Draft Electrical Safety Standards in the Private Rented Sector (England) Regulations 2020

Luke Hall Excerpts

Tuesday 17th March 2020 General Committees

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Luke Hall)]

I beg to move,

That the Committee has considered the draft Electrical Safety Standards in the Private Rented Sector (England) Regulations 2020.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Nokes. This Government are committed to ensuring that private tenants live in safe, secure and high-quality properties. We truly value the contribution that responsible private landlords make to the housing market and the private rented sector. The majority of private rented houses and flats are well maintained and offer safe accommodation to tenants. However, there are still unscrupulous landlords who wilfully flout their responsibilities and put their tenants at significant risk of harm. At present, only 60% of privately rented homes have all the recommended electrical safety features installed—modern PVC wiring, modern earthing, modern consumer units, miniature circuit breakers and residual current devices—compared with 75% of social housing. That is why these regulations are so important.

The regulations will require all landlords to do what good landlords are already doing: make sure that electrical installations in their rented properties are safe. The regulations form part of the Government’s work to improve safety in all buildings. They will drive up standards, reduce deaths and injuries caused by electrical faults, make tenants safer and help to level the playing field for the majority of good landlords who already provide decent rented properties. Landlords who choose to not comply with the vital safety measures in these regulations will have to improve or leave the business.

These regulations will apply to all new tenancies from July 2020 and to all existing tenancies from April 2021. They will require landlords to have the electrical installations in their properties inspected and tested at least every five years by a person who is qualified and competent. Landlords will have to provide a copy of the electrical safety report to their tenants and to their local authority if requested. If a report requires investigative or remedial works, landlords will have to carry those out. In practice, if a report does not require investigative or remedial works, the landlord will not be required to carry out any further work. Some landlords may already be complying with the requirements in the regulations—for example, where they have already had an inspection, where the electrical safety standards are being met and where no remedial work is required. Those proactive and responsible landlords may not need to take any further action when the regulations come into force.

In addition to requiring remedial work, reports can recommend improvements. If a report only recommends improvements but does not require any further investigative or remedial work to be carried out, although it would be good practice to carry out that work, it will not be required in order to comply with the regulations. In this way, we have ensured that the requirements are proportionate.

Because these regulations are so important, local authorities will have strong legal enforcement powers. They will have the power to require landlords to carry out remedial works, or even arrange the works themselves and recover the cost from the landlord. They will be able to decide on the appropriate penalty for landlords who do not comply, with the power to issue a financial penalty of up to £30,000. This is because those local authorities know their areas best and can make serious decisions about the unscrupulous landlords who are undercutting those who already provide safe and secure accommodation. Local authorities can see the severity of the issue and will know best how to tackle irresponsible landlords in their areas. Landlords will, of course, have a right of appeal against enforcement action. Local authorities will be able to keep the proceedings of financial penalties for enforcement purposes, allowing them to keep up the good work, driving up standards and contributing to their long-term financial stability.

The majority of landlords are proactive when it comes to ensuring the safety of their tenants, so the requirements in these regulations will not put an additional burden on those landlords, who make a welcome contribution to the housing market. However, it is of course reasonable to expect all landlords to make sure their tenants are safe from the risk of electrocution or fire. These regulations are important, because they will increase tenant safety and make the private rented sector fairer for those good landlords who are already concerned with tenant safety. Accordingly, I hope the Committee will support them.

--- Later in debate ---

[Luke Hall]

I am grateful for the contributions to the debate. I am certainly grateful for what sounds like support for the principle of introducing the regulations but, understandably, a number of questions have been raised.

All Opposition colleagues asked why this has taken so long. We wanted to introduce them early in this Parliament, having announced in July 2018 that we would introduce mandatory requirements. I hope all Members will appreciate that there have been parliamentary challenges on time over the past couple of years, but we have been using this time to work closely with experts in the sector, carefully considering some of the complex issues that we have talked about in the debate to ensure that what we are introducing is proportionate. Delivering the regulations early in this Parliament has been a priority.

We have heard a couple of questions about how landlords will know that an electrician is a qualified and competent person. We will ensure that landlords know that an electrician is a qualified and competent person. Before the regulations come into force, guidance on this specific issue will be published for landlords. I will make a note to ensure that the Members who have spoken in the debate are notified when that guidance is published.

[Meg Hillier]

I thank the Minister for alerting colleagues in the room—presumably others will pick this up—but we are now in mid-March. The regulations come into force in June, but landlords will want to make plans to get the tests done. When will the Minister provide that information? Will it be in time for landlords to know exactly who they should ask to do such work?

[Luke Hall]

I cannot give the hon. Member a specific date, but I will respond to her in writing on a number of the issues that she and others have raised. I will do my best to provide a date as soon as possible.

The right hon. Member for Warley mentioned the idea of competent person schemes and the principle of trusted trader schemes. We will be encouraging industry to establish competent person schemes but membership of them will not be compulsory, to ensure that there is no further pressure placed on industry nor burdens placed on inspectors or customers.

[John Spellar]

That is not necessary. Electricians are already highly regulated under all sorts of electrical legislation. They also have to be trained and to pass competency tests. They get certificates indicating their level of competency: some are competent to install, some to supervise and some to test. The industry already has this, and there is no need to create a new structure. Why does the Minister not just say that there are long-established regulatory bodies, and we will use their certification and schemes to establish competency? I honestly do not see the logical problem he is facing.

