Repairs and disrepair — Lewisham Council

If you rent your home from Lewisham Council and are living with damp, mould, leaks or repairs that never seem to get done, you have legal rights. If the council knew about a problem and failed to fix it in a reasonable time, you may have a disrepair claim.

"Disrepair" means problems with your home that your landlord is legally responsible for fixing but hasn't. Common examples include:

• damp and mould
• leaks — from the roof, pipes, or a flat above
• broken heating or no hot water
• rotten or draughty windows and doors
• cracked walls, unsafe ceilings or other structural problems
• faulty electrics.

You may have a claim against Lewisham Council if all of these apply:

1. Lewisham Council is your landlord — you are a council tenant (if you rent from a housing association or a private landlord, your claim is against them, not the council).
2. The council knew about the problem. Usually that means you reported it — so your texts, emails, photos, and repair reference numbers are gold. Keep them.
3. It failed to fix the problem in a reasonable time. What is "reasonable" depends on the problem — the timescales lower down this page are a good guide.
4. You were affected — for example, your health suffered, your belongings were damaged, or part of your home became unusable.

Leaseholders of council-owned buildings have rights too, though the route is a little different. Some Lewisham homes are managed day-to-day by other organisations — around 1,810 in the Brockley and Ladywell areas under a private finance initiative (PFI) contract, and a small number by tenant management organisations — but where the council owns the home, the council remains your landlord.^[21]

Report the repair first. Report a repair online through the council's housing portal, or on its freephone repairs line, 0800 028 2028 — open during office hours, with an emergency repairs service on the same number out of hours.^[9] Reporting it puts the problem on record and starts the clock on the council's repair timescales.

If a repair is reported and not put right in a reasonable time, complain to the council. It is free, you do not need anyone to do it for you, and it is often the fastest way to get repairs moving — and it creates the written record any later claim relies on.

Lewisham's complaints process. For complaints about the council as your landlord, Lewisham runs a two-stage housing complaints process: a written stage 1 response within 10 working days, and — if you are still unhappy — a stage 2 review within 20 working days, each extendable if more time is genuinely needed.^[18] After stage 2, the council points you to the Housing Ombudsman. Complaints about your home as a council tenant or leaseholder follow this housing process, not the council's separate corporate procedure.^[18] The council reported meeting the Ombudsman's Complaint Handling Code timescales on only 34.2% of stage 1 housing complaints in 2024/25, and says it has improved since.^[21][22]

If the complaint doesn't fix it: the Housing Ombudsman. If you have been through the council's process and are still unhappy, you can take your complaint to the Housing Ombudsman — free and independent, and available for advice at any point, not just at the end. It can order the landlord to carry out repairs, apologise and pay compensation, with no fee and nobody taking a share of any award.

For free, independent advice at any point, Shelter and Citizens Advice both offer housing advice, and a local law centre can tell you whether you qualify for legal aid — for disrepair, legal aid can be available where there is a serious risk to health or safety, though not normally for a compensation-only claim. Complaining first is the right move in almost every case: if the repairs still don't happen, the record you have built makes any claim stronger, not weaker.

A housing disrepair claim can deal with two things: getting the repairs done, and recognising what living with the problem has cost you. Depending on your situation, a claim may cover:

• the repairs themselves — a court can order the council to carry out the work;
• inconvenience and distress — compensation may be sought for the disruption of living with the problem;
• effects on health — for example where damp and mould have made a breathing condition worse;
• damaged belongings — clothes, furniture, carpets or electronics ruined by damp, mould or leaks;
• loss of use of part of your home — such as a bedroom or bathroom you could not safely use.

Every case is different, and no honest adviser can value a claim before seeing the evidence. A proper assessment looks at the disrepair, how long it went on after the council knew, and the impact on the household.

Step 1 — tell us what's happened. You answer some straightforward questions: what the problem is, when you reported it, what the council did (or didn't do), and how it has affected your household. Photos, repair references and complaint responses all help.

Step 2 — get your free report. We assess your answers against the legal tests on this page and give you a clear written view of whether you may have a claim and how strong it looks. Your first conversation with us is always free.

Step 3 — if your case is strong, we connect you with an independent, regulated law firm. If your case needs a solicitor, we connect you with an independent, regulated law firm — and we will be upfront about that before you commit to anything. They take it from there: advising you, notifying the council formally, and usually arranging an independent inspection of your home. Most disrepair cases settle without anyone going to court.

A note on time limits. Legal time limits apply to disrepair claims — usually six years from when the landlord should have fixed the problem — so even long-running problems can often still be claimed for, but it makes sense to check where you stand rather than assume.^[23] Go in with a realistic timescale, too: disrepair claims usually take months rather than weeks to resolve, and some take longer — which is one more reason to complain first and keep the pressure on for repairs while any claim runs.