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ARTICLE · 24 JANUARY 2023

Gove Names And Shames

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The Secretary of State for the Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, Mr Gove MP, has now named and shamed 14 social landlords (at the time of writing) for a variety of service failures.

United KingdomReal Estate and Construction
Clive Adams
Clive Adams

The Secretary of State for the Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, Mr Gove MP, has now named and shamed 14 social landlords (at the time of writing) for a variety of service failures.

In an article posted on the Government website dated 28 December 2022, which describes a letter penned by Mr Gove, he urged lawyers to direct tenants to the Housing Ombudsman to save tenants time and money. He further remarked that the Ombudsman should be the first port of call for reporting complaints about their landlord (presumably after the internal complaints process has been exhausted).

He also noted that it was unacceptable that landlords let legal proceedings get in the way of repairs. This would appear to be a thinly veiled remark to the policy of Rochdale Borough Housing not to undertake repairs once a legal claim had been initiated unless it had been agreed with the tenant's solicitors.

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