Council has different rules for private home owners than itself?!

[Emilymaitlisfangirl]

Afternoon everyone. I'm not sure whether this is better in property or legal, but think this is possibly technical.

I have owned my grade 2 (NO STAR) listed home since 2005. In 2010 i was served an enforcement notice because the previous owners changed timbers ash windows to upvc. I was going to change the windows anyway but not to timber which was very expensive. The council insisted upon single glazed, citing that in 1860 no one had double glazed so it was not in keeping. This means heat retention is crap and I've had to pay for secondary glazing (or pay in the form of bills). Also, The roof needed fixing. They made us buy very expensive tiles. This is now 2013 and 2018 respectively.

I have just discovered that the council owned properties on the street that are the same as mine have had double glazed windows installed and bog standard tiles. The premium I paid to keep aligned with council policy must be at least £15k.

I want to complain, but honestly I also want to be compensated, or fort he council to have to change everything they have done.

I had to take out loans for the extra I had to pay. I'm so upset.

Are there any thoughts on this?

Thank you. Checked the planning register. Nothing there. Perhaps I am not looking in the correct place?

This.

When my DSIS was renovating a flat (well, actually having it knocked down and rebuilt due to subsidence) one council dept said she had to put in single glazed sashes to comply with their conservation area rules, but building control at the same council said they had to be double glazed…

OP, I get where you are coming from. It’s not about you having to follow the rules (which you have done) - it’s the frustration that the council do not seem to have obeyed their own rules on listed buildings. I would definitely be putting in FOI requests to see if they had breached any rules or regulations and then follow up accordingly.

But, let's be clear, proving the Council has broken the rules will neither remove the rules from OPs property nor re-imburse her for the money she spent complying with the rules that govern her property.

At best, it will force the Council to remedy any non-compliant work at a great cost to the local tax payer. But, in general, Councils don't carry out non compliant works, so it's likely that OP will achieve nothing, other than wasting people's time (again, at a cost to the local tax payers)

I’m no expert on listed buildings, I’m taking OP’s word for it. It absolutely is true when it comes to the PRS vs social housing.

I don’t think OP is trying to remove the rules from her property, or get her money back, though, is she? She’s just angry that while she’s been made to follow the rules, the council itself (at least on the face of it) hasn’t. And so would like them to be held accountable and be made to put right their works to neighbouring listed buildings.

I don’t know about you, but if my local council was breaking any kind of rules then I’d want them to be called out on it and stopped from doing so again.

She did comply.

it certainly is relevant that the regulations enforced by the council aren’t followed by the council who own similar properties in the same street. Why haven’t the council been fined £££

Step 1 - look to see what planning permission has actually been granted. Just because your changes to your property are not permitted, it doesn't automatically mean no-one else's changes were permitted.

Meh, fine. If her aim is to cost her local Council money, and she is happy to raise everyone local Council Tax bill, plus she has a healthy sum to spend on legal challenges, then she should crack on!

Who do you think actually pays the fine? The Council tax payers...

This is exactly what I was going to say. You've had some really dickish responses on this thread OP, but I would be asking questions of the Council and you don't need to throw any money at it but I would be interested in the council's response so do please update

I'm not sure you can do much retrospectively, but if you want to do other work I would quote what has been allowed in neighbouring houses.

Not the same situation but I lived in a conservation area. We wanted to replace our rotten timber windows with high spec wood effect uPVC. The first application was refused as they were deemed as not in keeping with the area. This is despite most of our neighbours just having bog standard uPVC put in and a monstrosity of a modern house being built in the area. We put in an amended application for wooden frames but couldnt afford to do the whole house. This was also objected to so I emailed our local councillors and mentioned cost of living, trying to improve the efficiency of the house and also the monstrosity that had been built. They fought our case and our amended application went through.

I think you are the same poster who upthread said they think it is unlikely the council has breached their own planning policies. I can say with utmost certainty they have. So, I do not credit your opinion very much at all. You appear to be loaded with bias, I am not sure why. But I thank you for your responses, however dismissive.

I see that Legal has been invaded by the self-righteous, unqualified types from AIBU again. Ignore them, OP

Hi OP,

I can understand why this is infuriating for you.

I agree that The Council should stick to their own rules. However I do agree with the point made by previous posters - it will have been public money that paid for the upgrades and it will be public money that pays for their compliant replacements. No one at the Council will be out of pocket personally and no one will probably be overly bothered about the waste of public money.

So your home is grade 2 listed and the council owned ones are also grade 2 listed?

You have private money and council had public you want public money spend on this so you feel better about spending private money?

So bizarre that people don’t seem to get the injustice of it all. If the council are exempt from these rules, what is the point of them in the first place? Unless we’re all in agreement that the rules are nonsense but because private individuals have to bear the cost, no one gives a fuck.

I agree that preserving listed buildings is important but if there is some reason why councils are exempt from
this (money saving) then they shouldn’t be allowed to own listed buildings at all. They can’t have it both ways.

I'm not sure if it's a legal claim, but why don't you write to your local councillor and ask them what their rationale is for the different treatment? If you don't get a satisfactory response raise it with your MP.

This is shocking and I would think you could report the council for doing this, and they’ll be made to change the windows to single glazed. I dont know how much that would help you
personally but it might start a change of attitude about making listed buildings more practical to live in.

Maybe the owners have done the work without asking permission.

The listed building opposite my parent's house is always having non permitted work done. I mentioned it to a couple of the workmen and they just shrug.

The removed the slate roof and replaced it with blue corrugated metal. The council just said they were keeping an eye on it. My mum retorted they must be blind then.

This is the best advice so far.

OP, I understand why you’re feeling so aggrieved. Do some digging on the council’s planning portal/register, all the information you need should be on line. Ask questions of the planning and conservation department - be polite and specific. I wouldn’t even raise the issue of your own house, because that’s irrelevant to this (albeit not irrelevant to how you understandably feel), and will weaken how your requests will be perceived. You want to know what applications were approved for works to your neighbouring properties, and how those works were assessed against the relevant policies - you have a right to that information. If they don’t reply/fob you off, go a step up and submit a freedom of information request. Then you should approach all councillors who sit on the council’s planning committee with that information (which, if you are right, will confirm that works were undertaken without the appropriate permissions). They can retrospectively apply for permission, but this must be assessed against national and local planning policy, so they will need to show how any works done are in accordance with the rules. This is about getting them to rectify their properties, not trying to undo the work on your own house (because that’s a non starter)

What's the point of complaining to the council. They don't set the legislation for enforcement. Central government do. You need to lobby them.

I think you’re absolutely justified in feeling pissed off about this and I would look at whether you can complain.

If the council don’t have to apply their own rules then that is unfair.

But national policy would support enforcement in this case (assuming the OP is right and the council have undertaken work either without planning permission or not in accordance with relevant planning policy). This isn’t a national legislation problem. It’s a local council ignoring local and national planning policy (again, assuming the OP has got this right in her assumptions)

I can’t comment on whether they got permission, although they should have done. It is listed building consent they require rather than planning permission usually for something like this.

I do know that guidance has recently changed to support the change to double glazing. Generally timber is still required rather than upvc although some high quality wood grain upvc can be deemed acceptable. This is due to sustainability and the fact that planning policy in general puts a lot of weight to sustainability. So you may be unfortunate in that when you applied it was standard for refuse applications for double glazing/upvc but if you were to apply again now you may be approved. Obviously not helpful when you’ve already spent the money.