A buy-to-let landlord has been fined for failing to comply with electrical safety standards in what is thought to be the first prosecution of its kind.

Coventry City Council issued a £1,600 fine after the landlord failed to provide an Electrical Installation Condition Report (EICR) in respect of their property investment on Stoney Stanton Road in Foleshill.

The report should have been completed on or around 1 April 2020 by a competent and suitably qualified electrician to show that the electrical installation in the property was safe, and a copy provided to the tenant. The council says that it will also be serving a remedial notice requiring further action to be taken.

Regulations were introduced across the country last year giving local authorities powers to issue fines to landlords who fail to follow Electrical Safety Standards.

Adrian Chowns, licensing and housing enforcement manager at Coventry City Council, said: “We believe this is the first time these powers have been used by a local authority in England. It highlights how Coventry City Council are taking a proactive approach to enforcement and clamping down on rogue landlords in its city.

“The landlord has committed multiple offences both recently and in the past, all of which are serious in their nature, and has put multiple tenants at risk of harm. We’ve provided lots of advice to the landlord, but he has continued to contravene the law and there are no signs of improvement.”

The landlord in question has also been added to the Rogue Landlord Database.

Davina Blackburn, strategic lead for regulation in the city, commented: “Most landlords are decent law-abiding people. However, there is still a minority who continue to show a flagrant disregard for the law, who put their tenants at risk and, as such, the council will target its enforcement activity against them.”