Oral Answers to Questions

Joe Powell Excerpts

Monday 7th April 2025 Commons Chamber

[Matthew Pennycook]

The hon. Member will forgive me, but I am not going to comment on the specifics of the case she raises. We are giving serious consideration to how we better utilise public land in general, particularly in areas with constrained land allocation such as her own.

[Joe Powell (Kensington and Bayswater) (Lab)]

More than half my constituency casework consists of substandard repairs, poor quality communications from social landlords, and damp and mould. That is why this week I am launching a new safe and healthy homes campaign in Kensington and Bayswater. Will the Minister outline how the Government will work with councils and housing associations, ahead of changes in the law and policy frameworks such as Awaab’s law, to improve standards for social tenants, including in my constituency?

[Matthew Pennycook]

We are working closely with the sector and talking through how we can best implement reforms such as Awaab’s law and our intended overhaul of the decent homes standard. As I said in a previous question, all resident providers of social housing are required to deliver the outcomes of regulatory standards that are set by the independent regulator. The independent regulator has powers at its disposal to identify when serious failings are taking place.

Local Government Finances: London

Joe Powell Excerpts

Wednesday 26th March 2025 Westminster Hall

[Rachel Blake]

No.

Let us come to the matter at hand. I would like to talk about temporary accommodation costs, special educational needs and the specific challenges of managing the visitor economy in the very centre of London.

[Joe Powell (Kensington and Bayswater) (Lab)]

On the specific challenges for central London, does my hon. Friend agree that Westminster council is making the right decision to make use of the new council tax powers to implement a premium for second home owners? Will she join me in encouraging Kensington and Chelsea council to look at doing the same? That could raise £11 million a year, but is not currently the council’s position.

[Rachel Blake]

I am delighted to celebrate the work that Westminster city council does on tackling the challenges we face as a visitor economy. I am not sure how much Kensington and Chelsea council would appreciate me joining my hon. Friend’s campaign, but I certainly will, because it is for the best for the very centre of London.

Last year, Westminster city council spent £95 million on temporary accommodation, and the City of London’s temporary accommodation costs increased 52% to £1.1 million. I am very proud of the investment that Westminster city council is choosing to make to insource temporary accommodation. It is a real pioneer in that. However, we are doing it in a very challenging environment in terms of overall costs. I acknowledge the challenges that my outer London colleagues face because of the number of families moving to that area. We very much want those families to stay in the centre of London, and I hope that some of the solutions we will put forward will make sure that that happens.

On special educational needs, the number of pupils on education, health and care plans increased by 37%—from 1,035 to 1,413—between 2018 and 2024. None of those children and families deserves to have to go through such a difficult approach to securing a special educational needs plan, and every single one of them deserves the security and certainty that investment in their education will continue in the future.

I turn to the specific challenges of the very centre of London. We have higher additional street-cleaning costs, and Westminster has just invested £2 million in tackling the additional antisocial behaviour that we face. What can we do about that? The Government have made great progress, with £2 billion announced today for 18,000 new genuinely affordable homes, core spending power up by 5.3%, and multi-year settlements, which will make such a big difference. However, we can go further. Let us bring forward the short-term lets registration scheme and pilot it in Cities of London and Westminster. Let us review the formula so that it does not have to be uncertain and complex, and let us tackle the temporary accommodation crisis for good. Imagine what that would do for those families. Imagine what it would do to life chances. Imagine what it would do to public finances when we are not pouring money into a poor-quality private rented sector, but building the genuinely affordable homes that our country and our city need.

Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Joe Powell Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 24th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Chris Curtis (Milton Keynes North) (Lab)]

I thank the people across Government and from the Department who have worked so hard to pull this Bill together quite quickly. I also thank the hon. Member for Taunton and Wellington (Gideon Amos) for the first shout out to Milton Keynes in the debate. Hon. Members may be about to hear many more.

In politics we all like to talk about our own stories and how they have impacted us. I have sat on these Benches and heard the Education Secretary talk about how her education has helped her in life, and the Health Secretary talk about how his interactions with the NHS during his cancer diagnosis drive him to fix our health service. What is important to my life—I believe this is true of most young people’s lives—is having a decent home surrounded by a decent community.

Milton Keynes, my home town, was founded the last time an Act of Parliament was passed to make this country build 300,000 homes a year. Its pioneers pushed hard to get the place built, which meant that my parents were able to bring up my brother and me in a spacious home with our own back garden, giving us the security and stability needed for the best start in life. It meant that I could play safely in green spaces, I had access to excellent local amenities and my family could live affordably with a good quality of life. That is the kind of opportunity that every child in Britain deserves, so it is great to see legislation that will finally begin to remove the barriers to building the new homes that this country so desperately needs.

With the changes to development corporations and CPOs, we may also see the new towns that this country so desperately needs. The proposals for planning committees will play a key role in ensuring that much-needed developments do not get stuck in unnecessary bureaucracy and political gridlock.

[Joe Powell (Kensington and Bayswater) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that local people will still have a role in developing local plans and in many of the more complicated planning applications? Some of what we have heard today around local input has been scaremongering.

[Chris Curtis]

That is true. Certainty is incredibly important to enable the housing sector to invest in the skills, development and modern methods of construction that will enable us to alleviate the country’s housing crisis.

Beyond housing, we must recognise that our failure to build vital infrastructure in Britain is leaving our country vulnerable. Our energy security—the foundation of our national security—depends on having infrastructure to support a modern, productive economy. We have failed to build the transport links that are needed to get goods and people moving efficiently. We have failed to build the energy infrastructure that is needed to reduce our dependence on volatile foreign oil and gas, and we have not built a single reservoir in decades, meaning that we lack the water security that is required in the face of climate change.

