Social Housing (Regulation) Bill [Lords]

Eddie Hughes Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 7th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

I am more than happy to give way to my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall North (Eddie Hughes), who did so much to put these things right when he was a Minister. I will give way to everyone else in due course.

[Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con)]

It was an absolute privilege to work with the Secretary of State and to be tasked with converting the Social Housing White Paper into the robust legislation that we see before us today. Having listened to the podcast on the Grenfell Tower inquiry, may I ask whether the Secretary of State agrees that one of the overriding ambitions of the Bill is to ensure that social housing tenants are treated with respect at all times, and that we remove any stigma that is associated with such tenure?

[Michael Gove]

As ever, my hon. Friend is 100% spot-on. Even before the Grenfell tragedy, it was clear that the way in which tenants were being treated in social housing in far too many cases, and—it pains me to say this—particularly in Kensington, was simply not good enough. We have vivid documentary evidence of the fact that the tenant management organisation that was responsible for the refurbishment of Grenfell simply did not listen to tenants and behaved in a high-handed fashion. Their safety was not given the importance it deserved. A number of residents, including Ed Daffarn of Grenfell United, a survivor of that night, were very clear about the risks that were being run, but they were not listened to. One of the most powerful lessons of the tragedy is the need for us to ensure that social housing tenants feel that their voice is being heard. As my hon. Friend for Walsall North said, any high-handed and aloof behaviour exhibited by some towards people who are the most deserving of our protection should end, and I hope that it will.

Social Housing and Regulation Bill (First sitting)

Eddie Hughes Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 29th November 2022 Public Bill Committees

[Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Edward. I thank the Minister and the shadow Minister for their compliments about me and my Bill. No doubt we will be debating it in one of these Committee Rooms in the not too distant future.

One concern about the position on supported housing is the number of regulators that get involved already. There is almost a confusion of regulation. There is another problem: as we legislators seek to plug gaps, the rogue landlords seek alternative ways of making huge amounts of money. We already know that nearly £1 billion in housing benefit was paid out last year on supported housing in exempt accommodation. Clearly, that was for people who are vulnerable and need help and support. They are from a wide variety of different backgrounds. They might be recovering drug addicts; they might be people who became temporarily homeless or people who have had mental or physical health problems. I could go through a long list of people, but they are vulnerable and need help and support.

However, I have a concern about the proposed amendments. They seek to plug a gap, but are they comprehensive enough? We need more discussion to make sure we have a comprehensive measure that includes everything and makes it clear who the regulator is. Given the interventions by the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden, we want to make sure, as a Committee and as legislators, that the laws we introduce are actually enforced.

[Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con)]

The shadow Minister made a very interesting point, and I believe his case has some merit. We have invested in pilots in several areas of the country so that we can explore the case more fully. When the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee looked at the procedure, there was some frustration on the part of Members about the fact that we cannot easily compartmentalise the breadth of people who are supported in the accommodation, so a range of organisations have oversight of the quality of the accommodation provided, supported or otherwise. We need further work to be done through the pilots to make sure that any intervention we make does not have unintended consequences for the providers who provide excellent quality supported accommodation.

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[Siobhain McDonagh]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend. If there is no regulation, this will just grow and grow. As mortgage interest rates go up and business for buy-to-let landlords becomes less profitable, more people are going to look at providing this style of housing, because they can exploit the housing benefit system. If that is not happening in the constituencies of all the hon. Members of this Bill Committee, it will be coming to them soon.

[Eddie Hughes]

The point I am about to make is non-political, given that I am going to use the example of Labour-led Birmingham Council. That council did pilot work, and its scrutiny committee, which was chaired by a Labour member, subsequently published a report. It was able to identify a number of improvements that it could make within the existing legislation. I fully appreciate that legal challenge is an option for landlords who have their claims turned down. However, the council was able to reduce the number of people coming through the pipeline to provide this type of accommodation, and it was able to improve the quality of that accommodation. There is some room for councils who are prepared to focus on this, to improve outcomes for local people within the framework of the existing legislation.

