Tenancies (Reform) Bill
Debate between Caroline Lucas and Sarah Teather(10 years, 1 month ago)
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Sarah Teather (Brent Central) (LD)
I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.
I want to begin by telling the story of one of my constituents. I do not want to give her real name, so I am going to call her Jo. She and her partner had a pretty horrendous year last year and, in spite of the best efforts of our local citizens advice bureau in Brent, it all went from bad to worse. Jo was living in a studio flat with her partner, but there were real problems with the property. The ceiling collapsed as a result of leaking drains upstairs and, to make matters worse, there was no heating in the flat.
Being a reasonable tenant, and expecting the best of her landlord, Jo reported the problems to her landlord. Rather than trying to fix the problem, as one might hope would be the case, the landlord responded by giving Jo and her partner a basin to catch the water dripping from the collapsed ceiling. Understandably, Jo and her partner continued to press the landlord to get the problems fixed, but the next time the landlord responded, he did so by beginning eviction proceedings. Jo had become a victim of retaliatory eviction.
I dare say that many colleagues in the House will have heard similar stories to Jo’s in their advice surgeries over the years, because, sadly, this situation is not as unusual as we might like to think. I hope that there will be time today for colleagues to air some of their stories. Jo’s story is also depressingly familiar to organisations such as Citizens Advice and the charity Shelter, whose advisers are all too frequently contacted by people who are facing eviction after making requests for repairs to be carried out in their property. They are the victims of a small minority of landlords who would rather get rid of tenants than bring their properties up to scratch.
It is because of stories like those that I am bringing the Tenancies (Reform) Bill to the House today, and I ask the House to support it. No one should be evicted for asking their landlord to do basic repairs. No one should be frightened to tell their landlord about a problem for fear of losing their home. No one should be forced to put up with poor conditions because their landlord might retaliate if they make a fuss. This is about fairness and decency, and about doing the right thing. It is about upholding the existing law, and it should benefit everyone: tenants, landlords and local authorities.
Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)
I congratulate the hon. Lady on securing this important debate. Does she agree that at the heart of the issue is a massive power imbalance between landlords and tenants, and that if we could get that power balance more in equity, tenants would be able to press for the things that they need in order to have a secure roof over their head.
Sarah Teather
The hon. Lady is correct to say that there is a power imbalance. I will talk more about this later, but I do not want to skew the power wholly in favour of the tenant either. This has to be about fairness; both landlord and tenant have to be treated well. The landlord needs to know that they can let their property without being exploited by the tenant, and the tenant needs to know that they can live in a decent property without being exploited by the landlord. This is about levelling things out a bit, through a relatively small change in the law.
Legal Aid Reform
Debate between Caroline Lucas and Sarah Teather(11 years, 6 months ago)
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Sarah Teather
I will struggle if I try to give way to everyone. May I at least respond to one intervention before I accept another?
I intend to speak about the residence test rather than about criminal legal aid, but I know that a number of Members—including the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull East (Karl Turner), who supported the application to the Backbench Business Committee, and my hon. Friends the Member for Redcar (Ian Swales) and for Leeds North West (Greg Mulholland)—want to refer to it specifically.
Sarah Teather
I will give way first to the hon. Lady and then to the hon. Gentleman, but after that I must make some progress.
Caroline Lucas
I wanted to intervene early in the debate to crush the myth that this is about savings. It should be made absolutely clear that no money will be saved. Indeed, a barrister at Matrix Chambers has suggested that, rather than saving £6 million—which, in the great scheme of things, is not very much in any case—the changes are likely to generate on-costs of about £30 million.
Sarah Teather
I entirely agree with the hon. Lady. She was referring, of course, to the changes in civil rather than criminal legal aid. I think that the costs are likely to be significantly greater, especially if people remain in detention or cannot be released from hospital.