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Many travel and tourism industry commentators are hoping that a case will come to court to test Airbnb’ s claim to have no responsibility in such circumstances.
In November at a Policy UK event, Airbnb’ s head of policy Patrick Robinson was asked whether, when a Fire & Rescue Authority( FRA) requests that premises owners be identified, Airbnb provides the identifications necessary to allow that FRA to do its duty to protect the public. Robinson admitted that Airbnb would refuse all such requests without a court order.
However, Richard Nye of the Policy Group within London Fire Brigade admits that they( in common with other FRAs) never ask Airbnb – it seems they don’ t want to‘ discover’ vast numbers of new premises they may have to inspect, when they have insufficient resources to inspect the ones they already know about.
As 50,000 premises in London alone are beyond regulatory enforcement- because only Airbnb can identify the premises owners – will the next tragedy be a fire? And who will be responsible?