[Siobhain McDonagh]

I turn to Aves housing association, which was run by a man who was exposed by the BBC for running a former supposed housing association that is in fact a commercial enterprise. It specialises in parts of Pollards Hill and Longthornton in my constituency, which neighbour Croydon, and it routinely takes very vulnerable people to live in houses that are simply not big enough for conversion. It accesses people’s universal credit accounts and takes their money. When the housing benefit department at Merton Council discovered that, it decided not to pay housing benefit to Aves residents. That might seem sensible to most Committee Members. However, that then meant that 92 vulnerable people were not having their rent paid, so were vulnerable to eviction—at which point, Merton Council’s housing department and adult social services departments would have collapsed. Local authorities are in a bind. Do they take notice of what is going on—in which case, they get responsibilities they cannot meet—or do they turn a blind eye because, in the end, that is the only way they can manage?

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[Matthew Pennycook]

I thank the Minister for that helpful response, and I take on board the concerns she raised about the amendments.

I am slightly concerned about the lack of what we would consider to be true tenant empowerment. The quality resident panel is important, but it only lasts a year, so how will we get ongoing tenant engagement with the work of the regulator to inform how it operates, to shape future regulation, which is part of its remit, and to raise future issues of concern to tenants nationally, in terms of social housing regulation and policy? We do not think the Bill allows for that, and in all honesty I cannot understand the Government’s objection to allowing the advisory panel to notify Ministers directly, rather than the regulator, in certain rare circumstances. As the Minister said, the panel is at present constituted by the regulator, which appoints its membership, and it can only provide views directly to the regulator. We think there are some circumstances in which it may need to do otherwise. I hope the Minister takes away those points.

[Eddie Hughes]

Although there might be some deliberation about this mechanism, there are several mechanisms through which resident organisations are able to engage with Ministers and the regulator. I am delighted to see representatives of Grenfell United in the Public Gallery. There is a regular opportunity to meet Ministers, although it is not prescriptive and perhaps not as frequent as many would like, but the Government are certainly determined to build on it.

[Matthew Pennycook]

We recognise that Ministers meet tenants and tenant representatives frequently. My concern is that if tenants on the advisory panel have an issue that they feel is sufficiently serious that they need to bring it to the attention of Ministers, rather than the regulator, they should not have to rely on attempting to get a meeting with Ministers. There should be a mechanism through which they can put serious issues on the desk of the Secretary of State or the Minister if they feel that they, as well as the regulator, need to know about them. That is the point we are trying to address with amendment 14.

On amendment 15, I understand the Minister’s concerns about being too prescriptive, but I urge the Government to go away and think again about the membership of the advisory panel. I appreciate fully the need to have a diverse panel, but as I read clause 2(4), there is nothing on the face of the Bill to prevent the Government from putting one tenant or tenant representative on the panel and leaving it at that. There is no minimum quota for tenants, and we want tenant voices to be properly represented.

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[Matthew Pennycook]

I will be brief, but there is an issue that we want to highlight in relation to clause 5, which is about the relationship between the regulator and housing ombudsman. Clause 5 amends the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008 and the Housing Act 1996 to add measures on the relationship between the two bodies, so that they can exchange information quickly and effectively to provide better protection for tenants, all of which is entirely to the good and uncontroversial. However, consideration of the clause provides me with an opportunity to seek clarification from the Minister about the precise role of each body in the reformed regulatory regime that the Bill establishes.

Taken at face value, the role of each body is clearly delineated: the regulator regulates registered providers in England, while the housing ombudsman seeks to resolve complaints from individual residents about their registered provider. The regulator operates on a top-down basis, and the housing ombudsman operates on a bottom-up basis. However, when one considers how the reformed regulatory regime will operate in practice, things start to appear somewhat more complicated.

