Leasehold: Property Management Companies

Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Kennedy of Southwark

Monday 19th February 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper. I refer the House to the register of interests and the fact that I am a leaseholder.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (Baroness Penn) (Con)]

My Lords, I declare my interest as a leaseholder. The Leasehold and Freehold Reform Bill will make long-term changes to improve home ownership for millions of leaseholders in England and Wales. Measures to empower leaseholders and improve their consumer rights, such as better transparency of fees and charges and improved access to the right to manage, will make management companies more accountable to leaseholders who pay for their services.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)]

Leaseholders are at a complete disadvantage with regard to service charges, and the Bill before the other place does not change that fact, nor do the overoptimistic comments of the right honourable Member for Surrey Heath, which go way beyond what the legislation proposes. When will we get regulation of property agents, following the review by the noble Lord, Lord Best, published in 2019? When will we get proper control over the system whereby leaseholders pay out all the money but have no say in the services provided?

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

I am afraid I have to disagree with the noble Lord’s assessment of the Bill. I can set out a number of ways in which the Bill will improve the position of leaseholders regarding service charges. It will require greater transparency of service charges, so that leaseholders receive key information regularly; we will rebalance the legal costs regime, giving leaseholders greater confidence to challenge their service charges; it will replace the buildings insurance commissions system for managing agents, so that transparent admission fees are in place; and it will increase the non-residential limit from 25% to 50% for buying the freehold or exercising the right to manage, giving leaseholders greater rights in respect of taking over the freehold of their property or managing it themselves.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

I welcome the work of the noble Lord on this issue, and I know that your Lordships will be looking at it further in Committee. It is already a legal requirement for property agents to belong to one of two government-approved redress schemes. We also welcome ongoing work undertaken by the industry itself to raise professionalism and standards across the sector, which will make property managing agents more accountable to leaseholders. We will keep that and the question of further regulation for the sector under review.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)]

My Lord, if leaseholders want to change their managing agent, they need 50% plus one of the residents to vote for change. But in many modern blocks of, say, 100 flats, perhaps 40% to 50% are being sublet, and you have no right to know who the people are who need to vote. How can leaseholders who want to change their managing agent exercise their right to change? It is impossible, because they do not have a right to that data.

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

Leaseholders wishing to take forward the right to manage claim will need to obtain the title documents of their building from His Majesty’s Land Registry. Those will contain the names and addresses of leaseholders in the other flats in the building, so it should be possible to contact them. On the voting threshold of 50% plus one, we agree with the Law Commission’s recommendation that these existing requirements should not be changed, because they make sure that a minority of leaseholders cannot impose changes on the majority.

Levelling Up: Project Delivery

Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Kennedy of Southwark

Thursday 23rd November 2023 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (Baroness Penn) (Con)]

My Lords, the department has implemented several measures to support local authorities in their delivery of levelling-up projects. These include committing over £65 million for capacity support to unblock delivery issues and giving authorities greater flexibility over spending decisions. The National Audit Office report covers the progress of projects up to March 2023, and in the eight months since then the department has paid out over £1.5 billion of further funding to local authorities.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)]

I thank the noble Baroness for her comments. The report from the National Audit Office makes shocking reading: it tells of money allocated but not spent, contracts not signed and projects not delivered. Can the Minister explain to the House how a flagship programme of the Government is in such a mess?

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, the report itself highlights a number of issues that have delayed some of the delivery, including rising costs and inflation and other outside factors. That is why we are working with local authorities to address those issues. As I say, in the eight months since the report, the department has paid over £1.5 billion of further funding out to local places. We have already seen several projects completed or near completion, which are making a difference to the lives of people in those communities.

Chelsea Football Club

Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Kennedy of Southwark

Thursday 31st March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, I have a feeling that multiple different clubs may be commended to me in the course of this Question. The only thing I would say to the noble Lord is that the Government absolutely recognise the important role of fans and the beneficial role that they can have in the governance and ownership of clubs.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, can I also bring to the attention of the noble Baroness the wonderful work at AFC Wimbledon and the work that our dear noble friend Lady McDonagh did to bring that club back after it was destroyed. I went there recently. It is a fabulous club with a fabulous ground and is wholly owned by the fans.

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, I can absolutely endorse that. I also know that my noble friend Lord O’Shaughnessy was heavily involved in the renaissance of that club.

Covid-19: Hospital Patient Referrals

Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Kennedy of Southwark

Monday 28th June 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, on behalf of my noble friend Lady McDonagh, and with her permission, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in her name on the Order Paper.

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, there was limited testing capacity in March and early April 2020 and this was prioritised to those with symptoms. On 15 April 2020, the adult social care action plan instituted a policy of testing for all patients prior to discharge to a care home. All clinical guidance issued by the department, Public Health England and the NHS received clinical sign-off, following the best scientific advice available at the time.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, I want to understand whether the deaths in care homes, which were absolutely tragic, were down to the incompetence of the Government or just a disregard for the elderly. We all understand the need to free up acute beds in hospitals and it has been long understood that the safe way to do that is through isolation. If that was known by the care homes, were the individuals Covid positive or not being tested? Can the noble Baroness agree to publish all the emails, letters and other correspondence with the care home sector so that we can all see what the Government were doing at a particular time during the pandemic?

