A CRACKDOWN on rogue private landlords in Worcester has been defended by council chiefs - who insist they have "strong justification" for it.

The city council's Conservative cabinet has backed the first step towards slapping up to 2,000 private landlords with a £670 'tax', kicking off a 12-week consultation.

During a cabinet meeting last night, it emerged that:

- The £670 fee will help fund 300 inspections of private rented homes across Worcester a year, double the current tally

- In recent years, a staggering 92 per cent of private homes inspected by the council have failed basic safety checks like fire exits

- There is serious council concern that poor standards in the private rental homes industry are not getting addressed by landlords

As your Worcester News revealed last week, the council wants all owners of Houses of Multiple Occupation (HMOs) to pay for a "licence".

The fee would be payable once every five years, and apply to all homes where three or more people from two different families live - typically those used by students or young professionals.

At the moment only HMOs of five beds or more over three storeys need to be registered with the council, with the tally a paltry 187.

The council wants to do more inspections and keep checks on all the other HMOs currently under no controls whatsoever, saying the growth in the student population and the number of young professionals living together makes it a pressing concern.

Due to a lack of funds the council only inspects around 162 homes a year currently, on average.

It has no idea exactly how many HMOs there are in Worcester, but estimates it to be around 2,000.

Councillor David Wilkinson, cabinet member for safer and stronger communities, said: "The justification for this is firstly, the growing number of rented properties across Worcester, and secondly, the fact 92 per cent of properties we inspect need some kind of basic work on them.

"Thirdly, we want a level playing field."

Councillor Chris Mitchell, cabinet member for finance, said: "What is clear to me is that when we've got around 2,000 HMOs in the city and only 190-odd are licensed, it's not a level playing field.

"It's up to landlords to take responsibility for their property but apart from those 190-odd, there's no mechanism to 'tie' that responsibility to them.

"I think the majority of people in the city will appreciate what we're trying to do, and most landlords will too."

The money will make the project self-financing, and lead to an additional member of staff being employed to inspect the homes.

The consultation will include talks with the National Landlords Association, which has heavily criticised it as a 'tax' that will be passed onto tenants.

Don Robbie, the city's NLA representative, has called it "totally wrong" and says the body is "very concerned" about the implications.

"They should be focusing on the minority of bad landlords, not hitting the vast majority of good ones with this bill," he said.

The council says the £670 fee will reduce for renewals once the first five years has passed, and that if the policy is introduced, it will be reviewed three years in to see how it has worked.