First, if my reading of the Bill is correct, the regulator appears to be able to intervene in individual complaints. Clause 31, for example, enables the regulator to arrange for an authorised person to take emergency remedial action in respect of individual premises following completion of a survey. Presumably, it is therefore necessary for the regulator to receive a complaint from a tenant who fears they are at risk of an imminent serious health and safety risk. Otherwise, how could the regulator order the necessary survey of a given premises? It may be that that is not the case, and it will be for the ombudsman to refer an individual complaint to the regulator to allow them to make use of the provisions in clause 31; if that is the case, it is not clear from the Bill.

Secondly, following revisions to the housing ombudsman scheme enacted in September 2020, the ombudsman has a responsibility to publish a complaint handling code, enjoys a new power to issue complaint handling failure orders that can relate to a landlord’s overall complaint-handling policy and, crucially, has the ability to investigate beyond an initial complaint to establish whether evidence might indicate a systemic failing by a registered provider. It may be that the ombudsman can address such systemic failings on the part of registered providers on the basis of suggested changes to their policies only with the regulator responsible for exploring whether changes to their systems are necessary, but again that is not immediately clear in the Bill.

[Eddie Hughes]

I understand the point that the hon. Gentleman is making, but it is based on the premise that these bodies operate in a completely siloed fashion. The relationship between them is a fluid one; they speak regularly and consider complaints and points that have been raised, which come to them from either direction. They work in a collaborative fashion and are then able to identify who should best proceed with a particular case. Obviously, it is governed by a memorandum of understanding, but it is a much more fluid and collaborative arrangement than that.

[Matthew Pennycook]

I thank the hon. Gentleman, and I fully understand his point. I met with senior staff from the housing ombudsman yesterday, and we were talking precisely about the ways in which the respective roles operate and how they could be clarified. What these examples seek to illustrate is that there is still an obvious risk of overlap and duplication of roles in respect of these two bodies. One could argue, as the hon. Gentleman just has, that those issues can be resolved by means of updating the non-statutory memorandum of understanding that already sets out the functions of both organisations and how they work together, but that throws up two distinct issues in and of itself.

First, is it appropriate for us to leave these matters to the two bodies themselves to resolve, rather than clarifying on the face of the Bill the precise role of each body in the new regulatory regime, so as to avoid the duplication of functions and potential gaps in coverage—even if only in the short term, before they update that memorandum of understanding to reflect the new regulatory system of proactive consumer regulation?

Secondly, I am sure that hon. Members have been contacted by tenants who are aware that the Bill is progressing through the House. The expectations around the Bill are such that, after it receives Royal Assent, tenants who feel that they have not secured appropriate redress by means of a standard complaint to their landlord and believe that their grievance might be systemic in nature will understandably be uncertain about whether they should approach the ombudsman or the regulator with their complaint. I appreciate that the Department is alive to the risk, has produced guidance in the form of a fact sheet and is apparently delivering a communications campaign to tenants so that they know where to go and are well informed but, without greater clarity prior to Royal Assent about the precise roles of each body in the regime established by the Bill, I fear that neither will be sufficient to prevent a large degree of confusion. When debating this matter in the other place, Baroness Scott of Bybrook conceded that fears about confusion of the kind that I alluded to are legitimate, and that greater clarity is required as a result; yet, despite her promise to take the matter back to the Department, the Government are not amending the Bill to provide greater clarity or committing to take any further concrete steps—that I am aware of, at least—to ensure that confusion will be avoided.

As Shelter and others have argued, it is essential that the roles of the regulator and the housing ombudsman are clearly defined, that tenants and tenant groups understand the appropriate way to make complaints and that any complaints process or system is easy to use, accessible and effective. I would be grateful if the Minister provided greater clarity today and, if not today, in writing. I hope that, in general terms, she will assure me that the issues that I have highlighted will be both considered and acted on by the Department before the Bill receives Royal Assent.

Social Housing and Regulation Bill [ LORDS ] (Second sitting)

Eddie Hughes Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 29th November 2022 Public Bill Committees

[Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Dehenna Davison]

Two to choose from—I give way to my hon. Friend the Member for Harrow, East.

