Housing and Planning Bill

Lord Palmer of Childs Hill Excerpts

Tuesday 9th February 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Redfern (Con)]

My Lords, I support the Bill and welcome the following very clear measures to tackle the issue of rogue landlords that will strengthen the private rented sector.

Private tenants need additional reassurance that rogue landlords will be driven out of business, and banning orders for these criminal landlords and property agents is needed to prevent them operating and repeating serious housing offences. As a council leader, I believe that having the ability to apply for banning orders, together with fines, against rogue landlords and property agents is essential. This will prevent serious or repeat offenders, who are known to cause misery and harm to renters and place them at serious risk, from letting property. In such cases, there should be no room for these operators within the sector. I am pleased that the Government are determined to crack down on these landlords so that they either improve the service they provide or leave.

I also welcome the introduction of a much-needed database of rogue landlords and property agents. This will allow greater co-operation of local authorities around the country to keep track on banning orders and monitor ongoing trends. Having this national co-operation will, as I said, prevent serious or repeat offenders who are known to be causing misery and harm to renters and placing them at serious risk, from letting property, and there should be no room for these operators within the sector.

I ask the Minister to assure noble Lords that further government intervention against rogue landlords will happen and that she will collaborate with council leaders, like myself, in bringing a rogue landlord database to fruition as soon as possible.

[Lord Palmer of Childs Hill (LD)]

My Lords, I support Amendments 2 and 7, and draw the Committee’s attention to my entry in the register of interests as a director of the Property Redress Scheme, one of the government recognised organisations.

Amendment 2, in the name of my noble friend Lady Grender, draws attention to the fact that this House and the other place do not consider legislation in a holistic fashion. We seem to consider one amendment to one piece of legislation without looking at the unintended consequences of that legislation, as identified by Amendment 2. Yes, we should address rogue landlords, however one describes them, but that will have an effect on the tenants of the relevant properties. The tenant who makes a complaint will have some protection in terms of getting rehoused, but the property may contain a number of tenants, including those who have not made a complaint against the landlord who is banned. If the property is no longer available for letting, those tenants will become homeless. My noble friend drew attention to the transfer of the relevant property to other people who are not specified in the Bill. What then happens to the tenants? We do not know that because we are not adopting a holistic approach to the legislation. The noble Baroness, Lady Gardner of Parkes, said that we do not have consolidation Bills. We have unintentional effects because of that.

Amendment 7 was spoken to by my noble friend Lady Bakewell. The problem is that we pass legislation without considering sanctions. The sanctions are to be imposed by local authorities, which are having their grants reduced and are looking for ways not to spend money rather than to spend it. Amendment 7 proposes that local authorities which are proactive in implementing the legislation should retain the relevant financial penalty. When the Minister replies, will she say whether the Government have had discussions with trading standards departments, environmental health departments and housing departments on how they will implement this part of the legislation to ban rogue landlords? I know of only one London borough—Camden—that has a really active trading standards officer dealing with housing, but the rest do not have the finance to cover this area. Therefore, I hope that some research has been carried out with local authorities in England to determine whether these restrictions will bite where they need to.

[Baroness Gardner of Parkes]

My Lords, I support Amendment 7. I appreciate what has just been said, but certainly my view is that one of the big problems with all these housing issues of overcrowding and everything else is that the local authorities cannot afford to implement the enforcement and inspection measures that are constantly necessary. Indeed, at a later stage in the Bill I intend to bring forward an amendment to enable them to charge more for planning applications for these enormously expensive huge underground developments which many people find very inconvenient. The person who applies for planning permission for a simple little underground development just to give their family more space pays the same amount as the person applying to build a multimillion pound development. That is very unfair. The proposed measure would enable local authorities to have a little more money to enforce their many obligations. This amendment is valuable in that respect.

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[Lord Kennedy of Southwark]

That is absolutely right. I have no worries for the rogue landlord but the noble Lord, Lord Deben, spoke earlier about these characters and some of their despicable practices. I am worried about how they treat their tenants.

[Lord Palmer of Childs Hill]

In terms of the charges on the property, I seek some clarification. We are told that the local authority may have taken over management of the property and be taking a charge on it, and will be able to underwrite its costs in one way or another, which seems very sensible. The problem is if there is an existing charge on the property because the owner has a mortgage on it. To seek recompense and take action, the local authority will have to take cognisance of the fact that there is already a charge on that property. A local authority may be very reluctant to incur the cost when it knows it is in a queue and may get nothing whatever at the end of the line.

[Baroness Williams of Trafford]

My Lords, I would assume that in those circumstances the local authority would take a second charge out on the house. That is the assumption I would make in such circumstances.

Under subsection (7) the Secretary of State may make regulations specifying how financial penalties recovered under this clause are to be dealt with. Broadly speaking, we envisage that such sums could be used in connection with the authority’s private sector housing functions, but we will discuss the details of how the income is to be applied with relevant parties before making the regulations. We will consult on guidance, setting out the appropriate penalties to levy, and take into account a wide range of circumstances. Such guidance will also cover landlords’ right to appeal. Furthermore, we will issue local authorities with guidance on the utilisation of any money they receive through financial penalties.

I do not know whether I answered the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell, and the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, about the new burdens. I have probably made my point, but any policy that could result in a local authority incurring costs is subject to a new burdens assessment. We have considered this test when developing this policy. It is not a burden as it is not a requirement to place someone under a banning order.

In answer to the noble Lord, Lord Palmer, on how local authorities will implement this policy, local authorities have warmly welcomed it because it will help them to crack down on the rogues and retain the income from civil penalties and rent repayment orders. It is important that noble Lords are satisfied that local authorities are very happy with this.

The noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, mentioned the transfer of interest to a prohibited person when that interest is an overseas interest. It does not matter whether it is an overseas interest or whether it is in this country, the policy still applies, as I understand it.

The noble Lord, Lord Greaves, asked how local authorities would make their decision and how many cases we would have a year. Local authorities are likely to seek banning orders where the offence is particularly serious or where they have a repeat offender. We estimate that there will be about 600 banning orders per year. I hope my comments have reassured noble Lords, but I see that the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, is about to stand up.