Park Homes

Debate between Andrew Bridgen and Annette Brooke

Thursday 16th December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Annette Brooke]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. I am not pretending that this is easy to achieve, but I am trying to get a clear timetable to make progress on it. There is already work in progress. The previous Government had a statutory instrument ready to run, so some consultation has already taken place. We have the tribunal coming on board. That will provide evidence when people bring their cases about fit and proper persons and enable us to work together on all the issues that are arising.

I want to concentrate on malpractice in the buying and selling of park homes. In 2009, I presented a ten-minute rule Bill on this issue that aimed to prevent unjustified interference by a site owner when residents sell their park home. A park home site owner might reasonably wish to meet a prospective buyer, or at least to have a reference supplied, but an interview without the seller or an independent witness present can provide opportunities for rogue site owners to make misleading or untrue statements. Examples of such statements from across the country include: “The home is in poor condition”; “The home is not worth the price you’re paying”; “The home will have to be moved to another pitch next year”; “I have a right to ask the court to let me take the home off in five years”; and “The park is being developed and the home will have to be moved.”

Alternatively, the prospective buyer might be intimidated by real or implied threats and not want to be involved with the site owner in any way. The prospective buyer might understandably decide that he or she does not want to live on a park run in such a way, and/or by such an unpleasant person, and the sale will fall through. After that has been repeated a few times, the seller eventually sells the home to the site owner for a token sum. In each case, there are no witnesses and the prospective buyer is usually unwilling to give a witness statement, as he or she simply wants to get away from the park as quickly as possible. The seller does not usually go to court because there is no witness statement and the buyer is lost anyway.

The incentive for the site owner is to buy the home for a small sum, remove it from the park, site a new and possibly bigger home on the pitch, and sell it, thereby making a clear profit of perhaps £100,000. Rogue site owners currently have the ability to sabotage sales and can rely on the fact that many people who move to park homes are frail, vulnerable, elderly and easily intimidated. It seems reasonable for a site owner to be able to check out a prospective buyer, but how can we stop the abuse and possible fraud currently taking place? My Bill suggested that there should be an independent witness present at such meetings. However, that would not tackle phone conversations, so I can see that this is quite complicated.

In one case, constituents of mine were offered £81,000 by a prospective purchaser on the open market. The site owner had made an earlier offer of £15,000. A meeting took place between the prospective buyer and the site owner, who wrote to my constituent on 4 October 2007 to say:

“Thank you for your letter...introducing the above young lady to me and seeking my approval for her to buy the above home. Since taking over the park in 1999 we have always promoted the location as a retirement one for people over the age of 55. With that in mind I am unable to agree to”

the lady

“purchasing your home”.

On 5 October, the next day, a letter was issued to all residents on the park that said:

“Since taking over the Park in 1999 we have always promoted the location as a retirement one for people over the age of 55. My legal advisors have informed that this should be formalised within the Park Rules and I now write to advise you of the addition of the following rule…The Park is for retired/semi retired persons over the age of 55.”

So the rule was introduced after the refusal. The letter continued:

“In the event of anyone disagreeing with this rule please let me have your written objection within 28 days of the date of this letter.”

Representatives of the residents association on the site tell me that the prospective purchaser was originally prepared to make a statement about conversations with the site owner.

[Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)]

While I entirely agree with the need to find a better solution for the buying and selling of park homes, we also need something to help with dispute resolution. In my constituency, I came across a situation regarding residents wishing to insulate their park homes, which was being resisted by the site owner on grounds of the aesthetics of the park. I looked at that and saw that there were arguments in both directions. I then discovered that there was a conflict of interest because the owner was supplying gas to the residents at a premium price. This raises enormous questions. We need a dispute resolution system to deal with such ongoing problems that will give confidence to park home owners and certainty to operators about how they can act with regard to the residents.

[Annette Brooke]

I thank my hon. Friend for that helpful intervention. As he says, certainty and a clear understanding of the rules, and a requirement not to change them overnight, would be a big step forward. The residential property tribunal will enable both sides to put their case. I do not believe that it will solve the problem with buying and selling, but it is definitely a first step, and this debate will ensure that the next steps go ahead subsequently.