Small Business, Enterprise and Employment Bill

Baroness Wheatcroft Excerpts

Monday 9th March 2015 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)]

My Lords, I shall speak to Amendments 33M and 33W.

In Committee I supported my noble friend Lord Hodgson in proposing an exemption from an MRO for a tenant in return for an investment by a pub-owning company. It is necessary for the companies to have reassurances that investments—some of which are significant—made in their pubs are realised in both financial and non-financial returns. The latter would include good will and more intangible aspects such as reputation, quality of service and better atmosphere, which all serve to draw new customers in over a longer period of time. My noble friend the Minister was not minded to accept an exemption but I am pleased that she has been willing to engage with all after Committee and the word “deferral” seems to have replaced “exemption”.

Like my noble friend Lord Hodgson, I have some sympathy with many of the inserts proposed by the noble Lords, Lord Mendelsohn and Lord Stevenson, in their Amendment 33M, which, essentially, seeks to place considerable detail in primary legislation in the Bill by seeking clarification of the regulations, the Pubs Code and guidance. However, the noble Lords would place too much information in the Bill and the detail is more suited to secondary legislation and proper debate at this stage.

For example, subsection (2)(f) of the proposed new clause states that regulations and guidance shall include an investment agreement as a trigger for MRO. This is too vague and there is no substance in the timescales attached. Equally, in Amendment 33M subsection (3) of the proposed new clause states:

“Any investment agreement must recognise the different nature and size of pubs and relevant investment requirements”.

This is an aspiration but it is too short on detail. Finally on Amendment 33M, in subsection (2)(b) of the proposed new clause, the noble Lord, Lord Mendelsohn, cites that the maximum deferral period of an MRO in return for an investment should be five years. My noble friend Lord Hodgson alluded to this. That is too prescriptive and further work is required to determine the length of deferral time in relation to the amounts invested.

However, the overall tenor of Amendments 33M and 33W, tabled by my noble friend Lord Hodgson, I hope will go some way to persuade and encourage the Minister to commit to giving more thought to the details in a review—or is it called a consultation?—and to debate it thoroughly as secondary legislation.

There remain important unanswered questions, including what constitutes a major or minor investment, over what periods these investments might be considered to be reasonable to allow a decent rate of return and how one might describe “decent” and how it should be defined. Perhaps my noble friend can give the House further reassurances here on Report as to the process of how the details will be debated and presented.

[Baroness Wheatcroft (Con)]

My Lords, it is clear that pub companies need to be encouraged to invest in their estate: it is an obvious thing to do. The pubcos claim that they invested £200 million in their properties over the past two years and so, although there are complaints from tenants, there must be some happy ones out there.

[Lord Snape]

I apologise for interrupting the noble Baroness so soon in her speech. If there are some happy ones out there, could she list them for the benefit of the House?

[Baroness Wheatcroft]

I am afraid that I do not have the details of the happy ones because they are obviously getting on with running their businesses rather than contacting me, and I hope that they are doing very well.

[Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts]

My noble friend might like to know that I produced three or four examples for the noble Lord in Committee. He just regards them as anecdotal evidence, but the fact is that there are anecdotes on both sides of this argument. There are just as many happy ones—or perhaps more—as unhappy ones.

[Baroness Wheatcroft]

I thank my noble friend Lord Hodgson and I support him in his amendment because it finds the balance between being overly prescriptive and legislating to give some comfort to pub owners, thus persuading them that it is safe for them to invest. I cannot support the noble Lord, Lord Mendelsohn, in his amendment. It seems to be far too prescriptive for the Bill, as others have said, and somewhat contradictory. The Bill already states that a trigger event for an MRO will be something that was unforeseen. An investment agreement, by its very nature, will have to be something that is negotiated.

Surely there are pub owners and pub landlords who are capable of negotiating an investment agreement that suits both sides. I do not subscribe to the view that all pub owners are out to do the dirty on their tenants or that all tenants are weaklings. Indeed, the Pub Landlord, that character who is so well known to television viewers, is standing up to Nigel Farage in South Thanet, although it has to be said that that particular pub landlord has not been seen there very often.

We need to offer landlords some protection so that, if owners invest in their pubs, they will not immediately be forced into an MRO. The trigger, as cited in the amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Mendelsohn, would have that option. What sensible landlord is going to put money into his pub if the recipient could instantly trigger an MRO? There needs to be some scope for negotiation. My noble friend the Minister has shown that she is open to negotiation and consultation, and the amendment tabled by my noble friend Lord Hodgson would be the best way forward. However, perhaps the Minister could reassure us that she sees the need for investment to be encouraged and that she will find a way of giving pub owners and landlords the protection they need in order to invest in their estate.

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Mendelsohn, and my noble friend Lord Hodgson for their amendments and for providing us with an opportunity to debate further the very important question of continued investment by pub-owning companies in tied pubs. That is especially the case because, as my noble friend Lord Hodgson has just said, pubs are having to reinvent themselves in the 21st century. As we have heard, these two amendments approach the issue in rather different ways, and I understand the motivations behind both. I can reassure the noble Lord and my noble friend that the Government absolutely want to see investment in tied pubs. That is key to the success of the industry, both for pub companies and for tenants. We want to see pubs thriving and the new arrangements to work.

I think we all accept that the possibility of pubs exercising the market rent only option will create some uncertainty for pub companies, and it is possible that there might be more uncertainty than they can live with if they are thinking of making a substantial investment in a pub. It is equally clear that there is some nervousness around asking tenants to defer some of their MRO rights in return for investment and that serious consideration needs to be given to how this would work in practice and the safeguards that need to be in place. As I said earlier in our debate, we have been considering how best to address this and strike the right balance. I can reassure my noble friend Lord Hodgson that the Bill as drafted does not prevent pub companies issuing the tenant with a new lease alongside an offer of investment, and no amendment to the Bill is necessary to enable companies to do so.

As my noble friend pointed out, a new agreement may attract costs for tenants, including legal costs and stamp duty.

The situation means that the MRO triggers on rent review or renewal would not be available to the tenant for a period of five years, as that is the maximum interval that the code will currently allow between rent assessments. It would, however, provide the pub company with some certainty. We recognise that there will be occasions where a larger investment—