[Dehenna Davison]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I will respond to him and then perhaps I will have answered the question that my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall North wanted to ask. It is right that the regulator must have the right powers in place to deal with breaches of its standards. With regard to competence and conduct, the Bill enables the regulator to require providers to produce and implement a performance improvement plan to be approved by the regulator. If a provider fails to implement a plan, the regulator can issue an enforcement notice and levy an unlimited fine if that notice is not complied with. So the regulator will have teeth to ensure the kind of conduct that we expect. I hope that that answers the question from one hon. Friend.

[Eddie Hughes]

Anyone who has listened to the Grenfell Tower inquiry—especially the podcast, which provides a great summary of the challenges that were faced—will know that a number of tenants encountered members of staff who simply were not appropriately qualified to carry out their role. As a result, the tenants did not get the experience, support and help that they so rightly deserved. So, while I fully appreciate that it is appropriate to recruit for aptitude—this is a vocational area for many—it is incredibly appropriate to make sure that staff are trained for their role.

[Dehenna Davison]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. His expertise on this matter is welcome to all of us, and I thank him for all the work that he did as Minister on this really important body of work. He is right. That is why we have taken this away and are looking at what more we can do around professional qualifications, without that risk of reclassification. I hope that, following Committee stage, I will be able to report on what progress we have made before we reach Report stage.

It is important that we get this process right. We will continue the dialogue that we have already started with key stakeholders such as Grenfell United, Shelter and the CIH before we issue a statutory consultation on the direction itself. The regulator will then also consult on its draft standard before it comes into force. This Committee can be assured of our intent to take on board fully the views of both tenants and providers in developing the way forward. I have already spoken a little about compliance and sanctions if standards are not complied with, so I will leave that point there.

To summarise, the Government’s ambition is to build an empathetic, qualified and skilled social housing workforce. We want to bring about a wholesale organisational and cultural change, which we all recognise is desperately needed. We remain firm in our belief that our approach and the clause will deliver the professionalisation of the social housing sector, but we will of course continue to explore options for qualification requirements that would not trigger reclassification and would deliver the right outcomes for tenants. I commend the clause to the Committee and, on the basis of what I have outlined, I ask the shadow Minister not to move his new clause.

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[Matthew Pennycook]

At the outset, I should thank the Greater Manchester Law Centre for its support in drafting the new clause, the purpose of which is to probe the Government’s rationale for not using the Bill to bring registered providers of social housing within the scope of the Freedom of Information Act—other than local authorities, which, as the Minister rightly said, are already subject to it—and to press the Government to reconsider.

As the Minister is no doubt aware, this matter has been a perennial cause of concern. In 2011, the coalition Government announced that they would consult housing associations on bringing them within the scope of the Act; however, no further action was taken—almost certainly as a result of housing associations objecting. The issue resurfaced in the wake of the Grenfell Tower fire as a result of the Information Commissioner’s Office reporting to Parliament that it had experienced difficulties in accessing information relating to social housing and to the Kensington and Chelsea Tenant Management Organisation because the information was not covered by the Freedom of Information Act. The Information Commissioner at the time, Elizabeth Denham, made it clear that

“housing Associations are currently not subject to Freedom of Information Act because the Act does not designate them as public bodies. It is clear to me that this is a significant gap in the public’s right to know”.

We believe that she was right to highlight that gap, which remains to this day.

It is not simply that the public do not enjoy rights that they have never had; in the cases of housing associations that have had local authority stock transferred to their management, tenants and the public have lost freedom of information rights that they previously enjoyed when those homes were under local authority control. As I expected, the Minister has made the case that the issues are addressed by the provisions in clause 22 relating to information and transparency; however, those provisions are limited both in scope and specificity in terms of who may request the disclosure of information—it would appear that only tenants themselves have access to it, while journalists and others would not—and how the scheme will operate in practice.

[Eddie Hughes]

Perhaps the Minister can clarify this, but I understood that it was not just tenants, but people who were acting on their behalf. Can we confirm that? [Interruption.]

