, a bit of dignity and a bit of establishing a normal routine.

Exactly. This is what she needs. And this will give her that.

-This is the main room.

-Yeah.

'Sandra's health issues mean she relies on carers

'and has a lot of specialist equipment.

'So, housing officer Sarah wants me

'to suggest that the bed would be better off in the larger lounge.'

-So, we've got the bed...

-Got the bed.

-..that your auntie's got to get in here.

-The hoist.

'But it sounds like a family decision's already been made.'

She wants it separate, she wants to be...

-HE SIGHS

-That's all her day is.

So, for her, getting out of bed and doing something with her day,

even if it's just moving to the lounge to watch TV,

for her, that's her day,

that's achieved something in the day for her.

The idea, then, of moving to another room is kind of quite liberating.

It's a big deal for her. It's a very big thing.

She wants her freedom back.

It's still limited, she still needs carers to help her

but at least she's not in the same room,

same four walls day in, day out

which I-I couldn't... I couldn't imagine doing myself.

You've watched her over these last couple of years,

-what it's been like?

-It's horrible.

Knowing that there's nothing I can do directly to make

her life any better, is horrible.

And if all I can do is help her move in to a new property...

For me, it's a few days, fine.

For her, it means the world to have that independence back.

-And the security of knowing that it's not going to go away.

-Yeah.

It's council stock, she's paying the rent to the council, it's not like

a landlord is suddenly going to pull the rug out from under her feet.

Exactly.

'It's clear that Stephen

'really cares about his aunt's quality of life.

'And he also cares about the decoration.'

-What's the plan, do you know?

-Bring it back to bare wall.

Strip it right back, paint and she's picked out the wallpaper already

so we're going to do one wall as a feature wall for her

and do the best we can to get her in and make it as homely as we can.

Well, I think I failed in my mission quite spectacularly then.

Sarah wanted me to try to persuade Stephen to get Sandra to live

in the one big living area that there was,

but family knows best.

And he seemed to understand what it was that Sandra was really

trying to get out of this.

So many areas of her life are out of her control.

She's been stuck in that bed for a long time now

and he can see that what's really important

is for her to have a semblance of a normal routine, a normal life.

It's really hopeful and I think in that place

she might be able to get some of that back.

And not long after my visit, with a sterling effort made

to decorate the house by Stephen and the family,

Sandra's new home was finally ready to move into.

I can start to settle now cos I know I'm not just going to be here

for a few months.

I know this is it now, this is my home and it's where I'm staying now.

It's great to see Sandra finally

in her new home, and her quality of life improved.

That's it for today's show.

Join me next time, when I'll be finding out more about

what it takes to become a front-line housing officer.