Nearly 47% of people renting a private property in the South West have not had a carbon monoxide (CO) alarm installed by their landlord, research by campaign group Project SHOUT has uncovered.

The report also revealed that nearly 50% of private rented tenants across the UK have not had a CO alarm installed by their landlord, with a further 10% of tenants not sure whether they had a CO alarm or not.

This means nearly 60% of the UK’s nine million private tenants (5.4 million households) may be unprotected from the deadly gas that kills 50 people each year - deaths that are preventable by fitting an alarm, said the organisation.