Localism Bill

Debate between Lord Best and Lord Kennedy of Southwark

Monday 31st October 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Best]

Once again the House of Lords consideration of this Bill has led to a really sensible change to the legislation. I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, alongside the noble Lord, Lord Newton—I have supported these amendments all the way—on persuading the Minister who I know has handled this with great distinction. On behalf of all the organisations which have been extremely worried about this and all the people whose complaints will now be better handled, I thank the Minister very much.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness for moving the amendments. They are a work in progress. I also thank my noble friend Lady Hayter for her amendment which would reduce the period before referral from eight to six weeks. I hope that the Government will accept my noble friend’s proposal.

I never really got to the bottom of why it was such an issue for the Government. Looking back to the debate on Report, it was not only Members from the Labour Benches who expressed such concerns but Members from all sides. I have always thought that the democratic filter would do nothing to improve the process of enabling tenants to resolve their complaints. The Government’s proposals allow a tenant with a complaint direct access to the ombudsman after going through a process or on the refusal of a designated person to send it on.

When the noble Baroness responds to the debate, will she say how the ombudsmen satisfy themselves that either of the two conditions for direct referral have been met? I hope that that will be something very simple, such as the copy of a letter or an e-mail confirming that the complainant has gone through the process and the period of time has elapsed, or the refusal of a designated person, as I do not want to see added burdens on the complainant.

At this point, I would like to add my thanks to the Minister, other noble Lords on all sides of the House and the Bill team as we draw to a close on this Bill. This is the first Bill on which I have contributed to your Lordships’ House’s discussions from the Dispatch Box. It has been an interesting learning curve for me. I hope, in particular, that I have been of assistance to my noble friends Lord McKenzie of Luton and Lord Beecham. I again thank the Minister for bringing these amendments back. They are very welcome.

Localism Bill

Debate between Lord Best and Lord Kennedy of Southwark

Wednesday 7th September 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark]

My Lords, I offer my support and that of the Opposition to the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, as I have done on a number of occasions on Report. He has identified a problem that needs to be addressed. It involves real people with real concerns. If the matter requires further work, as he says, and it can be done—I hope that the Minister will comment on that—the issue may be sorted out. Given that we are discussing a charity, I understand that the issue may be more difficult than it at first seems, but I hope that the government Front Bench will give a positive response.

Amendments 65 and 67 in this group stand in my name. Amendment 65 would ensure that a parent company of a group of housing associations can be registered even if it owns no housing itself. This would allow the regulator to regulate group members via the parent rather than directly if he thinks that that would be more effective. Amendment 67 concerns the appointment of members to housing association boards. The law as it stands allows the regulator to make unlimited appointments to a registered provider’s governing body provided that they remain a minority. For a 10-member board, it would allow the regulator to make nine appointments. My amendment limits the number of appointments the regulator may make to no more than four. This is a proportionate number of appointments and would enable the regulator to strengthen the board by adding members with sufficient skills and abilities to deal with any concerns that they may have about the board’s performance. However, the number would not be too overbearing as this sort of appointment would be of a temporary nature to help the housing association board discharge its duties more effectively.

[Lord Best]

Amendment 67 stands in my name and that of the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy. It concerns the appointments made by the regulator. It is important to note that this amendment relates only to appointments made by the regulator where the housing association has not failed in any way. It is not a disciplinary measure but constitutes a voluntary helping hand for the organisation. In a number of cases that I know well additional members have been appointed by the regulator as new members of the board and have been very helpful. However, there are limits to the number of appointments that the regulator ought to make to the board. We suggest that these be limited in future to a maximum of four. In my experience three new people are usually appointed to strengthen a board that has become weak—four is quite enough. We are trying to protect the independence and sovereignty of these organisations.

