Leasehold Reform (Ground Rent) Bill [Lords]

Christian Matheson Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 29th November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Eddie Hughes]

As my right hon. Friend will know, unfortunately I am not the Secretary of State, much as I would like to be. [Interruption] Not yet, anyway. It is best to leave the fine detail of the formation of future legislation to the Secretary of State to decide. However, I look forward to discussing the matter further with my right hon. Friend as we progress.

[Christian Matheson (City of Chester) (Lab)]

I have listened to my right hon. Friend the Member for Alyn and Deeside (Mark Tami) and others. The Minister is waiting for the Competition and Markets Authority report, but is he prepared to say, even before that report has concluded, that on the basis of all the evidence we are hearing from right across the House, what we are seeing is nothing more than a financial scam from a bunch of greedy speculators?

[Eddie Hughes]

I am not sure I can go so far as to agree, but, as a number of hon. Members on both sides of the House have pointed out, it is an unfortunate practice that we will be seeking to address in future legislation.

--- Later in debate ---

[Justin Madders]

That is a fair point in theory, but I find it does not happen in practice. I have estates in my constituency that were built a dozen years ago and still have not been adopted because the developers have not put them up to the required standard. The to and fro never ends, because the developers have left town and they have no interest or incentive to bring those areas up to the adoptable standard.

[Christian Matheson]

I am grateful for the advice my hon. Friend has given to me and my constituents on this matter, as he is a neighbouring MP with particular expertise. He will be aware of one estate in my constituency that has been parcelled up and given to different developers, and it has been developed at different times. Not only do we have a problem with the local authority, but he will recall that we have a problem with different developers playing themselves off against each other in order not to bring the estate up to standard, as the hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake) suggests.

[Justin Madders]

My hon. Friend and constituency neighbour makes the point well. It all points to the lack of capacity in local authorities to tackle these issues. I do not want to make a party political point, but we have had a decade of austerity and we are now seeing the consequences in how local authorities police these things.

I would like to see a crackdown on unfair fees and contract terms by having an enforceable list of what are considered to be reasonable charges. We should require transparency on those charges and give leaseholders the right to challenge rip-off fees and poor performance. We should also try to ensure that residents are given greater powers to take over the management of their homes, if that is where we are going.

As my hon. Friend the Member for City of Chester (Christian Matheson) said, I do not want to be standing here in a few years’ time talking about another PPI for the house-building industry because the Government have once again failed to act on the warning signs that are there for us all to see.

This Bill must be promptly followed with the promised wider leasehold reforms, particularly the promised reforms for which we have been crying out that will enable leaseholders to buy their freehold quicker, easier and cheaper. I have had a private Member’s Bill ready to go for three years that would allow us to do just that. It could have already become law if there had been the will to take on the freeholder interests that would lose out as a result.

I have now got the message that my Bill will not find favour with the Government. I am aware the Bill would not have meant an end to leasehold, but it would at least have given the victims of this industrial-scale con an opportunity to take back control of their property at an affordable price. I thought this Government were all about taking back control. Do they not realise that leaseholders do not have control?

What is stopping firmer action being taken against freeholders? I know there are legal opinions floating about on freeholders’ human rights, but what about my constituents’ human rights? Do they not have the right to live in their own home without someone else trying to make it into a cash cow? Do they not have the right to expect that the biggest purchase they ever make will be done fairly and will be properly regulated? Do they not have the right to have a Government who are serious about stopping the industrial-scale foul play we have talked about tonight?

It is disappointing that, although on the one hand the Government accept that unfair practices in the leasehold market can turn people’s home-ownership dreams “into a nightmare,” we are still waiting for action for the many leaseholders who have been trapped in this web that they did not sign up to. We have made it clear that there are a number of reasons why they have found themselves in this position, not all of which are resolved by the Bill.

We know that one in three houses sold in the north-west in the past 10 years is leasehold, and those people will not benefit from the Bill. My constituents and my hon. Friend’s constituents have been disproportionately affected by the leasehold scandal, and they are still waiting for something that will help. If we are to talk about levelling up in this place, we should be looking at something like that as it will deliver true justice, fairness and levelling up.

We need some clear timescales from the Minister for when existing leaseholders can expect to see action on their concerns. What commitments can they expect? I think we all agree that what has happened is unfair and a significant injustice, but when are we going to see action to put things right for existing leaseholders? The right hon. Member for Bromsgrove (Sajid Javid), when he was Communities Secretary, promised an outright ban on leasehold for all houses four years ago. That is four years of people being trapped in homes that they cannot sell because of onerous ground rents, and four years of stress and uncertainty about whether they should try to buy their freeholds now or wait until the law is reformed. I get asked regularly, “What should I do? Should I wait until the law changes?” It is very difficult to give an answer on that because we still have no clarity on when that law will be changed. So let us end four years of jam tomorrow. Let us deliver solutions for leaseholders today. Let us stand up to the vested interests and please, finally, abolish leasehold.