Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, pursuant to the Answer of 5 July 2017 to Question 840, on multiple occupation: licensing, which local authorities have accessed new information from tenancy deposit protections schemes in order to identify mandatory licensable houses of multiple occupation since that data has been made available.

Measures within the Housing and Planning Act 2016 allow local housing authorities in England to access information held by the Tenancy Deposit Protection (TDP) schemes. Local Housing Authorities must only use the data:

1. For a purpose connected with the exercise of their functions under Parts 1-4 of the Housing Act 2004 in relation to any premises (in general improving housing conditions, licencing of Houses in Multiple Occupation, selective licencing of other accommodation and management orders); and

2. For the purpose of investigating whether an offence has been committed under any of those Parts in relation to any premises.

Local Housing Authorities are not required to access the information provided by the TDP schemes. It is up to individual authorities to decide whether to access and use the information or not, depending on local circumstances and other data sources available to them.

A list of local Housing Authorities in England who are known to have applied to the schemes for access to the information in the first quarter of 2017 is shown below.