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[Lord Best]

This amendment is about the new powers for the ombudsman to apply to a court to make its rulings legally enforceable—in other words, to insist, having made a judgment through the courts, that the landlord complies with the ombudsman’s decision. This is quite a big jump from the current scheme, which is based on informality. At the moment it is an inexpensive scheme. It is very accessible to complainants and people do not come with their lawyers. It is not part of the legal processes. It is feared that the new scheme will rather change the nature of the way in which the ombudsman works. It also carries the same risk that I have been harping on about today, that housing associations will slide into the public sector and become indistinguishable from public sector agencies, which has the effect thereafter that all of their borrowing will become part of the public sector debt, which I know the Government are very anxious to avoid. There is a risk that if housing associations are subject to legally enforceable decisions based on the opinion of a public authority—the ombudsman—they may not be regarded as being outside the public sector. That would be a calamity.

Once again, this is about trying to retain the independence and non-statutory nature of the sector. The removal of these new legal powers would be helpful in sustaining that independence and the success of the ombudsman’s scheme to date, without making the ombudsman’s rulings legally enforceable.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark]

My Lords, I shall speak briefly to Amendments 75 and 76. They would ensure that the ombudsman’s service is not damaged by unintended consequences. What is wonderful about the ombudsman’s service is that compared with the courts, proceedings are informal, inexpensive and accessible. It is respected as its rulings are complied with by registered providers. The Government are proposing to solve a problem that noble Lords on this side of the House do not believe exists. We should be careful not to undermine the service. Will the Minister tell the House where the proposal has come from? Who has asked for it? How has it arrived here?

Localism Bill

Debate between Lord Best and Lord Kennedy of Southwark

Monday 5th September 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark]

My Lords, this group of amendments is probably the most important that we will consider today as part of our deliberations on the housing section of the Localism Bill. If passed, it would give Parliament the opportunity to reflect on the changes after they become law and a period of three years has elapsed. They would then only be renewed if affirmative resolutions were passed by both Houses.

The changes in the Bill are significant. There is widespread concern about them. When the Government make such changes, they should always be prepared to listen and to be aware of the law of unintended consequences. By passing this amendment, Parliament would have the ability to review the decision it has made in a simple way that would not require lots of parliamentary time. I hope that the Government will be persuaded to accept this group of amendments.

It is important that we remind ourselves of what the Government propose and then reflect on the benefit of what I am proposing to your Lordships’ House today. Clause 134 amends Section 193 of the Housing Act 1996 to enable local authorities to discharge their duty to homeless households by offering private sector accommodation. Individuals concerned lose their right to give their consent to the arrangement. Clause 136 gives a two-year safety net. We have to examine that in the light of the fact that that may not be long enough.

Organisations working closely with homeless households are most concerned by these proposals. The chief executive of Shelter, Campbell Robb, said recently:

“It is unbelievable that at a time when every two minutes someone faces the nightmare of losing their home, the Government is proposing to reduce the rights of homeless people who approach their local authorities for help”.

The charity Crisis has an equally concerned view of these proposals. Both charities, along with many other respected organisations, have a unique understanding of the problems faced by homeless people and we should listen to them carefully.

If the proposals are further considered with the impact of the changes to housing benefit then the risks of homeless households being placed in a difficult, downward spiral are all too apparent. These are the reasons why we should avail ourselves of the opportunity to correct the situation, in case the reality turns out to be much less welcome and more damaging than the intention of the proposals in the Bill. I beg to move.

[Lord Best]

My Lords, my name is against this amendment, in support of the sunset clause coupled with a report on the position of homelessness three years from now. The Minister said earlier that one of a local authority’s most important duties is towards the homeless. A pretty fundamental change in the way that that duty is to be discharged means that it must be a good idea to pause for thought three years down the line and see whether these quite important and significant changes have made a big difference.

At the moment, the local authority must find the family or householder a secure and affordable place in the social housing sector. In the future, they will be able to fulfil the requirement placed upon them by seeing that family into a place in the private rented sector. That, by definition, is not going to be secure in the long term. Understandably, landlords may wish to have the property back and security of tenure over the long term cannot be offered. It may be that that property, after the reforms to housing benefit and the local housing allowance, will prove to be unaffordable. There is a gap between what the tenant pays in rent and the amount that they receive in benefit, and the private rented sector option may not work out.

