Enforcement action over Newcastle mansion becoming illegal shared house where 21 people shared a kitchen
Council bosses have ordered repairs be made to a historic former bishop’s home which was turned into an illegal house in multiple occupation (HMO).
Two directors of a company who held a lease on East Denton Hall, in Newcastle, were fined £60,000 this summer after 21 people, mainly care workers and also two children, were discovered to be sharing 14 bedrooms and one kitchen at the mansion.
The 17th century building, also known as the Bishop’s House, was deemed a serious health and safety hazard, with Newcastle City Council having found it had no fire detection system or emergency lighting and there were exposed wires in a fuse box.
Judith Elizabeth Bango and Abid Hussain, directors of House of Peace Enterprises Ltd, were each fined £30,000, having been found guilty in the absence at Newcastle Magistrates Court of running an unlicensed HMO at the property and multiple breaches of HMO management regulations.
The building’s owners said at the time that they were not aware the property was being used as an HMO and would seek legal advice to terminate the lease to House of Peace Enterprises, according to the city council.
Local authority chiefs have now issued new enforcement orders requiring a series of repairs to return the grade I listed West Road property, which was formerly the residence of the Roman Catholic Bishop of Hexham and Newcastle, to its previous state.
Two notices, served against Gainford Group and Gainford Care Homes director Imran Khaliq, demand that the building’s owners reinstate a series of historic features and remove partition walls and doors that were installed to create two extra rooms.
The council says that there has been an “adverse impact on the special architectural and historic interest” of the mansion as a result of the removal of partition walls, timber doors, and ornate stone from its ground floor chapel.
Civic Centre officials have also criticised the “unsympathetic and inappropriate” removal of a stone stairway behind the building, excavation works, and construction of a new stone and cement wall.
Their second enforcement notice requires the stairway, original cast iron railings, and stone flooring be reinstated, and the wall removed.
A council spokesperson said: “We have served two Listed Building Enforcement Notices on the owners of the historic East Denton Hall also known as Bishop’s House in Newcastle. Both require unauthorised work to be reversed.
“In respect to the internal works the reversal must be carried out within four months and 12 months, and in respect to the external works, five months The owners have until Monday, October 27 to appeal the notices which is when they will take effect.”
Gainford Group was contacted for a response. The company indicated that it had not been responsible for carrying out the works which are now the subject of the enforcement action and that the previous lessee has since been removed from the premises.
Gainford Group was previously refused planning permission in January this year to convert East Denton Hall into a nine-bedroom respite care unit, on the grounds that it “would harm the special interest and significance” of the site.