My heart goes out to all at Downland Court, Portslade, who are suffering (Letters, April 28) but, if it is any consolation, it is not just Brighton and Hove City Council that seems to come up with the perpetual excuse of "we can't do anything".

Adur District Council goes one better.

When Adur finds residents do not abide by its recently printed leasehold or tenancy booklets or abide by agreements, for example, to keep common ways in flat blocks clean, instead of policing the system it rewards them by bringing in contractors to do the job for them and charging the others who abide by the rules.

This sends a green light that other obligations may be ignored with impunity at the cost of all the other decent people and is given official sanction to boot. We have rights in society but we are expected to have some responsibility and it's about time we ensured the two went hand in hand rather than apparently reward miscreants at the cost of everyone else.

The same goes for anti-social behaviour. There has never been as much enabling legislation to allow local authorities to take action.

Not only are the tenants of Downland Court correct in mentioning the Housing Act 1966, which gives far-reaching grounds for possession - even for annoyance of neighbours - but anti-social behaviour orders also add to the armoury and may include any anti-social behaviour, including dumping rubbish.

How strange though, that, as a private landlord, I have to ensure my tenants are not causing a nuisance, even in accommodation where the freeholder may be the same local authority that appears to do little itself.

Sadly, the blurry-eyed vision is that all evictions are wrong. They are not. When vulnerable tenants use that vulnerability as an excuse to wreak havoc on the communities in which they live, it is time someone thought of the vulnerable innocent neighbours of these people, whose lives are destroyed through no fault of their own and are further desolated by authorities evading their responsibilities to take action.

We should also ask ourselves how many properties are not being let simply because people are too frightened to take the chance of letting because once tenants are in it could take months to gain possession and, in the meantime, decent residents' lives are made a misery.

It might take a little more effort to sort out the problem but it is a far better solution than the apparent appeasement that seems to take place at present and is certainly a more cost-effective and better solution in the long term.

Ask anyone affected by long-term nightmare neighbours.

-John Stevens, Roman Crescent, Southwick