--- Later in debate ---

[Joe Powell (Kensington and Bayswater) (Lab)]

Nothing symbolises the drift and decline of the past 14 years more than the appalling state of planning and infrastructure in Britain: a housing crisis that has forced children to live in overcrowded and unsafe homes; an energy crisis that has left us dangerously exposed to shocks in the global energy market; and a litany of infrastructure failures. It is not just the reservoirs or the £120 million spent on the Tory bat tunnel for HS2, but the promised 40 new hospitals by 2030—a claim now exposed as fiction with funds not allocated, many schemes not new hospitals, and a tiny fraction due to complete on time. I can see in my constituency the direct impact that that failure, especially on housing, has on my residents. I admire the commitment of the shadow Minister, who has just left his place, to the spreadsheet that he has been quoting from throughout the debate. He seems to have missed the line in the spreadsheet that states the number of times the previous Government hit their housing target—precisely zero.

There are nearly 3,000 people on the waiting list for social housing in the Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, and more than 2,000 in temporary accommodation. Behind those numbers are stories of daily struggle, like Sansha and her five children who live next to Grenfell Tower. Her son is in a wheelchair and awaiting open-heart surgery for his life-limiting condition. They live on the top floor, and the lift frequently breaks. There is no heating, no reliable hot water and just one working bathroom. They have been waiting more than three years for a move to a suitable property.

Then there is Lacey, whose six-year-old daughter has autism—and has tried to jump out of a window twice. Despite repeated safeguarding warnings, the family remains in overcrowded and unsafe housing. Then there is another resident I met recently who spent more than 15 years out of the borough with her children before moving back. There are more than 164,000 children living in temporary accommodation in England, the highest number on record. Instead of tackling the root causes, as the Bill seeks to do, we poured money into managing the problem.

[Joy Morrissey]

The hon. Gentleman makes an excellent point about temporary accommodation and the lack of housing availability. But why have the housing targets for London, which has some of the highest levels of unmet social housing accommodation need, not been raised to deal with overcrowding?

[Joe Powell]

I thank the hon. Lady for that point. The housing target for London is 88,000. She will know well that the previous target was never remotely close to being hit under the previous Government. With targets not being hit, we are interested in net new dwellings: affordable and social housing for the people I am most concerned about in my constituency. That is what the Bill will help to achieve.

I am delighted that we finally have a Government who have the ambition to tackle the problem. On energy, I am pleased that the Bill will deliver faster and more certain planning consent for critical infrastructure, including upgrading our electricity networks and maximising new clean energy sources. The Bill will move us on decisively from the era of the onshore wind ban, plummeting investment, and reliance on Putin and his fossil fuel oligarchs. If we are serious about speeding up delivery, however, we must address the capacity crisis in planning departments, so it is welcome that the Government have committed to 300 new planners. What assessment has been made of the total need for planners across the country to get to the level of approvals we need to meet our housing targets? Can the planning fee reform in the Bill support that recruitment through full cost recovery? We know that planning reform must be matched by the people and resources needed to make it work.

[Nesil Caliskan]

I thank my hon. Friend for his speech and for highlighting the gaps that exist in local government. I am sure he will recognise that, as the Local Government Association and the National Housing Federation have said, only 80% of local authorities have the capacity at the moment—in fact, it could be far less. Does he agree that that is a real concern?

--- Later in debate ---

[Joe Powell]

I could not agree more. That is why the devolution of fee setting is so important. It should enable an improvement in the capacity of planning departments and the training for councillors on planning committees to make those decisions effectively.

I also thank all the resident associations in my constituency who put time and effort into engaging in the planning system and who are passionate about making it work for our community. Their role will continue in the local plan and in applications that rise to the planning committee, contrary to some of the scaremongering we have heard in the debate.

The Bill sits alongside other crucial housing measures that the Government are taking, including the biggest investment in social and affordable housing in a generation, leasehold reform, stronger protection for renters, a new decent homes standard and the implementation of Awaab’s law. If we are serious about tackling the housing crisis, this ambition must also be reflected in the comprehensive spending review—this is not just day-to-day spending, but long-term public investment. That is exactly why the Chancellor took the bold decisions in the Budget to increase the capital available for investment and reverse more than a decade of under-investment and short-termism. I would therefore welcome any clarification from the Minister on the total investment in the CSR needed to meet our housing targets, in particular on the affordable and social component.

Advancing the Bill alongside new investment in the CSR could be transformative. We owe it to the constituents I mentioned earlier—to Sansha, Lacey and the thousands of children trapped in unsuitable and unsafe housing—to get this right. It will be a landmark legacy of this Labour Government to finally get Britain building again.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)]

I am going to try to get everybody in. If interventions are taken, some people are going to lose out on being called to speak. Please keep that in mind.

Political Finance Rules

Joe Powell Excerpts

Thursday 6th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Joe Powell (Kensington and Bayswater) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for South Dorset (Lloyd Hatton), who plays an instrumental role in the all-party parliamentary group on anti-corruption and responsible tax, for securing this important debate.

I was really proud to stand on a manifesto commitment to strengthen the rules on donations to political parties, and I welcome the Government�s commitment to bring forward an elections Bill in due course. I hope today�s debate will help inform what is in that future Bill, because as others have said, restoring trust in our political system and ensuring that everyone has a voice in the decisions that affect their lives is absolutely crucial to British democracy.

We know from international evidence the risk of allowing ever increasing amounts of money to dominate politics. I lived in Washington DC for almost 10 years and saw at first hand the impact of that system, including the world�s richest man spending a quarter of a billion dollars to bankroll the last election. When billionaires and corporate interests drown out the voices of everyone else, we should not be surprised that people lose faith in democracy working for them. It continues to amaze me that representatives of Reform, who unsurprisingly have not turned up for this debate, seem eager to take that approach to politics. They preach populism on the one hand, while courting foreign billionaires and their policy agendas on the other. That is not in keeping with British values.

