argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Housing and Planning Bill — House of Lords, 2016-03-14
Topic: Housing
Richard Best (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I will be brief. There are a couple of amendments in this group in my name and in those of my noble friends Lord Kerslake and Lord Low of Dalston, and the noble Lords, Lord Kennedy and Lord Beecham. I also entirely support the amendment on rent to buy in the names of the noble Lords, Lord Lansley and Lord Young of Cookham. The amendments in my name go together: the first would mean that only new tenancies after April 2017 would attract higher rents for higher-earning tenants, and the second would mean that any existing tenant—unaffected, therefore, by the new measure— would not face the higher rents if they transferred for downsizing or overcrowding reasons. The deterrent effect on people moving to make better use of social housing would be avoided Clearly, for the 350,000 tenants facing an uplift in their rents, this would bring a sigh of relief if government applied the new regime only to those who could make a decision about accepting a tenancy on the basis of knowledge of what their rent was going to be. However, I fear that this amendment—however fair and reasonable—may not get much traction with government, at least until we come to that later group of amendments and consider the administrative costs of pay to stay if applied to all existing tenants, with all the hassle involved, as opposed to their being relatively straightforward if applied when councils are considering allocating a new tenancy I also support my noble friend Lord Kerslake with Amendment 75B, which proposes the piloting of the pay-to-stay arrangements in a number of areas before the scheme is rolled out to the whole country. The Government are piloting the voluntary right to buy for housing association tenants in five areas. I know that all parties are gaining invaluable insights from that exercise, which has already started. Pay to stay is at least as complex and has at least as many imponderables. What works in Maidstone may not work in Middlesbrough; what works in Brighton may not work in Burnley. A pilot in several places would shed light on the kinds of variations most appropriate in different circumstances. I would obviously prefer local authorities to make their own decisions locally.
Housing and Planning Bill — House of Lords, 2016-03-14
Topic: Housing
Robert Kerslake (Crossbench, Unknown): Perhaps I could add one further point. It is perfectly possible to pilot this in a way that would not be inequitable to tenants. What you would be piloting is the information-gathering on income and how the different exemptions and changes might work on the ground. You do not need to change the rental position. What we really need to know is: does the system work in a way that is effective and fair? It would be perfectly possible to do that, modelling the system at local level without disadvantaging those tenants who were part of the pilot.
Housing and Planning Bill — House of Lords, 2016-03-14
Topic: Housing
Richard Best (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, Amendment 70A is in my name and those of my noble friends Lord Cameron of Dillington and Lord Kerslake, and the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy of Southwark The amendment would limit annual rent increases to a maximum of 5% or to inflation measured by the consumer prices index plus 2%, whichever is the lesser. Obviously, this would moderate rent increases in any one year for higher earners. If the weekly rent is currently £100, the increase would be no more than £5. A household with earnings of £5,000 over the threshold seems likely to face an increase in rent of £500 per annum, or £1,000 if the Government, very unkindly, choose the higher rate set out in the Minister’s letter to us. This amendment would stage the £10 a week increase over two years or over four years for the higher taper rate. The Government still get their extra income but the increases are phased. Those who are on still relatively low incomes—just £5,000 per annum above the somewhat arbitrary limits of £30,000 outside and £40,000 inside London—will certainly feel the pinch from a significant hike in their rent. Giving people time to readjust their household budgets by phasing the increase seems the right thing to do. Set alongside the 1% rent reduction for four consecutive years, this measure would certainly ease the transition. I beg to move.
Housing and Planning Bill — House of Lords, 2016-03-14
Topic: Housing
Robert Kerslake (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I shall speak briefly to the amendment as the arguments have been well made by the noble Lords, Lord Best and Lord Cameron of Dillington. The key issue is the difficulty of implementation and potential sources of injustice to individuals who face sharp rent increases. To the extent that it is possible to phase in those rent increases, the impact on individuals is likely to be less. This is, indeed, consistent with the approach taken in the past when there have been movements of rent towards more comparable rents—the so-called convergence policy that worked across individual organisations. Therefore, it is applying the same principles to individuals in relation to their rent movements as are applied to organisations which have moved towards rent convergence. This is more consistent with the implied contract to the tenant, who took on the property at a given rent and had a reasonable expectation that their rent would not be subject to sharp movements as a consequence of government policy. That is why this is an amendment worthy of the Minister’s consideration.
