Housing and Planning Bill

Baroness Grender Excerpts

Tuesday 9th February 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark]

My Lords, it was with much surprise that I heard that the Government had not agreed to an amendment in the other place which would have ensured that residential letting must be fit for human habitation. However, I am hopeful that your Lordships will be able to persuade the Government of the error of their ways as we progress through Committee and Report. Even at this early stage, I can say that we feel so strongly about this that we will divide the House at the appropriate time if the Government do not move from their present position.

The move to pass such an amendment in the other place was defeated, as I said earlier. The Communities Minister in the other place, Mr Marcus Jones MP, said that the Government believed that homes should be fit for human habitation but did not want to pass a new law that would explicitly require that. That is just nonsense. Unhealthy and unsafe housing needs to be tackled. The private rented sector is growing rapidly and tenants need protection to ensure that their home is fit to live in. Damp, mould, excessive cold, overcrowding and lack of proper space, fire hazards and other hazards regarding electrical and other safety can all have major consequences for people, even death.

Local authorities clearly have a role in protecting tenants in the private rented sector when landlords fail to maintain or provide properties that are safe and healthy to live in. However, local authorities are under considerable financial constraints, and this is never going to be enough. My amendment therefore seeks to provide tenants with the means to take action themselves, and would place a specific duty on landlords to ensure that the property they let is fit for human habitation and will remain so during the course of the tenancy. For me, that is a perfectly reasonable duty to place on landlords.

Amendment 22, in the names of my noble friends Lady Hayter of Kentish Town, the noble Lord, Lord Tope, and in my name, would introduce mandatory electrical safety checks into the private rented sector. Again, Members in the other place were unable to persuade the Government on this issue, but we hope again to have more success in your Lordships’ House. In fact, your Lordships’ House may be surprised that such checks, unlike those for gas safety, are not already mandatory, given the danger of electrocution as well as fires caused by faulty electrical installations. Indeed, according to the charity Electrical Safety First, which works to prevent electrical accidents, around 70 deaths per year involve electricity, compared to 18 from gas. That is over one a week. Yet, regrettably, the opportunity afforded by the Bill has not so far been used to protect tenants from electrical hazards.

Safety standards in the private sector depend on the age of the property, its location and, importantly, the competence—or willingness—of the landlord to undertake checks and repairs on electrical installations. We welcomed the measures introduced by the Government last year on carbon monoxide and smoke detectors. However, it is hard to explain why no consideration has been given to electrical safety which, sadly, is the cause of more deaths and injuries. Gas, carbon monoxide and smoke detectors all help make rented properties safe, but as my noble friend Lord Hunt of Kings Heath said in this House on 7 September 2015, electricity must be included if we are to provide private tenants with proper protection.

The Government’s rather unsatisfactory response then was that there is a legal duty on landlords to keep tenants’ electrical installations safe. This simply will not do—it is not enough. Not only does it mean that electrics in a rented property go unchecked for many years but it only guarantees prosecutions of landlords after the event, whereas we want to prevent electrocution or fires in the first place. Regrettably, while landlords in England must ensure that electrical installations are kept in safe working order, there is no legal requirement on them to check the installations regularly. Furthermore, there is no requirement to demonstrate to tenants that the electrics are safe. This is not acceptable, and is contrary to the Government’s autumn Statement on safety in the private rented sector and to their supposed desire to see a “bigger, better and safer” sector.

Furthermore, it is against what the public want. Of those responding to the DCLG’s own consultation, 84% believed that mandatory electrical checks in the private rented sector were needed. However, there has not been any action from the Government so far. The Local Government Association supports mandatory checks to reduce the risk of electrical fires. Electrical Safety First’s call for mandatory checks is also supported by the Chief Fire Officers Association, Shelter, Crisis, the London Fire Brigade, and British Gas, to say nothing of tenants.

