TV auctioneer stands up for agents and landlords

The founder and chairman of Clive Emson Auctioneers - the auction house featured frequently on BBC TV's Homes Under The Hammer - has issued a spirited broadside against the protective onus on tenants rather than agents and landlords.

Clive Emson, whose company is celebrating its 25th anniversary, says new licensing, immigration checks and other bureaucracy being imposed on agents and landlords means the authorities are in danger of throwing the baby out of the bath water."

Emson says there are only a few rogue landlords in the private sector but there are also rogue tenants.

"For example, tenants are now sent the rent to pay to the landlord, rather than the landlord receiving it direct from the government. This was on the misguided concept that tenants should be responsible for their own finance. "

Emson established the auction house in October 1989, being the first in the country to do so without being tied to multi-office estate agencies.

"By concentrating purely on auctions we were able to offer a service to some of the clients of 95 per cent of the agents without an auctioneering facility. It was a first - and a very risky concept in unchartered waters he admits.

The first office opened in Folkestone, followed quickly in Medway, before focusing on the whole of Kent and then the entire south coast of England in a line below the M4 and north side of the M25.