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Park homes

Stroud District Council oversees more than 40 mobile home and caravan sites within the district. These sites are subject to regular inspections by council officers to ensure compliance with the Caravan Sites and Development Act 1960. Following inspection, a license is issued to ensure that the site is being managed in accordance with its specific conditions and regulations.

Mobile Homes Act 2013

On 26th March 2013 the Mobile Homes Act 2013 was enacted. This new law has introduced a number of changes, which have been implemented in stages with the last stage coming into force on 1st April 2014.

Some of the changes implemented include the following:

  • a seller of a park home no longer needs to seek approval of the buyer from the site owner
  • new forms are to be completed if a site owner wants to increase pitch fees
  • certain site rules have been banned and there are new procedures for a site owner to follow if they want to make a new site rule, which has been specified in the Mobile Homes Act (Site Rules)(England) Regulations 2014
  • it has been made less onerous to prove an offence of harassment of an occupier of a park home
  • it has created a new offence of providing false or misleading information to deter the purchase of a mobile home going ahead.

The legislation also brings in a duty for the Local Authority to maintain a register of the site rules for each of the caravan sites in their district.

The Mobile Homes Fit and Proper Person Test

The Mobile Homes (Requirements for Manager of Site to be Fit and Proper) (England) Regulations 2020 came into force on 1 July 2021.

The purpose of the fit and proper person test is to improve the standards of mobile home site management.

The applicant wishing to be included on the register will have to show that there are suitable financial and management arrangements in place for the site and to provide information relating to their conduct. Stroud District Council will be following the government’s non-statutory guidance when making this assessment.