A battle between private landlords and the council will head into its second day at the Royal Courts of Justice.

The case which was scheduled to last 30 minutes to determine whether a judicial review will be considered against Enfield Borough Council’s landlord licensing scheme will now be decided today.

Yesterday Richard Clayton QC, barrister for Constantinos Regas, who is spearheading the campaign against the scheme which would see all private landlords pay a £500 fee over five years for each property they own.

Mr Regas’ case was set out to dismiss the correlation between private landlords and anti-social behaviour by tenants and calmed the council’s scheme was in breach of European legislation.

However, Kelvin Rutledge QC, who represented the council, said Mr Regas’  had delayed in bringing the challenge to the court and should be seen as a reason for Mr Justice Ousely to dismiss the judicial review application.

The QC claimed that the scheme had to borough-wide as “ring fencing” parts of the borough would give rogue landlords “an easy escape route” to avoid the charge.

QC Rutledge also stated the council had carried out a “comprehensive” consultation and had found a correlation between anti-social behaviour and the private rented sector.

Something which was met with disgruntled groans from the large number of landlords who attended the first day of the application.

Following the first day of the application case, Mr Regas told the Enfield Independent that the consultation process “has not been thorough” and that the local authority “still had questions to answer.”

The scheme will offer and early bird option that will be £250 instead of the £500 charge which is set to come in on April 1, 2015.

The decision is set to be made at 10.30am this morning by Justice Ousely. If he choses to side with Mr Regas’ case then a hearing to consider a the judicial review process will take place later this year.