MPs want short let landlords to provide details about the number of nights they let out their properties in a bid to clamp down on those flouting the 90-day rule and guests’ bad behaviour.

Short lets in the capital can’t operate for more than 90 nights per year without planning permission, but Labour MP for London and Westminster Rachel Blake (pictured) believes this is operationally impossible to enforce because of how difficult it is to get accurate information.

At the first reading of Blake’s Short-term Let Accommodation (Data Sharing Requirements) Private Members’ Bill, she said without crucial data about the number of nights, enforcing the 90-day limit would remain an elusive task for local authority planning enforcement teams.

“Data from AirDNA indicates that nearly 6,000 short lets in the Cities of London and Westminster are being let out for over the 90-day limit,” she told the Commons. “If we simply made these actors follow the law, or better still took them off the market entirely, we would significantly reduce the disruption caused by short-term letting.”

Promised

In December, the government promised that its short-term lets registration scheme was imminent. This would force owners to register and provide information on their accommodation and themselves, pay a registration fee, and then receive a registration number which must be used when advertising or letting accommodation. This unique reference number would then appear on all letting sites, and owners would have to confirm that they followed existing regulations applying to short-term lets, such as fire, gas and electrical certificates.

Blake’s Bill – backed by 10 other MPs - would amend the Data Protection Act 2018 to force landlords to share data about the number of nights as part of the scheme.

“In some parts of my constituency, as many as 30% of homes are being used as short-term lets, in the process making the homes that are left less affordable for long-term residents,” added Blake. “While every local authority should be able to undertake its open approach to this issue, local authorities such as Westminster and the City of London, where concentrations are so high, need to have the power to decide where homes can be let out and under what conditions.”

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