I took your advice and sent an email telling the agency that

thank you. I note the actions you have taken and the information you have previously been given on the matter. I do not disagree with my colleagues advice however I am concerned that you appreciate that it is not easy to surrender a tenancy unilaterally and is certainly not an absolute right. The tenancy can be surrendered with the agreement of the landlord, under any contractual right you may have or if you can demonstrate that the landlord is in breach of contract on a funamental term.

What this means in this case is that you would need to demonstrate that the property is uninhabitable as a consequence of the plumbing issues. This is as you will likely recognise relatively high hurdle. A smell of sewage is unlikely to be sufficient to give rise to a surrender of Tennessee unless the smell is so overwhelming that it is not reasonably possible to live in the property or if it represents a health hazard. The difficulty with smells as they are hard to evidence as he cannot take a picture of them. Rather, you are limited to describing them which is subject to dispute.

The position as things stand is that you have asked to surrender the tenancy and the landlord through his agent has remained silent on the point. Until such time as the landlord accepts the surrender, the landlord can claim that a tenancy continues to exist and you owe rent under the tenancy end of the landlord refuses to accept a surrender, then you may need to consider an application to court for a court order as regards surrender.

There are various options available to you. the key would be to continue to impress upon the agent your requirement for a surrender and if they refuse to engage, you may need to consider collecting some evidence to support your position that the property is uninhabitable as result of the stench. To do so, you can either contact the local authority's environmental health department and asked them to inspect the property as a health hazard or under the housing health and safety rating system inspection framework.

You can consider contacting the agents and precedent for a response to your request and if they refuse to accept a surrender, advising that you therefore request the keys in order that you can organise a HHSRS inspection and plumber to provide reports in respect to the drainage and that you will be seeking damages and an order that the property is uninhabitable as a consequence of which the landlord is in breach of contract. If they refuse to return the keys to you, if you can document this with evidence such as a video recording or telephone recording, this would be evidence in itself of acceptance of surrender because on the one hand they cannot claim the rent from you and on the other refuse to give you keys.

If you need to resolve this matter in the County Court, you can do so using form N1 seeking an order of breach of contract on the grounds that the property is uninhabitable there as above, you will need to consider having supporting evidence if such a claim were to be brought.

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/form-n1-claim-form-cpr-part-7

thank you. Based upon what you report, they have not agreed therefore to accept a surrender of the tenancy but rather simply saying that if you can find a replacement tenant, or they can, then they will release you at that point. This indicates that they intend to hold you fully liable for rent until such time as a replacement tenant is found. Obviously you do not want to pay rent in the circumstances and therefore I think you will need to consider some of the above suggestions in terms of collecting evidence in respect of a possible future dispute. As above, if you can obtain evidence that they refuse to give you the keys back, then this would operate to your advantage because it would be a demonstration of a fundamental breach of contract on the part of the landlord is failing to give you access to a property they are claiming rent for is a fundamental breach which would be grounds for claiming rescission of contract in its own right. Conversely, if they do you use, upon request, then you may need to consider collecting evidence as discussed above in order to defend against any claim for further rent at least by way of a rent reduction if not a claim that the contract is cancelled (rescinded) on grounds of the property being uninhabitable

Thank you for the update

the position seems very much as we discussed above that the landlord intends to attempt to hold you to the contract until such time as they find a replacement. This being the case, may need to give some consideration to some of the actions and steps that we discussed above, in particular obtaining evidence to support a claim of the property is uninhabitable which is generally demanding of a relatively high standard of proof

thank you. It certainly seems you have the basis for a claim I do not mean to suggest you don't will be excessively pessimistic. I'm to be concerned that you do not underestimate the what you need to show. Certainly if there is raw sewage seeping into the property or you are exposed to raw sewage underneath the floor boards, this presents a potentially strong case for the property being uninhabitable. I think some further evidence gathering is required in order to establish a position with little more certainty and the council's environment and health, maybe very helpful in this regard