But this is also about places such as Moldova and other countries where we have seen Russian operatives shipping money in to buy elections. We should not be complacent. Other Members have covered the threat to the UK, and I would like to pay tribute to Transparency International UK, Spotlight on Corruption and all the other great organisations helping to shine a light on the issue. I will move on swiftly to some areas on which I hope the Minister will consider reforms: transparency, company donations, the Electoral Commission and a cap.

On transparency, unincorporated associations, as we have heard, are particularly vulnerable to abuse. Since 2010, over �40 million has come through unincorporated associations and we have no idea where 95% of that money came from. As it stands, they are not required to check that those who donate to them are permissible, so they could be foreign donors. They are easy to set up, we do not know who are behind them and there are no transparency requirements in law for donations to candidates, as opposed to political parties or campaigners. I hope that in a future elections Bill, the Government will introduce reforms to clamp down on those loopholes, including provisions on identifying people responsible for unincorporated associations, permissibility checks for political donations and lower reporting thresholds.

We have already heard that company donations are a big issue. I fully endorse the proposals made on the issue by my hon. Friend the Member for South Dorset.

Thirdly, we need robust independent oversight and to restore the independence of the Electoral Commission. We need an urgent review of the requirement for the commission to submit a strategy and policy statement to the Government. I believe that was part of an entirely confected agenda on voter fraud in the Elections Act 2022. I hope we will repeal that as soon as possible.

Finally, I believe it is now time to consider caps on political donations. The previous Government�s massive increase in spending limits and the increasing reliance on major donors has convinced me that a well-enforced cap would be healthy for our democracy.

This is an issue that should unite us as a House. It is about the health of our democracy. There is a lot more we need to do: votes at 16, automatic voter registration, improving citizenship education, and ensuring citizens have a voice between elections and not just at them. But on this particular issue, with trust so low, it is vital that we act urgently.

Grenfell Tower Inquiry: Phase 2 Report

Joe Powell Excerpts

Wednesday 26th February 2025 Commons Chamber

[Angela Rayner]

I thank the hon. Member for his commitment and support in taking forward the recommendations that came from the inquiry. I thank him for his comments about ensuring that we take decisions about the future of Grenfell in the most sensitive of ways. I absolutely agree with him, and I am committed to taking the next steps respectfully and carefully with the community. I continue to support the independent Grenfell Tower Memorial Commission as the community choose a design team to work with them on designing a memorial.

I agree that it is a priority for us to work at pace because the work is urgent. We are working as quickly as we possibly can. Some of the inquiry recommendations are wide-reaching and some will require further work, including public consultation, before they can be delivered. However, where we can work quickly, such as with the machinery of Government change—moving responsibility for fire to my Department—we are committed to doing that.

I hope the hon. Gentleman heard my words on the acceleration of remediation and our action plan. As I hope was reflected in my response, I agree entirely with his comments about commerciality not taking precedent or having any control over safety. Safety must come first and this Government are committed to that.

[Joe Powell (Kensington and Bayswater) (Lab)]

I thank the Deputy Prime Minister for her statement today and the Prime Minister for his statement on 4 September, which made it clear that the lessons from Grenfell are central to this Government’s missions. Today is another painful step towards truth, justice and change for the bereaved families of the 72 people who lost their lives at Grenfell, the survivors and the community in my constituency of Kensington and Bayswater, many of whom have joined us today. I pay tribute again to their strength and resilience.

The fight for justice, now nearly eight years long, will continue after today, and every day, until we have criminal prosecutions and true accountability for those responsible, including those companies referenced in the inquiry report. I know the Government have looked seriously at the inquiry recommendations, and I welcome the commitment to meaningful change across all of them, but too often recommendations from public inquiries fail to be implemented. Indeed, if the lessons from previous fires had been learned, including at Lakanal House in 2009, then lives would have been saved—this was avoidable. Will the Deputy Prime Minister assure me that the Government will consider a strong oversight mechanism to ensure accountability for implementing what has been set out today, so that it lasts beyond any one Government and leads to real change?

Will she also provide further detail on how she plans to ensure accountability for the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, given their culpability before, during and after the fire? The council’s culture desperately needs to change and there needs to be an improvement in the quality of services in our community today.

[Angela Rayner]

I thank and pay tribute to my hon. Friend for the way he has constructively challenged and worked with us on behalf of his constituents. I know this report has great personal significance for his constituents, and I pay tribute to his dedicated work as an advocate in calling for truth, justice and change for the Grenfell community.

I agree that robust oversight of the Government’s implementation of the response is essential for this, and for all public inquiries. The system needs to be improved and we are taking forward the inquiry’s recommendations on oversight. We will create a publicly accessible record on gov.uk of recommendations made by public inquiries since 2024, and we will consider making that a legal requirement as part of a wider review of the inquiry’s framework.

On the Grenfell inquiry recommendations, my Department will publish quarterly progress updates on gov.uk until they have all been delivered. We will report annually to Parliament to enable Members to scrutinise our progress and hold us to account.

On my hon. Friend’s comments about the council, the council failed in some of its most fundamental duties to keep residents safe, to listen to their concerns and to respond effectively when disaster struck. The council was right to apologise, but it is clear that more must be done. I have welcomed the council’s commitment to improvement and culture change, and I have set my challenge to the leader of the council to ensure that those improvements are a reality felt by the council’s residents. I will continue to engage and keep an eye on that progress.

