Residential Estate Management Companies
Debate between Caroline Voaden and Olivia Bailey(3 days, 7 hours ago)
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Caroline Voaden
I agree that it is an absolute disgrace. We must have some kind of legislation to bring these companies to book.
In the UK, we have a rather strange situation whereby a new housing estate is built, but the council may not adopt the new area, so the builder has responsibility for roads, green spaces and communal areas and then passes that on to a third-party management company. Residents end up paying council tax on the one hand and estate management fees on the other. These charges can increase at any time, with no accountability or redress.
The Competition and Markets Authority has recommended ending the private estates model, which has been used for 40% of all new builds across Britain in the last five years, and potentially more, as the hon. Member for Warwick and Leamington (Matt Western) said. The CMA has recommended mandatory adoption by local councils of public amenities on new housing estates. Even when roads are accessible to the general public and green spaces can be enjoyed or used by anyone, residents can end up being responsible for their upkeep through service charges. The tenants of such developments pay both council tax and an estate management charge, yet they often receive a far worse service than those who live in adopted developments and are subject only to council tax, so I urge the Minister to consider ending the practice of shared ownership of public spaces for the vast majority of new developments. I would like to see a presumption that the shared areas around new developments are almost always adopted by the local authority where the development is standard in nature.
Ahead of this debate, I asked the House of Commons Library to engage with people who had signed relevant petitions. More than 1,100 people responded, one third of whom were freeholders. Ninety-four per cent said they were unhappy or very unhappy with the services provided by their management company; 94% said the service charges were unfair; and 94% said the transparency of what the service charges were for was completely inadequate.
Olivia Bailey (Reading West and Mid Berkshire) (Lab)
My constituents living in Beansheaf Grange and Fairfields, to name just two developments in my constituency, recognise much of what the hon. Lady is saying. They tell me about high fees, poor service and uncleared rubbish, even leading to marauding rats. Will she join me in welcoming the firm action that this Government are taking to be in a hurry to address this deep unfairness?
Caroline Voaden
I am glad that the hon. Lady says that the Government are in a hurry. We are looking forward to seeing the legislation come before the House.
Out of the 1,100 people to whom I was referring, only 10 were happy with the way things were going with their management company. By anyone’s measure, that is a pretty shocking state of affairs. Respondents talked of shoddy workmanship, years of delays in getting repairs done, charges for gardening where no gardens exist, charges for new windows when windows are not replaced, charges for buildings insurance when there are no communal buildings, charges for new light bulbs when there is no communal lighting—it would be funny if it were not so serious. They talked of broken lifts, flooded car parks, leaking ceilings, including one that has been leaking for nine years, exorbitant insurance charges—the list goes on and on.
Affordable Rural Housing
Debate between Caroline Voaden and Olivia Bailey(2 months ago)
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Olivia Bailey
I thank the hon. Member; I agree that this is about keeping generations of families together and I will talk more about that later in my speech.
As I said, people have been let down by Conservative and then Liberal Democrat administrations, which have been bodging the local plan process, trying to pass the buck and avoid the hard work needed to secure the vibrant villages that we were promised.
Caroline Voaden (South Devon) (LD)
In response to what the hon. Lady has just said, I would like to congratulate the Liberal Democrat-led South Hams district council, which has just contributed £623,000 to support a community housing project that will offer 39 new energy-efficient, 100% social rented homes for people with a local connection, including a community garden and orchard and a community building that will be delivered once the homes are complete. Does she agree that that is the kind of development that we need to see?