To report my neighbours

[Keebles]

Hi. Ok so let me just start by saying that usually I’m a live and let live kind of person who minds her own business and gets on with her own life, however I’m at the point now where I’ve had enough of my neighbours life choices affecting me and my family.

So basically I live in a lovely little HA house. We moved in two years ago, we spent money making it into a lovely cosy home but all that has been over shadowed by the fact my neighbours to the left of us smoke weed. Whilst that in itself wouldn’t be an issue if they smoked it outside, they choose to smoke it inside and unfortunately the smell comes through to our house. I’ve no idea how it does as neither me or my dh can see any obvious cracks in the walls or ceiling but there you go.

I’ve spoken to my neighbours twice about it. I explained the smell was coming to our house and politely asked if they could smoke it in their garden instead. For a whole they did this but the last few months they’ve gone back to smoking it inside. My dh refuses to speak to them again about it as they say there is no point and insists that we report it to the HA, however there might be a potential repercussion with that. I don’t care if the neighbours come round shouting at us, we’ve put up with it that long now that neither me or my dh care, but there is another issue at play. My neighbours children all
attend the school in which I work and one of their children is in my class. I’ve debated for a while now whether school would see the parents smoking in the house, potentially around the children, as a safeguarding issue so o am worried that if I report the parents to the HA if I’ll have to declare it to my work place as well as it’s potentially a safeguarding issue?

My neighbours aren’t great and we’ve had/have other issues with them eg them throwing their dog outside to bark non stop, allowing their kids to “play” eg shouting, screaming, kicking footballs off people’s fences walls and cars, them regularly having bonfires in their garden. None of this we have reported as like I said I’m usually able to ignore the behaviour of others and didn’t want to be THAT neighbour, however I’m not at the point where I don’t want to be in my home due not only their behaviour but also the weed smell. If you where me what would you do? We cannot move as the prices of houses in our area is ridiculous and we simply do not have the money. So the way I see it is I either suck it up or report to the HA and hope they do something.

Thank you @OnlyOpenMouthToChangeFeet

Is it not worth contacting the housing association first before the police?

Personally I'd try to resolve the smell problem with the police first and see how things pan out. That way you are saying 'we've tried talking to you, now the police can talk to you but we're not trying to get you evicted'. (Yet)

You should absolutely report this to the housing association.

You don't have to live like this, and they know full well what they are doing. Stand up for yourself. Regardless of whether you think they will do much, the fact is that cannabis is actually illegal, and you have every right to complain.

If nothing else, think of the children living there and inhaling all that weed. If you can smell it, what do you think it's like for them?

That is 100% a safeguarding issue and as a professional working with children and knowledgeable about safeguarding, your responsibility doesn't end when you leave school.

It is a good thing if you declare it to the school. More chance of something actually being done about it.

You know that this child is suffering and you need to step in.

Don't be scared of these people.

I take slight issue with this. I accept the Police don't do anything - there's a kid up our road who permanently smokes weed and drives - you can smell the stink every time his car passes, the Police couldn't be less interested, BUT they could do something if they wanted - they just choose to ignore dope use, presumably because it is so widespread now.

I'd report the dog issue & records these incidents. The way they treat their dog, I would not be able to cope with this.

Just to say though, my friend had an issue like this with neighbour & weed, she found that when they smoked outside she'd not be able to open her windows because it would waft in.
She had the move in the end. What about trying for a swap?
I'd say that you could try having a conversation with the HA but they tend to take a middle ground - depends on the HA they do vary but they don't like making people's homeless as a rule.
I think it's a 101 call personally, although I'm with the posters who don't think they'll do much, unless neighbours are part of a bigger operation & you never know they might be. Again the action would vary area to area, you could call for advice rather than to report?

When did you last speak to the neighbours about it? How long has it gone on for? How long have the kids been in the school you work at?

If its been a while since speaking to them, and the kids have been at the school for a while I'd be tempted to just go down the channel of reporting to the school. Let the school/social services speak to them and say the kids have been coming to school smelling of it. That should make them stop!

My brother had this issue, he drove him to being on the brink! It only stopped when they moved out.

I think it might be worth speaking to your HA.
As a private landlord I reported a neighbour to the LA on behalf of my tenants, as the smell of cannabis was getting into their flat.
The LA were initially very dismissive and said it was a police matter. I persevered and eventually they visited the flat and found that their tenants had removed part of the flue casing which meant the smell spread further. They fixed that and it made things better, which is all I could hope for.
I don’t think you are likely to get them in any trouble with or that there is much chance of the HA trying to evict them just for smoking. In my experience LA’s aren’t even bothered when they are actually growing, although they very much should be. Growing often involves dangerous practices with electricity which is a tangible fire hazard.

Absolutely report this to the HA.

I also assume that you are not their only neighbours so they won't know for sure that the report comes from you.

The HA can and will do something. Tenancies state that they should not cause any nuisance to neighbour and using drugs is still illegal.

They could be dealing too or having dealers in the house and this is not a good environment for their kids.

Basically use every channels you can think of: HA, police, social services and council.

You did the polite thing, spoke to them directly and gave them a chance to address the situation.

They did nothing so now you should have no hesitation to take this further.

So many decent Families would love the security of a HA property and I don't see what dodgy tenants should have the benefit of one if they repeatedly causes a nuisance.

Hopefully a letter from the HA will do the trick and they will calm down, if not it might be a longer battle but you might success in getting them moved somewhere else.

Do they drive? If so, it might be worth passing their registration to the police with the information that they habitually use drugs. Although that might just mean that they have more time in the house to smoke if they get banned. It'd make the roads safer though.

I don't know whether this would be futile but how about also calling Environmental Health? I had to do this once about a vile, vile stench coming from the basement of a building in which I had a flat. They got Landlord to sort it as it was affecting my health.

It does sound like they're growing it though.... The smell from weed growing is INCREDIBLY strong. Police will certainly be interested in that!

If they are smoking weed in the house and children live there then this is a safeguarding issue and needs reporting to your local safeguarding team. That's not acceptable.

Report it to your local MASH team:
www.gov.uk/government/news/working-together-to-safeguard-children-multi-agency-safeguarding-hubs

This was set up to piece together all sorts of information about children to make sure they are protected after children died due to lots of small pieces of evidence not being put together to build up a bigger picture.