Leasehold Reform

Debate between Clive Betts and Justin Madders

Thursday 21st March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Betts]

Absolutely. It is a complete scandal, and a number of developers have blatantly admitted that they sold on the property and did not tell the leaseholders what was being done. Ultimately, banning new houses from being built as leaseholds solves the problem, but immediately there ought to be a right of first refusal for leaseholders to buy their freehold at a clear and regulated price. The Law Commission is working on that issue, and we support that.

[Justin Madders (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

On behalf of the National Leasehold Campaign, I congratulate the Chair of the Select Committee and its members on an excellent, comprehensive report. There is, I think, a sense of vindication among all those who have campaigned on this issue, not least myself, the National Leasehold Campaign, the hon. Member for Worthing West (Sir Peter Bottomley) and my hon. Friend the Member for Poplar and Limehouse (Jim Fitzpatrick), because the Committee has picked up on all the issues that were of great concern to us. When considering the report, I hope the Government will note that the Leasehold Reform Bill is still on the books, which would make the process of enfranchisement simple and easy. Did the Committee come to a view on the agreements that have been reached between some developers and leaseholders for changing the terms of their lease from ground rent doubling to RPI?

[Mr Betts]

We did consider that, and we said that although such voluntary agreements might be a step forward, they were not sufficient and they were not as good as our proposals to restrict leases on existing properties to 0.1% of the value, or £250. Legislation would overturn the current arrangement, and provide a better one for leaseholders.

Grassroots Football Funding: Wembley Stadium

Debate between Clive Betts and Justin Madders

Tuesday 22nd January 2019 Westminster Hall

[Justin Madders]

My hon. Friend is right. As the shadow Sports Minister, she will know far more about the challenges than I do. When we compare our facilities with other countries, we are lagging behind. We have half the number of third generation pitches that Germany has and, shockingly, only one in three grass pitches are of adequate quality. Some 5 million playing opportunities were lost last year because of inadequate facilities. With the NHS struggling, schools facing a funding crisis, and the challenge of affordable housing, it is fair to say that we cannot expect the taxpayer to find the resources for this. However, as my hon. Friend said, there are huge opportunities for the grassroots in terms of the cash that is washing around the game.

[Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab)]

There are some really good examples. The Sheffield junior football league is the largest junior football league in Europe. The Isobel Bowler Sports Ground in my constituency is part of the Parklife project, funded by the FA and the Football Foundation. It has a great artificial pitch and a wonderful gym, where Disability Awareness with Sport runs facilities for disabled people. That is all wonderful and very positive—as is Mosborough rugby football club, where the Rugby Football Union has come in with support—but let us contrast the £300 million that local authorities spend on pitches in parks with the more than £200 million that the premier league’s clubs spent on agents’ fees alone in the last financial year. Is that not a contrast that we simply should not accept?

[Justin Madders]

I thank my hon. Friend for his contribution and for his excellent work with the parliamentary football club and with the Football Foundation. He is absolutely right about the cost: £200 million on agents’ fees, more than £1 billion in transfer fees every year now, and the direction of travel is only upwards. I know a levy operates at the moment on transfer fees, but a significant amount of that goes to players’ pensions and academies. There is nothing wrong with that, but that is for the professional side of the game and we are talking about the grassroots. I believe a small levy or a redistribution of existing funds could do an awful lot more for grassroots football.

Housing and Planning Bill

Debate between Clive Betts and Justin Madders

Tuesday 12th January 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Betts]

My hon. Friend must have been looking over my shoulder. I am sure she cannot read my handwriting—it is very difficult at the best of times—but that is exactly my next point. This is not just about individuals in their own home; individuals who are part of the wider community may join and become active members of their local tenants and residents associations only to be told that their home has suddenly gone, and the community life with it. The community, as well as such individuals, will lose out.

Of course, it is not just families who will be affected. A pensioner in their family home who has retired might decide that they want to move to a bungalow or flat that is more suitable to their immediate needs. I think that this legislation applies to people of retirement age, but perhaps the Minister could confirm that. If that pensioner is in a secure council property, they now face the prospect of moving into pensioner accommodation that does not have a secure tenancy.

We are therefore asking people to take the risk of moving from a family home with a secure tenancy to pensioner accommodation without that security. That will undermine mobility because it will mean that fewer family homes become available and that such pensioners cannot move on to more suitable accommodation. If they do, they will be faced with the prospect of being turfed out of that accommodation in their 80s on the wish of their landlord. It simply cannot be right to put pensioners in that position.

[Justin Madders]

One argument that was put forward in support of the heinous bedroom tax was that it would encourage people to move to smaller properties when the opportunity arose. Is not what my hon. Friend has just described completely inconsistent with the aims of that policy?

[Mr Betts]

This proposal will indeed discourage people from moving from a secure tenancy on a family home to an insecure tenancy on a smaller property. If it is the Government’s intention to ensure that people who have more space than the Government think they need move home, surely the answer is to build more properties in the first place so that there are more social rented properties for the people on the waiting lists who need them.

Finally, let us take this down to an individual level. Imagine a family sat around their breakfast table or a pensioner couple, who are now on a fixed-term tenancy, sitting in their home. They are waiting for the postman to come, bringing a letter from their local council or housing association. Perhaps in future, it might be called the “Lewis letter” when it drops on people’s doormats. That Lewis letter, when they open it with trembling hands, will tell them, without any forewarning, some six to nine months before their tenancy ends, whether they can stay in their home—these are not houses, apartments, flats or bungalows, but people’s homes at the end of the day—at the whim of the council for another five years, whether they can move to another property that is some distance away in a different neighbourhood, with a different school, or whether they will have no home at all from the council in the future. Just feel the tension in that household when the Lewis letter drops on the doormat and people open it. Even if the answer is, “Yes, you’ve been a good tenant and can stay in your home for another five years,” the trauma that this will put people through is beyond measure.

I hope that the Government will think again. This schedule is mean-minded and dreadful. I hope that the Government withdraw it and, if they do not, that amendments 142 and 105, which were tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for City of Durham (Dr Blackman-Woods), will be successful, so that we can give families, pensioners and everyone else the security of tenure that they rightly deserve.