Private Rented Sector

Lord Foster of Bath Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd January 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Mr Don Foster)]

I draw the House’s attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.

I was initially surprised to hear that the Opposition were planning a debate on housing. After all, their housing record during 13 years in government has not given them much to boast about. That said, however, when I saw the issues raised in the motion, I had to acknowledge that they would be of interest to Members on both sides of the House and, more importantly, to many of our constituents. After all, the private rented sector is of growing importance and provides accommodation for around 17% of all households in England—that figure has nearly doubled in the past 20 years—and they represent 3.6 million households.

The majority of the private rented sector is operating well and the vast majority of tenants are satisfied, but, as we have heard in the debate, there are some real problems that must be addressed. They include problems involving rogue landlords, poor quality accommodation and exploitative letting agents charging exorbitant fees. We have also heard concerns about the length of tenancies and the need to increase supply. We need to find solutions to those problems, and today’s debate has been extremely helpful in considering ways forward. I welcome the helpful and constructive tone of the debate. In fact, we could say that it has been a one nation debate.

I apologise that I shall not have time to mention all Members who have spoken. The hon. Members for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne) and for Stockton North (Alex Cunningham) both made it clear that there are many very good landlords and letting agents. They also pointed out, however, as did right hon. and hon. Members on both sides of the House, that there are too many who are not. The hon. Member for Manchester Central (Lucy Powell) raised concerns about the right to manage and about leasehold valuation tribunals. Those are really leasehold issues, and she will be delighted to know that my hon. Friend the Minister for Housing has today written to a number of people in the industry to address those very issues. The hon. Member for Hyndburn (Graham Jones) talked about the need to review the housing health and safety rating system, and we would be interested to hear from him on that. If he would like to come and talk to me afterwards, I will discuss double glazing with him as well. The hon. Member for Denton and Reddish also mentioned a particularly expensive level of rent, and I am sure that he will draw his constituents’ attention to the opportunities to use the rent assessment committee.

My hon. Friends raised a number of equally important points. My hon. Friend the Member for Meon Valley (George Hollingbery) talked about the barriers to investment in the private rented sector and drew attention to concerns about the impact of new regulation. My hon. Friend the Member for Rugby (Mark Pawsey), who is an active member of the Communities and Local Government Committee, reminded us of the Committee’s work in that area. Like him, we all look forward to the outcome of that work.

My hon. Friend the Member for Southport (John Pugh) talked about red tape fetishism and, becoming rather distracted by planning to write his new book, “Fifty Shades of Red”, ran out of time, but his concern about regulation reminds us that not all regulation is bad. It was therefore wrong for the Opposition’s motion to describe the lettings sector as “unregulated”. As my hon. Friend the Member for Calder Valley (Craig Whittaker) pointed out, there is a large amount of regulation in this area. Surely the key should be to find ways to make better use of existing powers and regulation before seeking to introduce new regulation, a point that was drawn to our attention firmly by Sir Adrian Montague in his review of the private rented sector.

As I have said, there are areas of concern, such as rogue landlords, which many right hon. and hon. Members mentioned. I remind the House that local authorities have a large number of wide-ranging powers that can be used to bring tough and effective enforcement against bad landlords. We reminded councils of those powers recently in our publication, “Dealing with rogue landlords”. Some councils are doing exemplary work, with enforcement teams, proactive inspections, the development of clear and proper compliant reporting procedures and landlord accreditation schemes, such as the excellent one in Portsmouth. Of course, under the Housing Act 2004, in certain circumstances councils can also introduce their own licensing schemes, as has been mentioned. Really good examples include Sunderland, Leeds, Hartlepool, Blackburn, Bolton, Burnley, Sedgefield and many others.

Another thing that has not been mentioned so far in the debate is the need to send a clear signal to rogue landlords that poor practice will not be tolerated. That is why the caps on the level of fines for offences under the 2004 Act will shortly be lifted. We believe that the Opposition’s proposal for a national register of landlords, in the way they have described it, would be too prescriptive, expensive and over-centralised. It is worth reminding ourselves that Labour’s own impact assessment stated that a full licensing scheme would be onerous, difficult to enforce and would cost £300 million. Surely we should be looking at local solutions to local problems and developing the regulations that already exist.

Concerns were also expressed about letting agents. Although it is true that there are already many pieces of legislation that provide protection for tenants, that is an area where we could be looking further. The hon. Member for Derby North (Chris Williamson) will know that the Office of Fair Trading is looking at that as we speak, and the Government will be listening to the recommendations not only from the OFT, but from the Select Committee.

This has been a useful debate on an important topic. The Government want a bigger, better private rented sector—

Mr Alan Campbell (Tynemouth) (Lab) claimed to move the closure (Standing Order No. 36).

Question put forthwith, That the Question be now put.

Question agreed to.

Question put accordingly (Standing Order No. 31(2)), That the original words stand part of the Question.