Property Agents: Registration

Lord Campbell-Savours Excerpts

Wednesday 18th October 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for that contribution. As he rightly says, it is not the subject of the Statement we heard today, but I will look at that matter and respond to him. I will ensure that a copy of my response is placed in the Library and copied to all noble Lords who participated in this Statement.

[Lord Campbell-Savours (Lab)]

My Lords, I am a little confused. The noble Lord referred to a paper on leaseholds. Surely any consultation on leasehold reform should be part of a wider package that includes the area we are dealing with today. That could then be incorporated in one piece of either draft or final legislation. Should not that be the intention? At the end of the day, these discussions all end in arguments about enfranchisement, as my noble friend suggested, and the purchase of freeholds.

That brings me to my final point. It is extremely difficult for residents’ associations to gain access to the lists of leasehold owners in blocks of flats, in particular in London where a large proportion of our flats are owned by people overseas. When residents’ associations seek to gain that information from management companies, they find that they are denied access to it. That often makes it impossible for them to move forward in the whole process of buying the freehold. Why is that not being considered as part of the legislation that the Government are proposing?

[Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for his contribution. On the general point about whether it is wiser to act on individual parts of the problem or wait and do the whole thing in a consolidated way in one go, I think he would probably find himself in disagreement with people who are keen to move things forward in some of the areas we have been talking about. I understand what he is saying but there is a discrete area that we have been looking at in relation to leasehold reform and houses that have been sold on very long leases with ground rents. There is a case for urgent action there before we tackle the broader issue of service charges that we are looking at here.

On the specific point that the noble Lord raises about residents’ associations, that is encompassed within the consultation. I think that he will be pleased about that. There is a general catch-all anyway. If there is a particular question that is not asked which someone feels is appropriate, there is a catch-all which provides the opportunity to respond on that as well. However, we are looking forward to hearing from people on the particular issue that he raises.