Landlord register - Freedom of information requests

Landlord register

2024501

10/05/2024

FOI

I would like to request a full copy of the landlord register, including private landlords, number of properties owned and date of registration.I doubt there would be an issue with this data being shared given the landlord register is public, but if there is an issue can you provide an alternative that provides a unique, anonymous number for every landlord.
Finally, if there are any issues with providing the information in the above formats, I'd like to request that it be provided as basic data - so a breakdown of landlords and how many each owns, i.e. X owns 50 properties, Y owns 12 etc (for at least ten landlords with most properties).

To assist we have included an overview of data regarding registered landlords in the Scottish Borders. Despite the landlord register being publicly accessible, intentionally its entirety is not, consequently for reasons outlined below we are unable to release full copy of the register as requested.

Overview:

The total number of individual private landlords that are approved and on the register. 4600

The total number of individual properties linked to a private registered landlord. 7439

The total number of properties linked to the top 10 private landlords
1. 113
2. 98
3. 82
4. 76
5. 73
6. 73
7. 54
8. 45
9. 41
10. 40

Full copy of the Landlord Register:
Part 8 of the Antisocial Behaviour etc Act 2004 (the 2004 Act ) as amended by the Housing (Scotland) Act 2006 sets out the way in which information should be provided on the register. Explanatory notes to the Housing (Scotland) Act 2006 state that the landlords register is controlled so as not to support undesirable purposes such as trawling the register.

The landlord registration site, provides a privacy notice to landlords advising how their information will be used. That advises that the information they provide will be displayed, as required, on the public register. The privacy notice includes a section on personal information available to the public and makes it clear to landlords that:

- The local authority may give out additional information, such as the owner or agent's home or office address, and addresses of other properties the owner lets, if they are satisfied it is appropriate to do so;
- To prevent the mining of landlord s contact details, the online public search only permits targeted searches using a specific property or landlord registration number.

The disclosure of this information to you (and therefore into the public domain) would make information on the register considerably more widely available than was intended and would allow the general trawling of the information that the provisions in the 2004 Act were expressly designed to avoid.

The Council holds the register for specific statutory purposes which limit the ways in which the register can be accessed. Given the specific purpose behind the legislation, we are of the view that disclosure of the requested information would result in the Council failing to meet its responsibilities under the 2004 Act (as amended) given that the purpose behind the amendment was introduced to prevent information being released in this way.

In addition, disclosure of the information would prevent the Council from considering on an individual basis (in terms of section 88A(4) of the 2004 Act) whether specific information should be withheld because its disclosure would be likely to jeopardise the safety or welfare of any person or the security of any premises.

We believe the exemption in section 30(c) of the Act applies in this case.
The council would still be obliged to release the information in response to your request unless the public interest in maintaining the exemption outweighs the public interest in disclosing the information. However, we are of the view that there is a greater public interest in ensuring that the effectiveness of the provisions controlling access to information within the landlord register are not undermined and therefore ensuring that the Council acts within the limit of its statutory powers as set out in the 2004 Act.

In forming this view, we have taken into account Decision 063/2011 by the Scottish Information Commissioner. For information, you can access the Decision Notice here: (link below)

Decision Notice