Homes (Fitness for Human Habitation and Liability for Housing Standards) Bill

Alex Chalk Excerpts

2nd reading: House of Commons
Friday 19th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Lucy Allan (Telford) (Con)]

I too would like to congratulate the hon. Member for Westminster North (Ms Buck) on introducing this important Bill and on securing Government support for it, which is an excellent example of cross-party working. Like all Members, I want to see this Bill deliver on its objectives to ensure that everyone can live in a decent home.

I am the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on new towns. Many new towns, including my own constituency of Telford, have a private rental sector with homes that are substandard and have long been neglected. Both the design and the materials of estates that were built at the same time—in a hurry, 50 years ago—have not stood the test of time and they are now past their useful life. Those estates are decaying simultaneously, which makes renewal and renovation challenging.

Housing estates in many new towns were often constructed to the Radburn design, which was innovative and experimental in its day. Cars were separated from housing, and the front was accessible only by a footpath, with back yards facing each other on to vehicle access alleyways. Over time, however, that has “designed in” crime and antisocial behaviour, and confusing layouts have rendered estates inaccessible. Wooden construction materials are rotting, and flat roofs are prone to leaking. There are houses in multiple occupation and empty properties, and now we have the worst of the rogue landlords. Over the years, the dream of a new start in a new town on a new estate has become a nightmare for some.

Although some of those ex-local authority homes are owner-occupied, most are privately rented and owned by multiple landlords who are very hard to trace. As has already been pointed out today, there are many good landlords who take good care of their properties, and there are long-term owner-occupiers who take pride in their areas, but the simple fact remains that some tenants—my constituents—are living in conditions that are totally unacceptable today. Those privately rented properties are a catalyst for a spiral of decline on their estates, and they cause untold misery not just to the tenants but to the owner-occupiers living alongside them.

Tenants are in those substandard properties because they have been unable to secure housing association properties. Our housing association properties in Telford are very well maintained by our innovative and aspirational housing association, the Wrekin Housing Trust, but they are hard to come by. Nor are those tenants able to secure any other rental property of an adequate standard, because they have complex vulnerabilities. They may have a history of evictions and debt, addiction, or mental health problems. They are at the mercy of rogue landlords, because other landlords are not willing to give them a tenancy. The rogue landlords charge the full amount of housing benefit, and provide nothing but a run-down, neglected property in return, just because they can.

Much as I welcome this Bill, I must sound a note of caution. Tenants who are affected by the worst conditions in the private rental sector are unlikely to be able to complain effectively, let alone take enforcement action against their landlords. Local authorities have an important role to play in that regard. It is not good enough for them to say, “This is an arm’s-length commercial relationship between tenant and landlord, and it has nothing to do with us.” These tenants are our most vulnerable residents, and they are being exploited. We have an obligation to help them to enforce the powers that the Bill will give them, as well as ensuring that local authorities use the powers that they already have.

[Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful point. Does she agree that if these excellent new measures are not to be a dead letter, we must ensure that some of our most vulnerable constituents—including some of mine in Cheltenham—have the tools that they need, through the legal process and through early advice and assistance, to prosecute the rights that the Bill will give them?

[Lucy Allan]

My hon. Friend is right. We must help to empower those vulnerable tenants, because legislation will not be a remedy if people are not helped to exercise it.