Property Guardians

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

Tuesday 26th March 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for the work he has taken forward since I introduced this issue in a Question for Short Debate in your Lordships’ House. Does he have any advice for local authorities, which use property guardian companies to get income from their empty properties, particularly on enforcing the law on decent conditions, which sometimes includes rogue landlord conditions?

[Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth]

I thank the noble Baroness for introducing this issue. How right she was to raise it in the way she did in October. I am grateful to her for that and our subsequent meetings. She is right about that problem, to which the noble Baroness, Lady Grender, also referred. There is a question about who polices local authorities and the other public authorities in this area. We will want to look at that too, as the noble Baroness said. No doubt the noble Lord, Lord Best, will want to comment on it as well.