Proportional Representation: General Elections

Joe Powell Excerpts

Thursday 30th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Joe Powell (Kensington and Bayswater) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central and Headingley (Alex Sobel), and the hon. Members for Hazel Grove (Lisa Smart) and for North Herefordshire (Ellie Chowns), for securing this debate.

As Members have mentioned, we met thousands of voters face to face in the general election campaign, and by far the most depressing conversations I had were with the many people who had lost trust in our Government institutions, our politicians and our democratic process. I absolutely do not think the voters are to blame for that loss of trust, which is partly due to the last decade, in which a chaotic Government lurched from crisis to crisis; to corruption scandals; and to the decline of local services. That drove a lot of people to opt out of the election, resulting in the poor turnout figures to which Members have referred—the lowest for 20 years. I do not think that is because of apathy; alienation from our political system is a fundamental threat to our democracy.

I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Exeter (Steve Race) that we should not for one minute think that electoral reform alone will solve this issue. The central task of this Government is to deliver rising living standards, rising wages and improved public services. That will help restore the electorate’s faith in politics, and faith that the Government will deliver on things that people care about.

[Mr Mohindra]

How does the hon. Gentleman think his party is doing on those criteria?

[Joe Powell]

We have record levels of investment, record rises in wages and the fastest-growing economy in Europe. The upgrades from the International Monetary Fund and the OECD speak for themselves.

The issue that we are focusing on today, fixing our democratic plumbing, matters too. The Prime Minister said that restoring trust in politics is the

“battle that defines our age”,

and I believe that we can earn that trust by ensuring that people feel heard and have a say in decisions that affect their lives.

[Paul Holmes]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way on that point?

[Joe Powell]

I will make a bit of progress.

We need to ensure that the voice of the people matters. That is the foundation of my belief in electoral reform: if done right, with appropriate models for different levels of government, it can help to rebuild faith in our democratic system so that we do not end up being more polarised, with more alienation, which leads to extreme politics and populism.

I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Welwyn Hatfield (Andrew Lewin) that today is not the time to go into models, but I think we can retain the constituency link and expand choice, as in the Australian model, which gives local winners a degree of preference from a majority of the voters in their district through ranked choice voting. An excellent analysis from Lewis Baston on Sam Freedman’s website explains how the Australian model could be appropriate for us. It is easily understood and encourages engagement across the spectrum, beyond the swing voters that otherwise become the predominant focus of elections.

Although I support electoral reform for Westminster elections, there is a straightforward policy change that the Government should consider immediately: restoring the ranked choice voting system for mayoral elections. That system worked perfectly well in London and other mayoralties, because it allows voters to express preferences and ensures that winners have broad support. Its removal was a regressive and self-interested step—it failed in London—by the previous Government, who actively tried to reduce voter choice and participation. I hope the Government will consider restoring that system in any future elections Bill that is being discussed.

Finally, I will briefly address another threat to our democracy that the APPG for fair elections is focusing on: the role of foreign billionaires in distorting political discourse, and the risk of overseas donations into our politics. There are still far too many loopholes in our electoral financing rules, leaving us vulnerable to foreign interference. I hope the Government will consider implementing reforms to address these serious issues in any future elections Bill, because if we are serious about defending democracy, we need transparency and safeguards against those with deep pockets who seek to warp our democratic institutions.

Our current system is failing to command public trust. That is the foundation of my belief in electoral reform. If we continue down this path, we risk losing something far greater than individual elections; we risk losing people’s faith in democracy itself. I am confident that our Government will deliver on their key missions, which will go a long way towards restoring the public’s trust and confidence, but our democratic plumbing matters too, and it is time for an upgrade.

Building Homes

Joe Powell Excerpts

Thursday 12th December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I call Joe Powell, another Select Committee member.

[Joe Powell (Kensington and Bayswater) (Lab)]

I welcome the statement and especially welcome what the Minister said about affordable homes, given the dismal numbers that were provided under the Conservatives. Those 1.3 million people on the waiting list deserve a voice in our planning system too, and I only wish the Opposition would recognise that.

What approach will the Minister take when there are multiple local plans, for example the London plan and the London borough plans? How will the targets be worked out between those different plans?

[Matthew Pennycook]

As my hon. Friend may know, the new method produces a figure for London of nearly 88,000. That is more than double recent delivery, and it constitutes the biggest proposed percentage increase against delivery in any region in the country by a significant margin. We expect London to step up and improve its housing delivery record. As for my hon. Friend’s specific question, it will be for London and the Mayor to consider how the aggregate local housing numbers are distributed across the whole of London. Because there is a spatial plan in the form of the London plan, the targets for individual London boroughs need to be viewed in that context. The same cannot be said for other parts of the country.

Grenfell Tower Inquiry

Joe Powell Excerpts

Monday 2nd December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Joe Powell (Kensington and Bayswater) (Lab)]

It is now more than seven and a half years since 72 people lost their lives at Grenfell Tower in my constituency in north Kensington. It was a greater loss of life than any terrorist attack in London’s history. That is seven and a half years of no justice, and seven and a half years of no meaningful change. It was a tragedy that was entirely preventable, and entirely foreseen. To our shame as a country, and as the recent fire in Dagenham showed, it could happen again today.

As the Grenfell inquiry sets out, the fire occurred because individuals and organisations were systematically dishonest, put profit before lives and were part of a system and culture that too often denies agency and power to those living in social housing in this country. I pay tribute to the next of kin, bereaved, survivors and our community, many of whom have joined us here today, for their resilience and strength in continuing to fight for truth, justice and change. I know that with each hearing, each story, each Government announcement and each new promise of change, they are forced to relive the horrific events of that night, and I know that today will be painful, too. Their voices must remain at the heart of this Government’s response and of all future decisions about Grenfell. I hope I speak for the whole House when I say to them that justice will only truly be served when there are criminal prosecutions and those responsible pay the price.