[The Chair]

Order. There is a Division in the House, so we will have to break for 15 minutes or so. We will resume as quickly as people can get back.

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[Eddie Hughes]

The hon. Lady makes a valid point. That is why we will do customer satisfaction surveys that have been agreed with the regulator. The format has been agreed. We will be able to compare housing associations and their relative performance in order to drill down and improve that performance. I understand her point, but the Government are making significant strides with the regulator to try to drive up customer and tenant engagement to ensure that we are genuinely getting the opinion of the majority, rather than a minority.

[Siobhain McDonagh]

That is not possible. We cannot construct a customer survey as emphatic or successful as that, because we have a broad span of residents and tenants, with different lives that determine whether they fill in forms. We as politicians, and people who deliver leaflets and get others to do so on our behalf, know that some people will always respond and others never will, even if, objectively speaking, they need to do so.

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[Dehenna Davison]

As the shadow Minister rightly outlined, new clause 5 seeks to ensure representation of tenants and councillors on the board of registered providers. While I agree with the sentiment behind the amendment—that we must ensure that the voice of social housing tenants is heard loud and clear in matters that affect them—I am afraid I must disagree that it is the best approach to take. 

Tenants speak from their lived experience, which can bring a different and valuable perspective to that of other board members. They should be listened to at all stages of decision making. However, we do not think that mandating the inclusion of a tenant board member is necessarily the best way to achieve that aim.

[Eddie Hughes]

I have some experience of this, having been a councillor representative on the board of Walsall Housing Group at a time when it was a prescribed position. I distinctly remember a couple of instances prior to my being on the board when the Conservative spot was decided by random voting or people having been coerced into filling it. That seemed completely inappropriate.

When I became chair of the board of that group, we took a different view—to adopt a skills-based approach, determining that some of the skills would be best met by those who had experience of being a tenant. It was not prescribed that we were saving places for tenants; it just became a natural order of business that they would have the appropriate skills and experience to fill some of the vacancies on the board. Speaking from personal experience, too prescriptive an approach can sometimes lead to unintended consequences: people filling a place just because they need somebody under a certain heading to fill it.

[Dehenna Davison]

I thank my hon. Friend for setting out his own experience. It is an area the Government are very concerned about, and it comes back to the Committee’s debate today about how prescriptive we should be in the Bill.

Some housing providers already have tenants on boards, and they have been effective in championing residents’ voices, but this is not the case for everyone. Tenant board members are required to put their legal duties as a board member before their role as the representative for residents, which can cause confusion and conflict. Other structures can be just as successful and involve a more diverse range of tenants in decision making. That can range from formal consultations, focus groups and local events to appointed board observers and membership of panels focused on scrutiny, procurement or complaints that feed in at all stages of the decision-making process. We want to retain a flexible approach that promotes tenant empowerment and engagement for all tenants without forcing the statutory duties of a board member on a single individual.

The Regulator of Social Housing already sets standards for the outcomes that landlords must achieve in respect of tenant engagement. It will review, consult and update them as part of the new consumer regulation regime. The regulator will also ask landlords to demonstrate how they engage with tenants and require them to report on tenant satisfaction measures, as part of their assessment and inspection of landlords in the new regime. That is important because for the first time it makes tenants’ experiences a measure by which housing providers will be judged and held to account by the regulator.

There will also be improved transparency measures for tenants to be able hold their landlord to account. They need to know how it is performing and what decisions it is making. That information needs to be easily available. Earlier today we touched on the access to information scheme that we will introduce. That will enable tenants of private registered providers to request information from their landlords.

In addition, we have made funding available for a residents’ opportunities and empowerment programme, which will provide training to residents across the country on how to engage effectively and hold landlords to account. I hope that I have provided enough reassurance for the shadow Minister to withdraw his new clause.

[Matthew Pennycook]

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

In rising to speak to the final new clause, I thank hon. Members for their indulgence. They have listened to me a lot today.

[Eddie Hughes]

Quality stuff!

