Following an investigation, the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has prosecuted a Slough landlord for breaching gas safety regulations and for failing to comply with an enforcement notice.
Mohammed Nawaz was fined for serious safety breaches after he left a young family in potential danger for nearly four years by repeatedly failing to check the gas appliances in a property he rented to them.
On 21 August HSE told Slough Magistrates’ Court that its investigation revealed that the gas appliances had not been maintained and checked so the family could be provided with a Landlord’s Gas Safety record for the property.
The court heard that as a landlord, Mr Nawaz had a legal duty to ensure the gas appliances in any properties he rented were checked every 12 months by a competent gas engineer. However, between June 2010 and February 2014, no such checks were carried out and no record was ever provided to the tenants at any point in four years of tenancy.
When a Gas Safe Register engineer visited the property, a boiler was classed as ‘At Risk’ because of an inadequate seal around the flue and incorrectly-sized gas supply pipes to the boiler.
Despite warnings and an enforcement notice from HSE, plus an abatement notice from the local council requiring him to comply with the law, Mr Nawaz failed to respond, continuing to expose the family to potential health risks.
He was fined a total of £9,000 and ordered to pay full costs of £3,941after admitting two breaches of the Gas Safety (Installation and Use) Regulations and a further charge of non-compliance with a HSE Improvement Notice.