I welcome the Prime Minister’s apology on 4 September on behalf of the British state, and I thank Sir Martin Moore-Bick and the whole inquiry team. The report is an important step in uncovering the truth of what happened that night, who was responsible and what must be done to ensure that such a tragedy is never repeated, but the path to justice is long and we are far from the end. In recent meetings with the then Minister for Courts and Legal Services, my hon. Friend the Member for Swindon South (Heidi Alexander) and the Metropolitan police, I have been clear that our community is watching and waiting. I urge all involved to remain focused on expediting the process as much as possible.

I fully understand the frustration that it has taken this long. On 24 June 2017, then Ministers Alok Sharma and Nick Hurd wrote to bereaved families. They said:

“The inquiry will not delay the conclusion of the Police inquiry…If criminal proceedings result from these investigations…we would not expect them to be delayed by the establishment of the public inquiry.”

That has clearly not come to pass. Justice has been delayed, but it must not be denied. While we wait for the police and the Crown Prosecution Service to complete their work, there are actions that must be taken now. Companies identified in the report, such as Arconic, Rydon, Kingspan and Celotex, must be excluded from public contracts while criminal investigations are ongoing. I thank the Secretary of State for her commitment to that, and I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts) that local authorities across the country should be encouraged to follow suit.

Justice is about more than contracts and criminal charges, and it goes beyond Grenfell. Across the country, up to a million people are still stuck in unsafe buildings. They are victims of the building safety crisis. The National Audit Office has just reported that, on current trends, it will take until at least 2037 before the last unsafe building is remediated, at a cost of £16.6 billion. I therefore welcome the Government’s announcement today that they will speed up the remediation work, that developers will be forced to double the pace of fixing the crisis and that building owners who sit on their hands will be subject to severe penalties. That is right, because while residents wait, they also pay the costs.

In a block of flats in Earl’s Court, just two miles south of Grenfell, a recent fire inspection found flammable rendering. The insurance premium has gone up from £15,000 a year to £375,000 a year, meaning an extra £400 a month in service charges for leaseholders. While leaseholders face this increasing cost of living crisis, and the fear of living in buildings that are unsafe, the insurance industry has so far failed to tackle the problem. The Association of British Insurers committed to bringing down costs, but the experience of my constituents shows that it is not working. I am delighted that the Government have committed to working with insurers to consider urgently how bills can be reduced during remediation programmes. That cannot come soon enough. I know that Members from across the House will have their own horror stories of leaseholders who cannot sell and cannot move on with their lives, who are caught in the middle between freeholders, developers, managing agents and all levels of government. My test of this Government’s plan and whether it will be deemed a success is whether it brings this merry-go-round of buck-passing to an end.

I know that the Government are also considering their formal response to the inquiry, including ending the chaotic and fragmented regulatory system. Accountability for building regulations should be streamlined under a single Secretary of State. We need one regulator—a high-quality, well-resourced public body reporting directly to that Secretary of State—and we need robust product regulation. Currently, only a third of construction products are regulated. Instead, all construction products should be subject to regulations to ensure safety and public trust.

This inquiry is just one of many recent high-profile public inquiries into state injustices, whether that is Hillsborough, the Post Office, Windrush, infected blood or LGBT veterans. I welcome the Government’s resolve to righting the wrongs of the past and tackling the injustices that the previous Government largely failed to budget for. Time and again, we have seen a pattern of inaction and too many lifesaving recommendations from public inquiries and inquests ignored by corporate bodies and Departments, and that failure to act has had fatal consequences. Had the coroner’s regulations following the Lakanal House fire, which claimed six lives, been implemented, it is likely that the Grenfell Tower tragedy would have been prevented.

The previous Government dragged their feet on implementing personal emergency evacuation plans for disabled people in phase 1, so I welcome the Government’s announcement today on the next steps to protect disabled tenants. Such examples have convinced me that we must consider an independent oversight body, answerable to Parliament, to track the implementation of inquiry recommendations and prevent avoidable deaths. I welcome the commitment to passing the Hillsborough law duty of candour to ensure that public authorities and officials act in the public interest, with openness, honesty and transparency about their actions, decisions and failings.

Nowhere is the need for candour and oversight more evident than with the royal borough of Kensington and Chelsea, which failed residents in the years leading up to the Grenfell fire, on the night of the tragedy and in its aftermath. The inquiry determined that RBKC bears

“considerable responsibility for the dangerous condition of the building”,

highlighted a

“persistent indifference to fire safety”,

and found that RBKC’s response was

“muddled, slow, indecisive and piecemeal”,

with it

“ill-equipped to deal with a serious emergency”,

exposing a complete failure to protect and serve the community for whom it was entrusted to care. Even today, many north Kensington residents still rely on community groups for essential support and services. In stark contrast to the failures of RBKC, the community acted decisively and heroically on the night of the fire and in its immediate aftermath. I am proud of how our community responded to the fire and continues to support residents across north Kensington.

But this is not just about one council; it is about a culture of neglect and disrespect that impacts millions of people living in social housing across the country. Some 60% of my casework in Kensington and Bayswater relates to slow repairs, damp, mould, overcrowding and poor communication from landlords. On Saturday, I visited a council estate close to Grenfell and spoke to many residents, including a woman who has been in temporary accommodation for 19 years out of the borough and who has had to chase relentlessly to get her move back home, and a resident with an extractor fan that has been broken for years, despite multiple surveyors coming to assess the job.

[Florence Eshalomi (Vauxhall and Camberwell Green) (Lab/Co-op)]

I thank my hon. Friend for making such a powerful speech on behalf of his constituents. What he has described reflects all our inboxes. Does he agree that to address residents’, tenants’ and leaseholders’ concerns in a timely manner with good customer care does not cost any money?

