Leasehold Reform — House of Commons, 2019-07-11
Topic: Housing
James Fitzpatrick (Labour, Centre-left): I am grateful for the opportunity to speak briefly in yet another leasehold debate and I am pleased to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Leigh (Jo Platt) in this very well-informed discussion. I thank the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee for its excellent report. I thank the Leasehold Knowledge Partnership, Martin Boyd and Sebastian O’Kelly for their analysis of the Government’s response, their ongoing expertise and their unstinting support for the all-party group on leasehold and commonhold reform. It is due to their efforts, and those of the National Leasehold Campaign and others, that this issue has risen up the political agenda steadily in recent years. The plight of leaseholders is not new. Governments of both colours have tried in recent decades to improve the position of leaseholders and to offer them more regulatory protection. That vulnerability has increased because of the explosion of tenure as the demand for new housing has grown and the profits to be made have been understood. Some of those profits have been entirely unearned and border on profiteering and ongoing criminal exploitation Poplar and Limehouse has the second-highest proportion of leasehold properties of any constituency. The tragedy at Grenfell only highlighted some of the problems that leaseholders have faced from some freeholders, developers and property management companies. That is only one example of the lack of protection that the law affords leaseholders, which led this Government to set aside £400 million for the public sector and £200 million for private sector blocks for fire safety work and repairs As my hon. Friend the Member for Leigh has just mentioned, there has been a lot of noise from the Government on other aspects: the 2017 housing White Paper; the 2017 consultation on ground rents; the 2018 consultation on leasehold sector reform; the report on the regulation of management agents and permission fees; the Government’s engagement with the Law Commission on commonhold; their commitment to consult on enfranchisement to help leaseholders buy freehold; and the Competition and Markets Authority’s announcement of an inquiry, having been written to by the Secretary of State The Chair of the Select Committee did an excellent job of introducing the debate. I want to make only a few points. First, the Government have repeatedly used the defence "as soon as Parliamentary time allows." That appears in paragraphs 11, 36, 89 and 96 of their response to the Committee’s report, to mention just a few, and it has been used regularly at the Dispatch Box in recent years. If not now, in this Parliament, then when Secondly, I would be grateful if the Minister could reassure us that Lord Best’s inquiry into the regulation of property agents, permission fees and so on is still on track for the end of this month. Thirdly, the Government have announced for a third time that leasehold house sales, with exceptions, will be banned. Can the Minister confirm that Help to Buy has shut this down in the meantime? Fourthly, lease forfeiture is a source of major abuse, as we have heard, and many well documented cases have been supplied, yet the Government still seem hesitant. Perhaps the Minister could explain why On a separate matter, the Minister will know that the APPG’s officers, the LKP and others have been critical of the Leasehold Advisory Service—LEASE—especially following a recent meeting. Can the Minister advise when the APPG’s officers might receive a response to our request for an apology to our secretariat The Labour party has published its policy platform on leasehold. Its five strong pledges are very welcome, and I commend our shadow housing team for their excellent work—I look forward to hearing my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon Central (Sarah Jones) respond to the debate In conclusion, the Government have an impressive list of promises—I have mentioned some, but there are also ground rents on new leases at zero, and a new housing ombudsman. I commend the hard work of the many civil servants in the Department who have worked on the programme. However, most of the Government’s programme, if not all of it, is subject to that great "Get out of jail free" card: "as soon as Parliamentary time allows." Leaseholders have been waiting long enough. Surely it is now time to deliver.