Leasehold and Freehold Reform Bill (Sixth sitting)

Andy Carter Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 23rd January 2024 Public Bill Committees

This is important, because in schedule 2 we are eliminating completely value, which is a real thing. We know that. We are expunging it completely for a political reason. We have inadequate analysis on who that value is being taken. We have good insight into who they might be, but we do not know who they are. It is important to understand that that these are real values—values that have been subject to abuse. That goes to the political underpinning and political imperative for making these changes, which is, as I understand it—again, I am very naive on these issues—that there has been abuse in the system. I have listened to the evidence about the sources of that abuse, and it is clear that the abuses are real. The Government are not acting blindly on the basis of no facts, and the Opposition are supporting them because they see that there are some wrongs to be corrected.

[Andy Carter (Warrington South) (Con)]

Not only have the Government accepted that, but this follows a very detailed investigation by the Competition and Markets Authority, which concluded that there were significant wrongs. It came to my constituency, interviewed my constituents and assessed that there were problems with mis-selling. That is why this is such an important issue for so many people. They put their hard-earned money into what they thought was going to be their property, but discovered that that was not the case.