[Joe Powell]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The waste of councils’ and housing associations’ precious resources and the waste of people’s time in taking time off work and disrupting their lives to deal with the inefficiency and repairs is something that we have to fix. I am really hopeful that incoming legislation such as Awaab’s law will help with that.

The case study from Saturday is a good example. A constituent is forced to open the windows to prevent mould coming into her home, which means that she has paid thousands extra in energy bills over the past few years while she waits for the council to fix the fan. On the Lancaster West estate, where Grenfell is located, there are concerns that the promise from all levels of government for a modern 21st-century social housing estate will not be fulfilled.

It is essential that RBKC, residents and Ministers agree a plan to complete the refurbishment with transparency and accountability on budgets and timelines, because those residents have been living on a building site for far too long. It is not enough just to talk about change. Until the tenants of RBKC and the housing associations in my constituency are treated with respect and have access to what they are entitled to as a right, they will lack trust in the institutions that are meant to serve them. Just last week, the regulator found one of our major housing associations, Notting Hill Genesis, to be non-compliant after an inspection revealed governance failings and poor health and safety outcomes for tenants.

I do not want just to criticise; I want to help RBKC and our housing associations to find solutions. In the new year, we will be launching a new campaign on social housing quality in Kensington and Bayswater, because I want our community to be a trailblazer on how to implement Awaab’s law on damp and mould, how to enforce the new decent homes standard and how to break people out of the doom cycle of endless emails, phone calls, missed appointments and subcontractors even to get simple repairs done. If we cannot get it right in Kensington and Bayswater given Grenfell, given our amazing community organisations and given that we are on the frontline of the nation’s housing crisis, what hope does the rest of the country have? Central to the campaign will be the voice of tenants. I extend an open invitation to anyone who can help to join our campaign and make a practical difference for the community.

It has been over seven years since the bereaved, the survivors and the local community endured a tragedy that changed their lives forever. I will continue to advocate in this place for truth, justice and lasting change, and for Grenfell bereaved and survivors to be heard. Their dignity and resilience have held up a mirror to us as a nation, forcing us to confront a fundamental question: do we truly give everyone an equal voice in how this country is run?

The opportunity is for the Government—a mission-led Government—to focus on service and give people a real say in decisions that affect them. We cannot afford to continue with nearly a million people sleeping in unsafe buildings. We cannot afford another Grenfell Tower. True justice means criminal charges for those responsible, a complete culture change with respect for every tenant, and every child in the country growing up in a safe and decent home. That must be the legacy of Grenfell.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

I call the Liberal Democrat spokesperson.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Bernard Jenkin]

I am not in favour of taking building control away from local authorities, but if we go down the route recommended by the hon. Gentleman, we will not succeed in making buildings safer, not least because of the shortage of capacity in the sector. If it is decided that there cannot be any private sector building control surveyors, there will be even less capacity, and remediating all this will take even longer.

An approach that relies entirely on local government or a state body of building control risks worsening a situation that we are already experiencing. The building control workforce is ageing, and recruitment struggles to keep up with demand. Restricting private sector competition would exacerbate these problems, driving skilled professionals not back into local authorities—because they cannot afford them—but into consultancy roles in which they would be working for the construction companies directly, not inspecting what those companies are doing. Rather than narrowing the pool of inspectors, we should be raising the standards of building control across the board.

Private sector approved inspectors were already subject to a strict licensing regime through the Construction Industry Council approved inspectors register, with a code of conduct, regular auditing and a complaints process. Moreover, the local authority, not the private sector building control sector, was responsible for the problem at Grenfell. Our recommendation suggests a fully integrated building control service involving both local authorities and registered building control approvers working to common standards within a framework designed to promote continuous improvement. That, I think, is the right answer. To deal with high-rise blocks, multidisciplinary teams would be set up to perform the building control function, recruited on the basis of proven skills and experience from both public and private sectors on a level playing field without the choice being biased in favour of the former. That, I submit, should be the Government’s objective.

We welcome the steps taken to require all building inspectors, whether working for local authorities or registered building control approvers, to be individually registered by the BSR, but further steps can and should be taken to drive up standards and to maximise much-needed capacity. However, recommendations 113.37 and 113.38 in the final report of the inquiry could undermine this process. Implicit in recommendation 113.37 is the assumption that it is inappropriate for private sector commercial organisations to be involved in building control work at all, although no evidence is advanced to support that assumption. It is an assumption that many people make, but there is no evidential basis for it. Recommendation 113.37 proposes that there should be a panel to consider the matter, which I hope will happen, but if it decided to ban private sector building control, that would seriously aggravate the capacity problem.

[Joe Powell]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Sir Bernard Jenkin]

I will certainly give way, because this is a crucial point.

[Joe Powell]

I simply wanted to ask for a clarification. Surely the issue, which was raised earlier, is that there is a conflict of interests when you are paying to have your product assessed. As we know from Sir Martin’s report, there was a cover-up of testing results. If you accept that, how do you get around the “conflict of interests” issue?

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

Order. I am not going to admonish the hon. Member for using the word “you”, but, Sir Bernard, you have now spoken for longer than both Front Benchers put together, and many other Members wish to get in.

Renters’ Rights Bill

Joe Powell Excerpts

Wednesday 9th October 2024 Commons Chamber

[Florence Eshalomi (Vauxhall and Camberwell Green) (Lab/Co-op)]

May I start by thanking the Minister for Housing and Planning, my hon. Friend the Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Matthew Pennycook), for meeting me over recess to discuss the Bill. I know that he will be closing the debate later today.

