8,000 'ghost' houses rotting in Bradford (From Bradford Telegraph and Argus)

8,000 'ghost' houses rotting in Bradford

7:30am Tuesday 24th November 2009 in

• Skip social links
• Print
• Email
• Comments(8)

More than 8,000 “ghost” houses are being left to rot by private landlords across Bradford.

Empty Dwelling Management Orders (EDMOs) were introduced in 2006 to give councils temporary management rights over homes at risk of falling prey to squatters, drug-dealers and fly-tippers – allowing a house to revert to its original owner at a later date.

EDMOs are designed to kick out a landlord refusing to co-operate with attempts to bring a property back into use. But across the country only 27 properties have been refurbished in that way, none by Bradford Council according to Government information.

Latest figures show there are about 8,300 privately-owned empty homes across the Bradford district. Across the UK, the number of empty homes has hit one million.

Chris Brown, Bradford Council’s Regeneration Manager (Housing), said: “Empty Dwelling Management Orders are just one of a range of powers available to local authorities to deal with empty private accommodation.

“But they only provide a temporary solution to the problem, allowing a local authority to take over the management of a property to bring it back into a habitable condition and often means substantial costs to the Council.

“We have found it a much more effective and permanent solution to work with the property owners, offering advice and support to help them bring properties back into use. We are keen to use appropriate legal powers when necessary to bring about change. These powers range from requiring properties to be boarded up, dealing with statutory nuisance, such as damp penetration, and in extreme cases Compulsory Purchase Orders and Enforced Sale.

“In December 2006 the Executive agreed that Bradford Council would not use Empty Dwelling Management Orders.”

The Tories have pledged to scrap EDMOs. Housing spokesman Grant Shapps said: “Labour announces these schemes with a fanfare and they turn out to be damp squibs.”

But Communities Minister Ian Austin insisted the scheme was “beginning to work well”, adding: “We always intended the legislation to be used only as a last resort.”