Housing and Planning Bill — House of Lords, 2016-03-14
Topic: Housing
Richard Best (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I apologise for my delay in rising to speak. I did indeed lead on this amendment, although I spoke to it very briefly compared with the debate that has followed. The rather modest recommendation in my amendment that these rent increases should be limited on the basis of 5% or inflation plus 2% is one of very many ways in which one could make a significant difference to people’s lives with the disruption that is still coming down the road, even with the tapers that we have heard about It may be that others have not read into the mysterious letter, which has gone to a number of noble Lords, what I have: that we have a choice of two levels of taper—10p in the pound or 20p in the pound. I hope very much that the Government will go for the 10p. Those are the options the Government are now seriously considering, and we have to accept that. It is a very much better deal than people had feared. Now, you would have to have an income approaching £100,000 in order to pay the market rent in Camden for some of the highest-value properties. The gap is so wide that at 10p in the pound or 20p in the pound, it will take a long time to fill it I shall not detain the Committee any longer. I apologise for being slow to get to my feet, and I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Housing and Planning Bill — House of Lords, 2016-03-14
Topic: Housing
Robert Kerslake (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I support the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Best. I will also speak to Amendment 81A, which I supported, and 81B, which I put forward and lead on. These amendments go to the fundamental question for local authorities of whether the costs they will incur will be properly recognised within the arrangements. As has been well put by the noble Lord, Lord Best, in some instances the costs may make the whole policy not worth putting in. In fact, we may find—depending on the outcome of all this—that the costs will raise a question about the whole policy. However, at the very least, in different housing markets it most certainly will raise questions. Therefore, it is absolutely right to say that in circumstances where it clearly does not make sense to implement the policy in terms of costs and benefits, there is provision to not proceed with it The other two amendments seek to be very clear that administrative costs will be covered. I speak specifically to Amendment 81B. Within the draft Bill, it says the Minister "may provide for deductions" to cover costs. In other words, it is a permissive choice for Ministers whether or not they make these deductions. It seems inconsistent with the intent of Government and therefore the amendment does something very simple, which is to change the "may" to a "must", to put it beyond doubt that, as this is a government policy which local authorities are being asked to implement, they must properly provide for the costs of implementing that policy This is the key. First, in order to access the information about incomes, the net has to be cast wide—effectively ask all tenants to secure information about less than 10% of the tenants. That is the first point. Secondly, if this is operated in a fair way there will be complexity. There is no doubt about that. The noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, very precisely pointed to one of the issues of fairness: if people’s income changes, in the interest of administrative simplicity you might say, "We won’t change the rent", but that would be extraordinarily unfair if people have lost jobs or changed roles and their income has changed significantly As we know, in the labour market that we work in, people can see their incomes as householders change very rapidly indeed—from one week to the next, as I said earlier. Therefore, you have complexity. You have complexity about the different benefits within the system, about the makeup of families, and about how you assess who the higher earners are within those families. With that complexity comes cost. It is an absolutely logical consequence of seeking to introduce a fair system.
Housing and Planning Bill — House of Lords, 2016-03-14
Topic: Housing
Robert Kerslake (Crossbench, Unknown): The noble Lord makes a very powerful point. With any new system—or indeed with very mature systems, such as housing benefit—there are huge risks of error and cost in correcting it. I have run a housing benefit system and know just how easy it is to run into difficulties with it. I also know how costly it is to run because of the complexity of individual circumstances. We are here creating a whole new parallel system of assessment that sits alongside those for universal credit, housing benefit and so on. It will be new, and we will not establish a lot of the detail until we have run it. That, by the way, is why I still feel strongly that a pilot to test the operation of the system would be very valuable, not least because it would tell us how much cost is involved and what are the potential error rates It is essential, first, that we recognise that this may not be worth doing nationally, and certainly not locally. Secondly, we must give comfort in the Bill to local authorities that their costs will be covered. Thirdly, we must recognise that if this is to be a genuinely fair system, it will come with complexity and significant cost.