I am afraid that one consequence of the Government’s prioritisation of this Bill is that, because my Committee has no members, I cannot yet speak as its Chair, but I very much look forward to doing so, and I thank the House for electing me to this important role.

The Bill is of great importance to many people in my Vauxhall and Camberwell Green constituency and to millions of renters across the country. Too often they feel the sharp end of a market that is not working for them. They can suffer inflation-busting rent rises under the threat of eviction. They can end up waiting far too long for repairs to serious problems. Data from Shelter highlights the fact that almost one in three households in my constituency lives in the private rented sector. In 2001, the number of households in private rented accommodation was 8,129. By 2021, that figure had increased to more than 13,178—a staggering 62% increase in just 20 years.

We have spoken about affordability and rent increases. This issue is pushing so many people into debt and putting them at risk of homelessness. According to Shelter, the average monthly rent in August 2024 in England was £1,327, but the figure for Lambeth is almost twice the national average at over £2,210. We all know that wages are not rising in line with this increase. The reality facing many private renters today is that they can be evicted with only two months’ notice, often needing to find thousands of pounds to cover moving costs and deposits on a new property.

We have touched on the fact that most private landlords are good. The majority of them are providing a good service, and they play an important role in our housing ecosystem. The majority of them take their responsibilities seriously, but for far too long a minority of rogue landlords have been able to exploit loopholes in legislation to treat tenants in a frankly unacceptable way. The Bill must put an end to that, and provide tenants with the certainty and security they deserve.

In 2019, when I first stood for election, the Conservative manifesto promised to end no-fault evictions, yet half a decade later, renters are still desperately waiting for a fair deal and they cannot afford to wait any longer. I think about the emails that I have received since the start of the cost of living crisis, with constituents facing rent rises of between 20% and 30%. One constituent even emailed me to say that their rent had doubled in just one year. They said:

“I am a private renter. I’m particularly concerned about unfair rent increases. I am 47 and have lived in the same area for most of my time in London, but despite the huge amount of properties that have been built in the area, none is affordable to buy and few are affordable to rent.”

He goes on to say:

“I rent privately and my rent has been increasing faster than my salary. At this point in my life, things should feel more secure. If you want to truly end no-fault evictions, you need to address extortionate rent increases which are as good as an eviction for many.”

I know that many colleagues across this House have received similar emails, which highlights why this Bill is so badly needed.

It is critical that the Government act urgently on this matter, so I welcome the speed with which they have delivered this Bill to the House. It shows how seriously they take the private rented sector. Although this Bill is similar to the Renters (Reform) Bill, which was introduced under the previous Government, there are a couple of important differences that further improve the offer to private renters.

The raising of maximum fines in multiple areas, such as discrimination against those with children or those who are on benefits, is a step in the right direction, although the Renters’ Reform Coalition has called for an even larger fine to act as a proper deterrent. I hope the Secretary of State will take that on board.

The introduction of clause 55 outlawing rental bidding is also important. Since the general election in July, I have been contacted by tenants who are facing bidding wars. A person is told that they are going to view a rental property, and then, when they turn up, they are told that 45 other people will be viewing it with them and that the property will go to the highest bidder. That is just unacceptable.

I also welcome the extension to the protected period for no-fault eviction grounds and the required notice periods where these grounds are used.

[Joe Powell (Kensington and Bayswater) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that one of the unintended consequences of section 21 is that people often do not report damp and mould or the repairs that they need for fear of eviction, because they will be pushed into finding a new tenancy, which they simply cannot afford?

[Florence Eshalomi]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. That is really important. I give credit to the previous Government for Awaab’s law, which tackles the problems of damp and mould in the social housing sector, but it is vital that we have the same protections for private tenants who, frankly, live in squalor. We have seen emails from people talking about black mould. That is not acceptable. Housing benefit is being paid for those properties. We need to make sure that tenants are renting the right properties.

The Bill will increase security for tenants, and help deal with those big deposits that they have to save for. However, as some colleagues have highlighted, the success of the measures in this Bill will come down to enforcement. In its report on the previous Government’s Renters (Reform) Bill, the predecessor Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee found that measures making it easier for tenants to challenge rent rises in a first-tier tribunal could increase the workload of our justice system. We all know that our justice system is struggling under the backlog, and that backlogs are far too common. It is critical that the Government’s good intentions do not result in a system that tenants simply cannot access because of those lengthy backlogs. We cannot send tenants to tribunals if it ends with them being further frustrated by the judicial system. Will the Minister please tell me what work is under way to ensure that the tribunals are ready for this change in the law and can cope with the increase in cases?

The previous Committee also warned that levels of implementation could vary massively between different councils. The large number of landlords in this country can make enforcement in the sector quite challenging, particularly when local authority finances are so stretched. Although the introduction of the private rented sector database will help, we could see unscrupulous landlords fall through the cracks if there is not stringent enforcement by councils. The Bill will place new regulatory powers and enforcement responsibilities on local authorities.

The Minister is well aware that our councils are facing significant funding pressures. The Local Government Association reports that due to inflation, wage pressures, and cost and demand pressures, English councils face a £2.3 billion funding gap in 2025-26. What steps is the Minister taking to work with councils to ensure that there is sufficient enforcement of this legislation and that councils are properly resourced to carry out their new responsibilities effectively?

Finally, will the Minister please confirm whether the housing ombudsman will run the new private rented sector ombudsman, so that tenants can access justice in disputes? When I met the housing ombudsman, he mentioned that a number of cases that were brought before him were allowed when an appeal was made, so there is already failure at a local level. We also have to consider the fact that so many private renters are afraid to challenge their landlord because of the fear of eviction. We need a strong ombudsman to help them get the justice that they deserve.