[Matthew Pennycook]

Absolutely right.

We finish with an important new clause. It relates to what comes under the rubric of consumer standards as defined by the Bill. Since its initial publication in June, the Bill has been improved in several important respects. Today we have urged the Government to go further in relation to some areas and we will continue to do so, but we welcome the introduction of the consumer standards in relation to safety, transparency, competence and conduct.

However, there are other matters of real importance to social tenants that the Bill, as drafted, does not extend new consumer standards to. They include major repairs or improvement works, estate regeneration, service charges, advice and assistance in relation to the prevention of homelessness and urgent moves resulting from the risk of domestic abuse or serious violence.

New clause 6 simply seeks to ensure that the regulator has the freedom to set standards for registered providers in respect of each of those areas of housing management by amending section 193 of the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008 to include them within the scope of what is considered a consumer matter.

There is arguably a need for the regulator to carry out a thorough consultation about consumer standards to better understand what housing management issues currently matter most to tenants. However, we know both from organisations providing housing support, guidance and expert advice services and, I would argue, from our own postbags, that the issues covered by new clause 6 are important to tenants. There is an arguable case for placing them in the Bill to at least allow the regulator, which has probably consulted and developed them, to set consumer standards in relation to some of these issues at a later date. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

Social Housing (Regulation) Bill [Lords]

Eddie Hughes Excerpts

Report stage
Wednesday 1st March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Matthew Pennycook]

I start by thanking the Clerks, the House staff, and Library specialists for facilitating our debates on this important piece of legislation, and all the external organisations—including Shelter, the Chartered Institute of Housing, and the Greater Manchester Law Centre—that have engaged extensively with us on it.

[Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con)]

Will the shadow Minister give way?

[Matthew Pennycook]

I will.

[Eddie Hughes]

I apologise for the very early intervention, but as the Minister who was partly responsible for overseeing the transition from White Paper to Bill, I just wanted to thank the incredible team who sit behind the Minister in the Box for their work. I see some very familiar faces, belonging to some very committed individuals, and I was certainly very grateful for their contribution. I am sure the Minister was, too.

[Matthew Pennycook]

I welcome the hon. Gentleman’s intervention. I certainly thank that team, and I thank him for all the work he has done in this area as well.

I also thank the Minister for the constructive tone with which she has approached the legislation, as well as all hon. Members who have contributed to our proceedings at all stages, particularly those who took the Bill so ably through Committee. Lastly, I pay tribute on behalf of the Opposition to the work of Grenfell United and the Grenfell Foundation, which have pushed at every turn for this legislation to come forward and to ensure it is strengthened, and to the family of Awaab Ishak, who with dignity and fortitude have campaigned for—and will now have secured—a change in the law that I have no doubt will save lives.

We know from the circumstances leading up to the Grenfell Tower fire, those surrounding the death of Awaab Ishak, and countless other appalling cases that never attracted media attention that poorly maintained and managed social housing can literally kill. That is why it is so important that we overhaul the regulation of social housing, and that this Bill passes. It is almost six years since 72 men, women and children lost their lives at Grenfell. More than four and a half years have passed since the Green Paper was issued, and more than two have passed since the White Paper was published. There is no question that it took the Government far too long to bring us to this moment, but we are extremely pleased that this necessary and urgently required Bill will complete its remaining Commons stages today.

The Opposition were determined to see the Bill strengthened in a number of areas, so that standards in social housing markedly and rapidly improve, tenants are able to pursue effective redress, and those tenants are empowered and their voices truly listened to. We welcome the various concessions and revisions that the Government have made, which without question have improved the Bill. However, as things stand, we do not believe that it is the most robust piece of legislation that this House could have delivered for tenants. We support the passage of the Bill tonight, because millions of those living in social homes across England need action now to address the plight of poor conditions and neglect and negligence at the hands of their landlords, but we hope that the Government will reflect further on the compelling arguments we have made for changes to further strengthen this vital piece of legislation.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read the Third time and passed, with amendments.