Housing and Planning Bill — House of Lords, 2016-03-14
Topic: Housing
Richard Best (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have joined in the debate. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Kerslake, who reminded us of his earlier amendment asking for a pilot scheme. If ever I saw a case for a pilot, this is it. Surely we need to test this out on the ground in a few places to see what the costs and the realities are I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell, and to the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, who listed all the things that have to go into the administration of the scheme—processes for verification, data matching, combating fraud, market-rent setting and the rest. I am grateful for the support of the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy of Southwark, and I am also grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Stunell, who made the point that an artist rather than a scientist may be behind the definition of "market" in the context of market rent. However, the Minister has given us some reassurances and I want to pin a good deal of hope on them The recovery of reasonable costs leaves the matter open. I was a bit alarmed by the impact statement coming up with a figure which I calculated to be about £15 per case, which is about half what is currently spent on housing benefit cases. I think that we will see a higher figure for these cases than for housing benefit cases. The figure of £15 given in the impact statement looked rather low, but no doubt that is all to play for and it is the Government’s intention that costs will be fully reimbursed. Possibly more important is the recognition by government that there will probably be some cases where it is not worth going out and collecting the money because the administration costs will exceed, match or be very close to the amount that will be raised. I am sure that the Local Government Association will have a good deal to say about this and that there will be some tough negotiations there, but I think that we are left with some hope that, where the administration costs are disproportionately high, the Government will not proceed with the scheme. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Housing and Planning Bill — House of Lords, 2016-03-14
Topic: Housing
Robert Kerslake (Crossbench, Unknown): Does the noble Lord not agree that if this is the change that is happening—I say we should be aiming for both secure communities and flexibility—why not leave that to the discretion of the local authority? Why impose it from central government?
Housing and Planning Bill — House of Lords, 2016-03-14
Topic: Housing
John Seymour (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I rise briefly to support the thrust of this group of amendments. The provision to limit tenancies to five years seems an odd idea, implying as it does bad effects on social cohesion and localism. At a stroke it will remove any incentive to care for, improve or decorate a council house, or even to tend the garden. The noble Lord, Lord Best, told us eloquently about where opportunities for short-term tenancies already exist and the fact that they have not been taken up. It will also inhibit the putting down of any roots in the community. People who feel attached to a community are much more willing to invest in social togetherness by contributing to voluntary and social activities The Minister, in a previous grouping, described how she recognises an owned property when she visits because it is in such good order. Surely the reverse principle applies here, where the shorter the tenancy the less incentive there is for the tenant to be houseproud. The ending of secure tenancies after five years could recreate in council housing the problems we see nowadays in short-term private renting, where tenants often move on very quickly. This includes the landlord’s extra costs of redecorating or possibly refurbishment. Equally, extra administration costs are bound to be involved Turning briefly to schools, we know that many schoolchildren are not getting into their parents’ first choice of school. The Minister gave reassurance to the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, recently about school-age children and their families not being required to move on at the end of the five-year period. However, what about families whose children have not yet reached school age? Surely this will cause huge difficulties for them in their planning. It will contribute to stress and anxiety in the family. Where indeed would families be expected to go after their five years The greatest effect will be on those people on council housing waiting lists, adding enormously to their uncertainty. I support the amendments.
Calais: Child Refugees — House of Lords, 2016-02-29
Topic: Immigration
Raymond Jolliffe (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I apologise for not having heard what the Minister repeated. He was too quick for me. However, as I was in Calais just over a month ago, perhaps I could ask: does he agree that getting information to the relevant people, whether children or adults, is crucial to those who already have close relatives in Britain? Does he also agree that that kind of information would be best conveyed not by officials but by people who are already in this country, who can explain their situation and how to go about family reunion? I hope the Minister will look sympathetically on my amendment about family reunion when we come to Report on the Immigration Bill.
Scotland Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-29
Topic: Mixed Topics
James Hope (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, in view of the difficulties to which the noble and learned Lord has drawn our attention, does he agree that clarity and dispute resolution is absolutely crucial? This issue is ripe with areas that will give rise to dispute of various kinds and it cannot be left in a position where there is no mechanism for deciding them.
Scotland Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-29
Topic: Other
John McCluskey (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, that was my 14th point. My notes state that the arrangements for resolution of these disputes read like the draft of a script for a BBC drama that would put "War and Peace" to shame.
