Landlord handed suspended jail sentence after forging gas safety document

Date:

22 November 2012

Release No:

East/104/12

A Cambridge landlord risked the health of his tenants by failing to ensure gas appliances were safe to use and then produced a fake certificate to give the impression they were, a court has heard.

Emran Hussain, aged 43, knowingly attempted to deceive officials after shirking his legal responsibilities in relation to a house he rented to four tenants on Spalding Way.

Cambridge Magistrates' Court was told today (22 November) that Cambridge City Council issued a notice in October 2009 requiring him to produce a valid Landlords Gas Safety Record for the property.

He failed to do so, so the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) was notified and served an Improvement Notice that he also ignored. This flouted safety law so he was summoned to appear in court on 23 August this year.

On the day of the hearing he presented a copy of the required gas safety certificate as evidence, which purported to be valid for the dates on the Improvement Notice.

However, HSE checks revealed it was fake. The pad from which the certificate was taken wasn't printed until August 2011 - some eight months after the record had allegedly been authorised.

Mr Hussain, of Beaumont Road, Cambridge, pleaded guilty to two charges under Section 33(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 for his legal failings and dishonesty. He was sentenced to spend a total of two months in jail for each offence, with the sentences to run concurrently but suspended for 12 months. He is also required to wear an electronic tag for two months and was ordered to pay full prosecution costs of £4,768.

After the hearing HSE Inspector Roxanne Barker said:

"Every year, around 20 people die from Carbon Monoxide poisoning caused by improperly installed or maintained gas appliances. Many others suffer ill health. There were four tenants at the property for which Mr Hussain was responsible, all of whom were put at unnecessary risk.

"Mr Husain then attempted to deceive HSE and the Court by producing a document which he knew to be false.

"It is important that landlords fulfil their legal gas safety obligations to their tenants by ensuring that an annual gas safety check is carried out by a suitably qualified Gas Safe registered engineer, and that tenants are provided with a copy of these checks."

Further information on the role and responsibilities of landlords in relation to gas safety can be found online at www.hse.gov.uk/gas/landlords

Notes to editors

1. The Health and Safety Executive is Britain's national regulator for workplace health and safety. It aims to reduce work-related death, injury and ill health. It does so through research, information and advice; promoting training; new or revised regulations and codes of practice; and working with local authority partners by inspection, investigation and enforcement. www.hse.gov.uk
2. Section 33(1)g of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 states: "It is an offence for a person to contravene any requirement or prohibition imposed by an improvement notice or a prohibition notice (including any such notice as modified on appeal)".
3. Section 33(1)m states: "It is an offence for a person with intent to deceive, to forge or use a document issued or authorised to be issued under any of the relevant statutory provisions or required for any purpose thereunder or to make or have in his possession a document so closely resembling any such document as to be calculated to deceive.

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