Leasehold Reform Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government
Chris McDonald
Main Page: Chris McDonald (Labour - Stockton North)Department Debates - View all Chris McDonald's debates with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government
(3 weeks, 3 days ago)
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Alex Norris
I do. I appreciate that there is frustration about consultation, but some of the challenges within the Act show why it is important that we get this right, and that we have a process that delivers the relief that people are so desperately waiting for. One such consultation that has now concluded is around insurance commissions, which relates to service charges. We are consulting on how to replace that with a fairer and more transparent permitted insurance fee.
This year, we will also start the consultation on relevant measures related to service charges and litigation costs more generally. On new consumer protection provisions, as my hon. Friend the Member for Swindon North (Will Stone) mentioned, for the up to 1.75 million homes on private and mixed-tenure housing estates that are subject to estate charges, we will bring the measures into force as soon as possible once we have the correct model.
Chris McDonald (Stockton North) (Lab)
I thank the Minister for the interest that he has shown in the issues we have in Stockton North at Queensgate, Willow Sage Court and Wynyard. I am pleased to provide the update to the Minister that, following my intervention, in Queensgate we now have 98% of the roads completed. Does he agree that the issue here is a lack of consumer choice? There is a market failure; in local areas such as Stockton, people who want to buy a house have very limited opportunity to do so without entering into one of these agreements.
Alex Norris
I commend my hon. Friend for his work there; it will be of great succour to a number of his constituents. However, he is right, because this is a confluence a failure to build enough houses and a system that has been left to govern itself and act in the ways that my hon. Friend the Member for Brentford and Isleworth set out, leaving people with no choice but to enter into arrangements that lead to them having to live with these long-term consequences. That is why we must build more houses and address those behaviours.