Scotland Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-29
Topic: Other
John McCluskey (Crossbench, Unknown): Perhaps the noble Earl will permit me to ask him a brief question arising out of what he has said. If those of us who reside in Scotland are going to benefit so much, as we all think we are, should we be declaring an interest in speaking in this debate?
Housing and Planning Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-09
Topic: Housing
John Lytton (Crossbench, Unknown): I support the noble Baroness and, in doing so, I declare my interests, first as a professional property manager, and—possibly even more significantly—as a private sector landlord. I believe I have a very contented set of tenants, without any of the roguishness that we have heard about Leaving aside the absence of a clear due process in the Bill and the safeguards that should go with that, in what I can describe only as this "subcontract" process to local government, putting to one side the non-judicial disposal of a case that might result in the label "rogue", with lasting stains on character, and parking for one moment the hiatus in terms of the standard of proof referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, there remains an overriding need for Parliament to retain scrutiny of the process, the safeguards and the standards. At the moment we seem to be short of a commitment on that I am also concerned that the whole process is a bit reactive, populist and, if I may say so, potentially discriminatory against a class of person called a landlord or their letting or managing agent. At Second Reading, I advocated—at least, I hope it was interpreted that way—perhaps going beyond that to try to support and nurture best practice, in equal measure carrot and stick. It seems to me that landlords can very easily be pilloried by their feckless tenants in the same way that tenants can clearly be very easily prejudiced by malevolent landlords There are probably at least as many undesirable tenants, in numerical total, as there are undesirable landlords. I do not say that in any way to cast aspersions on the tenants. I believe that the vast majority of them, in the same way as landlords, honour their commitments, try to do the best thing and genuinely create something that is growing in popularity. It is an expanding sector. The last thing we need to do is to set about damaging it so that people feel that they are under the cosh and go away. At Second Reading, I referred to the fact that our European neighbours seem to have sorted this out without this continual anti-landlord or anti-tenant adversarial approach in their dealings Therefore, we need to look at the whole situation and—if I may put it this way—somehow invert the process. Perhaps having the regulations before us is one step on the way so that we can look at that in detail and examine what the actual process is. At the moment, it would be possible for almost anything to be passed down to local government. As a vice-president of the Local Government Association, I would be slightly fearful, as a local government chief officer, of what might get passed down to me, thank you very much, as a hand-me-down to police this sector I support the noble Baroness. The key to this is very much to get these regulations out, and I support the general thrust of her amendment.
Housing and Planning Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-09
Topic: Housing
Molly Christine Meacher (Crossbench, Unknown): My Lords, I thank the noble Lords, Lord Shipley, Lord Judd, Lord Campbell-Savours and Lord Beecham, and the noble Baroness, Lady Hollis, for their considered, well-informed and powerful contributions to this short debate. I am not at all convinced that the Government’s housing survey will provide the necessary focus on the soaring levels of rent and rent arrears and their impact on families and children and on the Government’s emphasis on health, well-being, educational attainment and so on The Government and Parliament really need to understand what is happening now and what will happen over the next few years in these regards. However, it is a late hour. We will have to come back to this issue, and I will no doubt have a conversation with the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, about precisely what the wording of the amendment should be. With that, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Trade Union Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-08
Topic: Mixed Topics
David Pannick (Crossbench, Unknown): I am grateful to the noble Baroness. All noble Lords now live their lives electronically. I exempt the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, from that, but the rest of us shop, bank and conduct any number of transactions electronically. What is it about a trade union ballot that exempts it from principles that are commonplace in society nowadays?
Trade Union Bill — House of Lords, 2016-02-10
Topic: Mixed Topics
David Pannick (Crossbench, Unknown): That is precisely why I expressed my understanding and support for the suggestion that the words "reasonably detailed" are unnecessary and may well be counterproductive. I see the force of that criticism, but only that criticism. Let me add that the noble Lord, Lord Lea, was concerned that this would require the trade union to put in its demands; it would not. What it requires is that the voting paper must indicate the matter or matters at issue. If we take out "reasonably detailed", I cannot see the objection to a ballot paper indicating—not setting out in detail, but indicating—the matter or matters in dispute. That seems perfectly reasonable.