I look forward to working with the Minister as this Bill progresses through Parliament. I hope that he will address the points I have made and ensure that we have a sector that works with our tenants, recognising how much they pay, and provides them with security, so that they no longer have to fear being evicted through no fault of their own. Thank you.

--- Later in debate ---

[Joe Powell (Kensington and Bayswater) (Lab)]

It is a great privilege to follow that excellent speech. The Renters’ Reform Bill is potentially transformative for Kensington and Bayswater, as it is for the whole country. Nearly 45% of my constituents are now private renters—a huge increase in the last decade and now the biggest tenure type by some distance. Those renters pay the highest rents in the country: an average rent of £1,600 per person. A rental property in my constituency now averages £3,400 a month.

Yet despite the fact that those renters pay an increasing proportion of their take-home pay each month in rent, I have been inundated since the general election with cases of constituents facing the major challenges that colleagues have already highlighted—section 21 evictions, damp and mould, slow repairs, unaffordable rent hikes, bidding wars and a feeling of insecurity and lack of power that never leaves a person under the current rules.

I think of my former constituents Jean and Jack Franco, who lived with their mum in a rental flat in north Kensington. After eight years of never missing a rent payment, they were served a section 21 notice by an anonymous overseas landlord and given just weeks to leave. All their attempts to challenge the decision and engage the landlord failed. Their request for just a few more weeks to find a new home was denied. The council were unable to help them, so Jack and Jean had to leave with their mum for a new part of London as rents in my constituency are so unaffordable.

The letting agent told the Francos that the owner wanted to sell the property, but today that property is still being rented out, but at twice the rent that the previous family were paying—a back-door eviction by an anonymous landlord that this Bill would have stopped. I also think of the constituents who I met, along with the Deputy Prime Minister and the Minister, around the table in north Kensington; they could not even bring themselves to report the challenges with the condition of their flats for fear of a section 21 notice that could leave them on the streets, sofa surfing or scrambling for temporary accommodation. This renters’ Bill is also for them. I want to focus on one critical area of implementation, the landlord register, which is a huge opportunity to give renters, landlords and local authorities the information they need to ensure that standards are upheld and new rights can be enforced. I note here my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests, because I have worked on a number of new government registers in recent years, including the public register of beneficial ownership and the register of overseas entities. It is crucial to design them in a way that is as transparent as possible and does not create loopholes.

I ask the Secretary of State and the Minister to look at the detail of what will be in that register, including landlord and agent contact details, details of past enforcement action, eviction notices, safety information, information about accessibility and the rent being charged. If we include all those things, we will have a genuinely useful register that will promote accountability and genuinely drive up standards.

This game-changing Bill should also not be seen in isolation. The most exciting thing about today is the Government’s commitment to attacking our housing crisis from multiple angles: planning reform to build 1.5 million new homes, including the biggest increase in social housing in a generation; learning from Grenfell, and speeding up the remedial work up and down the country; accelerated implementation of the Social Housing (Regulation) Act 2023, including Awaab’s law; a new decent homes standard for social and private housing; a crackdown on dirty money in luxury property; and an end to the feudal leasehold system. This is a comprehensive—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

Order. The hon. Member will know that there was a time limit, on which he is beginning to stretch my patience.

Short-term Lets: Regulation

Joe Powell Excerpts

Thursday 12th September 2024 Westminster Hall

[Joe Powell (Kensington and Bayswater) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Rachel Blake) on securing this debate and giving the subject the attention it deserves. We obviously share a border, but we also share an office in this place that, with its high ceilings and windows, comfortable sofas and views of Whitehall, I am sure would fetch a very high price if it were a short-term let. I hope we can agree that we will not be doing that in our period of sharing an office.

When I was knocking on doors during the general election campaign, the issue of short-term let regulation united constituents in South Kensington, North Kensington, Bayswater and Lancaster Gate. That was due to the current effective free-for-all with weak rules that are barely enforced, leading to issues that had very real and personal consequences for them and their families. It was not just the antisocial behaviour, noise and associated crime, but the violations of building insurance, mansion block rules and tenancy agreements, which had very real impacts on service charges and their day-to-day living in flats. I therefore agree with many of the speakers in the debate that there must be a middle ground where we can find sensible regulation that allows a destination like Kensington and Bayswater to continue to welcome millions of tourists from around the world, but with a system that can also help tackle our housing crisis.

To give hon. Members a sense of the scale of the problem, I share councils—Kensington and Chelsea and Westminster—and it is estimated that more than 5% of properties in both those council areas have been listed as short-term lets. As my hon. Friend the Member for Cities of London and Westminster said, the latest estimate in Westminster is 13,000. It is therefore important that any proposed changes related to change of use do not lock in those numbers, and that we sequence the reforms correctly.

There are some things that work and I praise the councils that, with limited tools, have been able to take some steps on enforcement, especially in Westminster. Kensington and Chelsea agreed a deal with Airbnb that would share data around some council blocks, so that leaseholders and council tenants in those blocks who might be in breach of their tenancy could be investigated. However, that also struck me as unfair when we have 40% of our residents in the private rental sector, where there is very little regulation.

As for solutions, I join others in calling for the Government to consider a licensing scheme, while thinking carefully about some of the lessons already learned. For example, the 90-day rule is totally unenforceable. With multiple platforms listing properties, and very small and limited—even non-existent—resources in local authorities to enforce the rule, we must ensure that fees are paid into the system to help cover the enforcement cost for local authorities, so that the cost is proportionate. We must also ensure that each property—not just each host—is registered, because individual properties have different consequences. This is an important part of tackling our housing crisis. I am delighted with the Renters’ Rights Bill, introduced yesterday, and I believe that if we also brought in a complementary package of reforms, it could make a real difference for constituencies such as mine.