I know we have a few lawyers and law students on here and I can't seem to get any help from google so this seemed like the best place to get some information.
Over the Easter weekend my girlfriend's student house in Leicester was broken into. The whole place was ransacked and anything small and valuable was stolen. That's not really an issue though as apart from sentimental things it will all be replaced by the insurance company hopefully.
The problem though is the security of the house. When the 3 of them signed contracts it was for a house with a burglar alarm. I guess common sense assumes the contract means a working burglar alarm but I think since they moved in the alarm and the 2 outside security lights (front and back) have not worked. The front, back and patio doors all have pretty shitty locks on them that I doubt meet current building regulation standards (they don't have bolts at the top, middle and bottom, which I think are meant to go on all newly built properties?). It was the patio door that was broken into by a screwdriver and a bit of brute force. All internally doors that had locks on were then smashed down.
Unfortunately the landlady, who has been useless in the past, is out of the country and ignoring all phone calls and emails. The estate agents have been worse than useless as well and seem to think they can't do anything until the landlady gives them the ok, which is what brings me to this thread. At the request of the police the estate agents fitted a window style lock to the patio door so that at least it is lockable again. They seem to think this makes the house safe despite the fact that this new lock is worse than the original lock that was broken in the break in.
Do they have any kind of rights as tenants to force the estate agents into giving them a more secure property? Or is simply making sure that every outside door locks sufficient as far as the law is concerned? From next week onwards it's going to be just 2 girls living in the house (the 1 boy is going away for a month) and neither of them feel very secure. It would be very useful to know whether the estate agents and landlady can be kicked into making a positive move by simply pointing out some tenants laws/rights that state they have to do x, y and z to provide a secure house. That house was also broken into in the exact same way several years ago according to the police and the same landlady was told then that the doors where not secure enough, would that go down as some sort of neglect?
Their contract runs out at the end of June and I would be very surprised if anything gets done before then unless their hand is forced. Unfortunately it seems that this landlady along with several others I have dealt with don't give a shit about their tenants
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Edit:
I forgot to mention that none of the outside door locks are lockable from the inside, they just simply click shut. You can only double lock them from the outside, which doesn't help when you are inside at night and not feeling secure. Unless I go round and lock them all in and then let them all out again in the morning!