Bristol mum left with "nails sticking out" of council home carpet
Carpets in council homes in Bristol are being removed after tenants move out and before ones move in “due to minor damage or dirt”. New tenants then have to pay for their own carpets when they move in, with one young mother reportedly having floors with nails sticking out.
Bristol City Council has changed its policy on floor covering in council homes, addressing concerns about “furniture poverty”. The council is the largest landlord in the city, with roughly 26,000 homes. But there are ongoing concerns about the quality of council housing in Bristol.
Buying and installing new carpets can cost more than £1,000, which is a considerable expense given that people living in council homes tend to be less well off than average.
Labour Councillor Zoë Peat said: “I recently had a young mother reach out to me through a charity. She essentially said that she had a toddler, she’s moved into a council house, and she’s had to blockade off rooms because the carpets have been removed. And there are just nails and things poking up through the ground.
“The council has essentially told her that she has to pay for the cost of the new carpet, because the carpet was removed before she was moved in. And now she’s relying on a food bank. From what I understand, around 30 per cent of properties with tenants moving in end up keeping their carpets.
“Whereas huge swathes of houses are having their carpets removed, due to very minor damage or dirt — things that could be easily cleaned with a carpet cleaner. Instead we appear to just be removing the carpets each time. I’m concerned these properties are not fit for human habitation if they don’t have flooring, and especially if the flooring has things like nails poking out of them.”
There is a wider context about poor quality flooring in social housing too. The government is trying to ramp up standards in social housing, with a new Decent Homes Standard. This provides tighter rules for landlords, including housing associations and council homes. However the new rules do not include a requirement for landlords to provide floor coverings.
The practice is common among housing associations. Research suggests hundreds of thousands of tenants are affected, with higher heating costs and the risk of getting into debt to pay for new carpets.
That means that the council has to decide whether it will exceed the new standards, and provide floor coverings such as carpets. Green Cllr Barry Parsons, chair of the housing committee, said he expected a lot of landlords not to do so, leaving tenants still having to pay for their own carpets. The council previously had a policy of removing all carpets after tenants move out.
Siân Humphreys, the council’s interim director of housing property, said: “We’ve now got an initiative where — unless there is a health and safety issue or they’re in such a poor state they’re dangerous — we are looking to try and leave carpets and flooring for people now. We recognise that it’s a significant cost for people.”
As well as being expensive to purchase, a lack of carpets can cause noise problems in flats. This is because carpets provide sound insulation, masking the noise of footsteps in flats above. Over the last two years, a new project has been trying to prevent carpets getting removed unnecessarily. Working on this with the council is the Citizens Advice Bureau and a food bank.
Green Cllr Lisa Stone said: “There are targets being implemented. We’ve changed the tenancy book, where people can now donate white goods and carpets and soft furnishings, if they wish to. And we are going to hopefully be organising a housing summit, which would bring all the housing associations together to specifically look at this issue, which is about furniture poverty.”