We hope that you enjoy your new home and will not have any problems, but there are times when a neighbour's behaviour can cause a nuisance.

We believe that everyone has the right to enjoy their home and surrounding in their own way as long as this does not affect the lives of people living near them. We may have different ideas of what is acceptable behaviour, so we also believe that a good neighbour should try to be tolerant and try to understand the different life styles of others.

This web page is to help you if you are having problems with your neighbours and if you feel you are suffering as a result of nuisance or antisocial behaviour.

Antisocial behaviour ranges from serious criminal activity such as selling drugs, harassment or threatening behaviour, to annoyance and nuisance caused by playing loud music, rowdy behaviour and DIY at unsocial hours.

If you are having problems with a neighbour, and if you feel able, try to speak to them calmly and politely to tell them that they are causing you some difficulties. Your neighbour may not be aware that they are causing you a nuisance and you may be able to sort everything out in a friendly way.

If this is not successful, you should contact your housing officer who can provide advice and explain what we may be able to do to help sort the problem.

For any serious incident such as assault, threatening behaviour or racial or sexual harassment, you should contact the Police immediately and then tell us about it.

Your Housing Officer will investigate your complaint and will contact the persons involved. We will treat what you tell us in confidence and support you as much as possible. We will not take any action without your agreement. Please remember that if you want us to keep what you tell us confidential it may limit the action we can take.

If the problem continues we may ask you to keep a record of incidents over an agreed period of time. A plan of action will be agreed with you to help resolve the matter e.g. speaking to your neighbour, investigating further or in the case of very serious incidents, legal action.

Actions can include

• Involving other agencies like the Environmental Health or the Police.
• Contacting other witnesses for information.
• Setting up mediation between yourself and your neighbour.
• Taking legal action.

Legal Action
Involvement in legal action can be a stressful experience and residents often feel concerned that this will cause their relationship with neighbours to get worse. That is why we stress the importance of trying to resolve most problems openly and fairly and only taking legal action as a last resort to solve a serious and on-going problem.

There are a number of legal steps available;

• Injunction - we ask the court to make an order preventing your neighbour from continuing to do whatever is causing the problem.
• Antisocial Behaviour Order - a court orders your neighbour or neighbours to improve their behaviour.
• Demoted tenancies - we ask the court to reduce the security of your neighbours tenancy as a final warning that they may lose their tenancy.
• Possession Order - through the county court, this could result in the tenant being evicted.

Acceptable Behaviour Contracts
This is not a legal action but it can be useful in preventing nuisance. It is a contract between us, the police and the tenant which sets out the behaviour that has caused the problem and the tenant's promise that they will not behave in this way again.

For Solon to take any legal action, the level of supporting evidence has to be very high. In such cases you are likely to be required to be a witness in court. If this happens we will support you fully throughout the process.

If you tell us that you are having a problem with your neighbour, we will;

• Listen to what you say and take it seriously.
• Deal with it as quickly as possible.
• Be as honest about what we can do and give you the best advice possible.
• Agree any action we may take beforehand.
• Respect your confidentiality.
• Keep you informed of progress.

To download  a leaflet on Anti-social behaviour and nuisance Click Here