Business and Planning Bill

Debate between Baroness Penn and Lord Kennedy of Southwark

Committee stage & Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 13th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark]

My Lords, this group contains two amendments: Amendment 42, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Anelay of St Johns, and the noble Earl, Lord Clancarty, and Amendment 78, in my name. These probing amendments seek to highlight wider issues surrounding support for the hospitality sector. As we heard in the debate, the industry desperately needs government backing to see it through the coming months, which is why this House is supporting the Bill and why it is seeking improvements to make it even better.

I welcome Amendment 42 and entirely agree with the comments of the noble Baroness and the noble Earl. The amendment introduces the requirement for a review of support. Given that these are labour-intensive businesses, we should bear in mind that there is an enormous unemployment risk if businesses in this sector collapse.

Amendment 78 in my name aims to start a debate on two issues plaguing the hospitality sector, the first of which is lack of consumer confidence. Many people are still cautious about visiting hospitality venues, and the Government must play an active role in encouraging customers to return safely. The second issue is rent disputes. One large pub chain told us that disputes between tenanted pubs and their owners are still unresolved and there is no effective mechanism to fix this. I hope the Government can explain how they will encourage consumer confidence to help people return to pubs.

Obviously, this is a probing amendment that highlights these issues and seeks a government response regarding how they see these points being resolved in a satisfactory way that keeps businesses open, staff working safely and customers coming through the doors, reassured that they can enjoy themselves and spend money safely. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

[Baroness Penn (Con)]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lady Anelay, the noble Earl, Lord Clancarty, and the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, for their amendments. Through her amendment, my noble friend Lady Anelay raised the question of how the Government will review its measures to support the hospitality and tourism sector, and the parliamentary scrutiny of those measures. She also said that the date she had chosen for that review was the end of January. However, although some of the Government’s measures will have come to an end by then, because we are going through different phases in our response to coronavirus, many will be ongoing, not least some in the Bill such as pavement licensing and those that allow for a second summer of support, should we still be in a world of social distancing by then.

The coronavirus job retention scheme bonus will be paid from the end of January, so while we will have seen the end of the summer and potentially a more tricky autumn and winter period for the hospitality and tourism industry, we will only be part of the way through the Government’s response to the pandemic, and may be in a new phase of it.

There will be measures in place on 31 January and beyond to support the sector. Many noble Lords have spoken of the importance of the sector and how particularly hard hit it is. That is why measures are in place to support it—not only those in the Bill but the business grants that have been given to the retail, hospitality and leisure sectors, the business rates holidays now in place and the Bounce Back Loan Scheme grant. That grant is an example of our looking back at how these measures have worked after the event, and of our constantly reviewing and adapting our policy response. The bounce-back loans were a response to smaller businesses struggling to get access to the finance they need, many of which are in the hospitality and tourism sector.

Turning to the support we have provided for the tourism and hospitality sector, there is a £1.3 million destination management organisation resilience fund to support local tourism organisations in England, and the £10 million kick-starting tourism package, which gives small businesses and tourist destinations grants of up to £5,000 to help them adapt their business following Covid. The noble Lord, Lord Kennedy of Southwark, mentioned giving people confidence to go out and enjoy our tourist destinations; the kick-starting tourism package and allowing people to become more Covid-secure will contribute to that. We also have an “enjoy summer safely” campaign to market all the attractions available for people to enjoy in a safe and Covid-secure way.

I would also like to reassure the House this is not the end of the story. The DDCMS will continue to engage with stakeholders, including through the Cultural Renewal Taskforce and the Visitor Economy Working Group, to assess how we can effectively support tourism’s recovery across the UK.

I turn now to Amendment 78, which addresses various aspects of data protection. The Government publish relevant data on the Covid business lending schemes weekly, including the number of applications received and the number and value of facilities approved. Since 11 June we have been publishing monthly data on the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, broken down by employer size, sector and geography. That has allowed us to design measures more targeted at those that are struggling. For example, the Job Retention Bonus, set at a flat rate, will benefit those in the lower paid jobs and lower paid sectors more, because it will act as a greater incentive in those sectors. Furthermore, Visit England publishes a great deal of research, including regular surveys on visitor attractions, accommodation occupancy, day visits and Great Britain tourism. The ONS publishes fortnightly surveys on the business impacts of coronavirus which include sector-specific information. We will continue to engage with the sectors in the ways I have already mentioned.

The noble Baroness, Lady Uddin, mentioned some of the further measures announced last week that we have put in place to support the hospitality sector, including the “eat out to help out” scheme. Again, that discount is not just a financial incentive; it is about getting people out there to see that it is safe and secure to be out and about.

The noble Lord, Lord Kennedy of Southwark, raised the issue of premises that cannot afford to pay their rent because of Covid-19. They are currently protected from eviction. That protection was extended once already to the end of September 2020 and there is the option to extend it further if necessary.

The Government also published a code of practice for the commercial property sector. This will facilitate discussions during the moratorium over rent arrears and future payments between landlords and tenants to ensure best practice across the sector.

For the reasons I have set out, I hope my noble friend Lady Anelay and the noble Earl, Lord Clancarty, will be able to withdraw their Amendment and that the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, will not move his Amendment 78 when it is reached.