What Awaab's Law Does Not Cover

Where the edges of Awaab's Law are

Awaab's Law sets hard deadlines for social landlords to investigate hazards in their tenants' homes and make those homes safe. It is a powerful protection — but it does not reach every problem a resident might face. Knowing where its edges sit matters: it tells a resident or a landlord whether a given situation falls inside the regime before anyone relies on it. The sections below set out the main exclusions, each with the regulation behind it.

Overcrowding

Overcrowding is outside Awaab's Law (Reg 3 / Reg 5). Overcrowding hazards are not in scope of Awaab's Law.

The reason given in the regulations' explanatory material is straightforward: Overcrowding is not usually a result of disrepair and cannot be fixed by repairs or maintenance (Explanatory Memorandum para 7.7).

This is not a temporary gap that a later phase will close. The Government's planned full expansion of the regime is described as covering “all remaining HHSRS hazards (apart from overcrowding) — full HHSRS expansion” — so overcrowding remains excluded even then.

Cladding work

Cladding work is excluded from Awaab's Law's make-safe and keep-safe duties (Reg 12(5)(c)).

Awaab's Law's safety and preventative-work duties do not require cladding work; the landlord's other duties — such as investigating the hazard and keeping the tenant updated — still apply.

The reason is one of fit, not of seriousness: Cladding remediation cost and complexity are incompatible with Awaab's Law timeframes (Explanatory Memorandum para 7.8). Cladding remediation has its own dedicated routes; what matters here is that the landlord's duty to investigate and to keep the tenant informed is not switched off just because the remedial cladding work itself sits outside the make-safe timetable.

Hazards reported before 27 October 2025

Awaab's Law came into force on 27 October 2025, and a transitional provision (Reg 21) means it does not reach back to reports made before that date — with two exceptions. Hazard reports made before 27 October 2025 do not trigger Awaab's Law unless re-reported after that date OR the landlord becomes aware of a material change to the relevant matter after that date.

In plain terms: if the problem was reported before the law began, the simplest way to bring it within Awaab's Law is to report it again now — or the duty is triggered if the landlord becomes aware of a material change in the hazard after that date.

Work that is not “required work” (Reg 4)

Even where a hazard is in scope, Awaab's Law only obliges the landlord to carry out required work. Regulation 4 defines that term and deliberately carves several things out. In full, the regulations define required work as:

Work, in relation to a significant or emergency hazard affecting a social home, that is necessary to make the home safe and to ensure (so far as is possible) that the hazard does not recur, and that the lessor can lawfully undertake — or can lawfully undertake once it obtains any necessary consents, where it has not yet exhausted all reasonable endeavours to obtain them. Required work does not include: work for which the lessee is liable under the duty to use the premises in a tenant-like manner (or an express covenant of substantially the same effect); work to rebuild or reinstate the dwelling after destruction or damage by fire, storm, flood or other inevitable accident; or work to keep in repair or maintain anything the lessee is entitled to remove from the dwelling. (Reg 4)

In practice, those carve-outs mean Awaab's Law does not require:

• Work the tenant is liable for— for example, a failure to use the home in a tenant-like manner, or a breach of an express covenant of substantially the same effect.
• Rebuilding or reinstating the home after it has been destroyed or damaged by fire, storm, flood or other inevitable accident.
• Keeping or maintaining anything the tenant is entitled to remove from the home.
• Work the landlord cannot lawfully do without another person's consent— but only once the landlord has exhausted all reasonable endeavours to obtain that consent. The mere absence of consent is not enough on its own: the landlord must have genuinely tried, and run out of reasonable options, before the work falls outside its duty.

What Awaab's Law does cover

For balance: in its first phase, in force since 27 October 2025, Awaab's Law covers significant damp and mould hazards, and all emergency hazards (other than overcrowding), and further hazards are expected to come into scope in later phases. For the full picture of what is in scope and the background to the law, see What is Awaab's Law?; for the planned expansion of hazard categories, see the Phase 2 guide.

Outside Awaab's Law is not always outside the law

One important caveat to close on. The fact that a situation falls outside Awaab's Law does not necessarily mean the landlord has no obligation at all. Landlords carry duties under other legal routes too, and a problem this regime does not reach may still be actionable elsewhere. If you are unsure, it is worth taking advice rather than assuming nothing can be done.