It may be that the dire warnings that we have heard from Shelter, Crisis, Homeless Link and others do not work out in practice, but there is a danger that those warnings prove to be entirely timely. We had a lot of discussion on these provisions earlier in the House. The noble Lords, Lord Shipley, Lord Rix, Lord McKenzie and Lord Kennedy, the noble Baronesses, Lady Doocey and Lady Greengross, and others all spoke on this matter in Committee. There is a great deal of concern about the fundamental changes to the duties upon local authorities.

I hope that noble Lords had a chance to look at Hansard over the summer. As I have said, noble Lords should regard reading the last debate as a bit of a teach-in on all the aspects of homelessness that we ought to think about. We were not able to secure all those different aspects as a whole series of amendments to the Bill but the Government have, in trying to ensure that accommodation is suitable in the private rented sector, come up with a code of guidance. That has some very good things in it. It does not go all the way down the line, but perhaps that will lead to a successful outcome for those who are placed in the private rented sector. This sunset clause would ensure that after a period of three years a thoroughgoing report is placed before Parliament, and that unless the Secretary of State revives these measures by order, those measures will fall.

Earlier this year I moved a Motion on the housing benefit regulations asking the noble Lord, Lord Freud, the Minister responsible, whether he would over the months and years ahead put in hand a fundamental reform along the lines of the housing benefit reforms in order to see what impact they had on homelessness, families, poverty, people’s incomes and the local authorities themselves. The noble Lord, Lord Freud, not only agreed to do that and to have a review, which is now under way and which will report in three stages over the next 18 months, but did it in a way that, I am pleased to report back to the House, met entirely with my approval and indeed that of others interested in these matters. He has brought together Professor Kemp from the University of Oxford and Professor Cole from Sheffield Hallam University; he has Ipsos MORI doing surveys and the IFS looking at the macroeconomics. It is a real, thoroughgoing review of the impact of these changes, which is just what we asked for and just what this House required. A comparable exercise to look down the line at how things are going would again be a triumph for the Government and a thoroughly commendable and useful exercise, which would provide the evidence and inform a decision on a sunset clause three years from now. Let us do it again. I strongly support the amendment.

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[Lord Kennedy of Southwark]

My Lords, the amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, has the full support of the Opposition. I concur in particular with the remarks of my noble friend Lord Whitty. This amendment was moved by the noble Lord, Lord Best, in the curtailed Committee stage on the last day before the Summer Recess. As the noble Lord explained, the amendment concerns the flexible tenancy regime proposed in the Bill. It is supported by both Crisis and Shelter and seeks to provide protections for certain vulnerable groups by excluding them from the proposals. The groups to be exempt are of people for whom, through a variety of circumstances, flexible tenancies are not appropriate. The groups include older people aged 60 or more, households where one or more member has a long-term illness, and tenants who need more secure forms of accommodation.

What worries me most about this section of the Bill is the reliance that the Government have placed on words such as “in most cases” or “of course, the social landlord will take into account the needs of the vulnerable”. This is all too risky for the people most in need of additional help and protection. I hope that the Minister has had time over the summer to reflect on the proposals, and will be able to give us some welcome news today, and assurances that at least things will be tightened up. If that is not the case, I hope very much that the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, will press his amendment and test the opinion of the House.

[Lord Best]

My Lords, perhaps I may say a brief word. I moved an amendment along these lines just before the Committee stage finished, and received many helpful reassurances about the way in which the policy might work. Perhaps it would help the House if the Minister, in responding to the question about where the policy leads, would agree with me that a fundamental part of the policy is that no opprobrium will fall upon any council or housing association that decides not to deploy flexible—that is to say, fixed-term—tenures. The Hanover Housing Association, which I chair, houses only older people. We are a retirement housing organisation. We have absolutely no intention of giving anybody a two-year or five-year tenancy: the idea is absolute anathema. People who move in to a sheltered flat or a retirement apartment will be able to stay there for the rest of their life: that is the deal. Some local authorities may take the view that the families whom they are housing—just like the older people in my case—should have security on a permanent, long-term basis. I invite the Minister to confirm—I think that she will be able to do this—that if a social landlord, be they a council or housing association, does not wish to take advantage of flexible tenures and fixed-term tenancies, that will not in any way rebound on them.