[Luke Hall]

As I say, before the regulations come into force we will be publishing guidance. I will look closely at the issues, but the guidance can be used before employing inspectors and testers to ensure that the person is competent. Of course, I will take the right hon. Gentleman’s point away.

A number of Members raised the issue of PAT testing. They are right to point out that that has not been included in the draft regulations because of the variety of electrical appliances and because the use of one single mandated approach has not been considered practical. The Chair of the Public Accounts Committee has asked to me to look at that issue, which I am happy to do. I will report back to her on that point.

The Opposition Front-Bench spokesperson talked about the importance of not only considering the private rented sector in our work, but considering the social sector as well. She is right to make that point. We all acknowledge that the standards in the private rented sectors are significantly lower in some incidences than in the social sector, so the draft regulations target that sector, but we will be separately considering measures for social rented properties. I am happy to work with the hon. Lady and continue discussions as we move through this Parliament about how we can best achieve that.

Hon. Members also talked about how the regulations will be funded. Local authority environmental health departments are already responsible for enforcing electrical safety standards in the private rented sector. The new regulations will make it simpler for local authorities to do this because landlords will now have to provide them with proof that their electrics are safe. Local authorities will also be able to keep any money raised from financial penalties to fund those activities.

There was also a question about the first-tier tribunal, instead of enforcement, and about the system in Scotland and the number of cases. I do not have that information to hand, but I will find it and make sure it is reported back to the hon. Member for Croydon Central after the debate.

I am pleased that we have general support for the regulations and for our work to improve the private rented sector. I think we all agree that this is timely and overdue, and it is right we are bringing it forward this morning. We rightly heard that 871 people were injured in England in electrical fires in the home in 2016-17, and 16 people died. In a five-year period, the London Fire Brigade dealt with 748 fires caused by electrics. In the same period, only 97 fires it dealt with in London were caused by gas.

We have heard the discrepancies and disparities between the social rented sector and the private rented sector. Although there is a compelling case for change, it is right that we put on record the important contribution that private landlords make to the housing market. The majority of landlords in England provide well-maintained and safe accommodation for their tenants, allowing them to put down roots and thrive in their communities. However, we must ensure that all landlords, not just the good ones, are meeting standards of electrical safety. We want irresponsible and unscrupulous landlords who wilfully disregard their responsibilities and rent out dangerous properties to change their behaviour or leave the business. That will help level the playing field and helps support good landlords to deliver the homes that our country needs. The regulations are an important part of our wider reform programme, which seeks to level up the private rented sector, making it fairer, safer and more secure.

[Meg Hillier]

I thank the Minister for giving way again. I raised the issue of new burdens. We recognise that in certain parts of the country there are clusters of poor landlords, who need to be driven out. The challenge, though, is for local authorities, because they are going to have to pay up front for the inspections for the work before they get any money from the fines. Some of those landlords may well be the sort of fly-by-night people from whom it is very difficult to extract the fine at all, because they will find a way of dodging it by going bankrupt or whatever, or they often have properties in the name of other family members. How is the Minister going to make sure that local government can afford to get on with this job, and has he considered the new burdens?

[Luke Hall]

I thank the hon. Lady for making that point. The House has secured the most positive local government finance settlement for 10 years, a £2.9 billion increase in funding for local authorities. We are quite clear that that will not resolve all of the pressures on local authorities, but that settlement—a 4.4% real-terms increase in support for local government—has been welcomed by the sector, and we think they do have the resources they need. We accept that they are—

[Meg Hillier]

I apologise for intervening on the Minister again, but the new burdens rules are very clear. If there is a new requirement for local government to act, the Department has to make sure that the Treasury provides the necessary money to local government for at least 12 months after the new burden is introduced. If he cannot answer now, perhaps he could write to us with that information, but this is vitally important, particularly in areas with large swathes of unscrupulous landlords where it will be costly for the local authority to act when, quite rightly, they will want to do so.

As Chair of the Public Accounts Committee, I must pick the Minister up on the fact that Minister after Minister stands at the Dispatch Box and tells us that local government has had its biggest financial settlement in cash terms for the past decade. That is because local authority funding has been cut back so ruthlessly over the past decade—by 40%, in my own local authority’s case—so that does not go anywhere near filling the gap. There is still a huge squeeze on local authorities, and they certainly do not have money swilling around to deal with this as a huge priority above everything else. Although it is vital that they deal with it, they are having to face Hobson’s choice, so will the Minister undertake to look at those new burden issues? I am sure it has been done already, but if he cannot tell me now, perhaps he could write to me.

[Luke Hall]

I will write to the hon. Lady with that information. She is right, by the way, that we do not think this latest settlement solves all the pressures that local government is facing. The Secretary of State made that very clear when we brought the settlement before the House a couple of weeks ago, so we completely appreciate that point. We do think, though, that it is the most positive settlement for a few years, and are pleased that it has been welcomed and supported by the whole House for the first time in a number of years. We will absolutely consider the points that the hon. Lady has made.

I am grateful that the Committee seems to support these vital regulations, and I will pick up on the points that have been raised. They will drive up standards and reduce injuries in the private rented sector, so I am grateful for the Committee’s support.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That the Committee has considered the draft Electrical Safety Standards in the Private Rented Sector (England) Regulations 2020.