A third of private-sector tenants stay in their home for less than a year, with eight out of 10 being in their current home for less than five years, so not only do an increasing proportion of our citizens live in the private rented sector, but it is a sector with a high turnover and an average tenancy of only about three years. Therefore, checks by landlords for electrical safety are essential. We know that privately rented homes are at a higher risk of fire. There has been no reduction in private rented sector fires since 2010 of those investigated by the London Fire Brigade. Indeed, of these 748 had an electrical source of ignition in the past five years, while only 97 fires had a gas source of ignition.

Why are the Government not taking this more seriously if they want a safer private rented sector? It seems that there is no strategy or response. I concur with Electrical Safety First that tenants would be better protected with mandatory five-yearly checks of electrical installations and supplied appliances. We know that annual gas checks work. Now is the time to implement mandatory electrical checks to discover faults before they cause accidents or fires. Our amendment would improve standards and not be burdensome to landlords.

Electrical Safety First estimates this would cost landlords about £3 per month over a five-year period. Of course, the amendment is about saving lives and damage to tenants’ property, but it also would protect the landlords’ assets. Checks could spot problems before they pose a serious risk through electrocution or fires.

We are pleased that the department has been undertaking research into the merits of introducing these checks, but it is now time for action. I hope the Minister will undertake to bring forward proposals while we have the Bill in front of us.

The final amendment in this group is Amendment 30, which seeks to ensure that people living in properties under a guardianship contract have some rights and protections. It is fair to say that these guardianship schemes are increasing in popularity. The guardian pays a licence fee to occupy a part of a building, secure it and prevent damage. Most of the buildings are not housing, and the guardian is not a tenant, which means he has few legal rights. My amendment seeks to redress the balance, which I think is only fair and reasonable. I beg to move.

[Baroness Grender (LD)]

My Lords, we are also supporting Amendment 20, and I would like to speak in support of Amendment 22 and electrical checks on behalf of my noble friend Lord Tope.

At Second Reading, the Minister said, in response to this very point:

“Local authorities already have strong and effective powers to deal with poor-quality unsafe accommodation, and we expect them to use them”.—[Official Report, 26/1/16; col. 1270.]

In the Committee stage in the Commons, the Minister of State, Brandon Lewis, said:

“Local authorities already have strong and effective powers to deal with poor-quality unsafe accommodation, and we expect them to use those powers”.—[Official Report, Commons, 10/12/15; col. 707.]

I would like to stress to the Minister and to the Government that this is slightly the wrong end of the stick of the point that this amendment is trying to make. The amendment is trying to beef up existing legislation to ensure that tenants have greater rights. It is less about local authority involvement and much more about liberating the consumer—the tenant—to take action and get repairs delivered. It is not even about the issue of compensation afterwards. It is about where they live right now and having the legal weight behind them to take action and get the repair in the place where they are a tenant. I cannot stress that enough. Therefore, I simply suggest that, if the Minister comes back and says that local authorities have enough power, that does not answer the question I am trying to raise.

This is not new legislation. It is not extra red tape. It is simply about enabling tenants, as I made clear at Second Reading. It revives an outdated law. It is about rights for consumers—something I suggest that this Government should be eager to embrace. Overstretched local authorities could encourage tenants to challenge conditions themselves and free their resources to focus on the very worst conditions. It would therefore act as a deterrent to landlords letting out properties in poor conditions.

The key point is that the clause does not impose new requirements on landlords; it is not a further regulatory burden. The standards set out are effectively the same as those in the Housing Act 2004 via the housing health and safety rating system, the HHSRS. There were 51,916 complaints about housing conditions to the relevant councils in 2013-14 but only 14,000 inspections of PRS properties. In other words, yes, the local authorities have the power, but they do not have the resources, so when complaints are made to them, very few inspections are made as a result, and there is even less enforcement. The prosecutions resulting from that in that one figure average one per council per year. With 4.4 million households in the private rented sector, surely we can provide some better basis for them to go to court and get their landlord to make repairs.