Tenant Fees Bill

Richard Graham Excerpts

3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Wednesday 5th September 2018 Commons Chamber

[Matt Rodda]

My hon. Friend makes an interesting point, and I urge the Minister to take this opportunity to listen to him and to the points made by our Front Benchers.

Amendment 3 provides a clear definition of default fees and limits the amount that could be charged, while still allowing landlords and agents to charge for expenses where there is a clear cost. It would provide clarity for all parties and, crucially, it would provide tenants in my constituency and elsewhere with the protection from exploitation that they so desperately need. Surely colleagues across the whole House would agree that that is the right thing to do. I therefore urge the Minister to consider this amendment and to consider strengthening the Bill to provide limits on what can be charged for. I urge him to take this opportunity to protect tenants from exploitation. It is time for the Government to listen to tenants and to deliver a fair, accessible and accountable rental market for all.

[Richard Graham (Gloucester) (Con)]

I rise to support the Tenant Fees Bill, which has been so clearly presented today by the Minister. The abolition of most up-front fees, the capping of security deposits at six weeks’ rent, the reduction of costs to tenants in the private sector potentially by hundreds of pounds and the increasing of transparency in the housing market—surely we can all unite in saying that these characteristics of the Bill are a good thing. We have all met constituents who rent and whose fees have gone up by roughly 60% in the period between 2010 and 2014 and who have been charged fees for the most bizarre and sometimes unfair reasons—including, for example, checks being made by the same agency on the same tenant for a different property in a short space of time. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Scarborough and Whitby (Mr Goodwill) mentioned, those fees should be paid by the landlord if they are going to be paid by anyone. As rents and demand increase, the unfairness in the marketplace from a few—I stress a few—landlords and agents that is tolerated by law requires a response from the Government.

However, the Bill is not just about saving money and increasing transparency. The principle of fairness will also be boosted because all landlords will have to be members of a redress scheme, and because tenants should have easier access to dispute resolution. That is an issue that many of us will be familiar with through our own surgeries. Agents will have to be registered as members of a client money protection scheme, as many already are, and banning orders and a database of rogue landlords will be introduced. We all know about the frequent suspects whose properties consistently fail environmental health inspections, and I suspect that they will find their way on to that list unless they change their habits, which is the point of the Bill. At the same time, there will be a further consultation on benefits and barriers relating to longer-term tenancies, which I also welcome.

The ban on fees, the capping of security deposits and much else has already been welcomed by many organisations, such as Which? and Citizens Advice, and on the face of it there is no reason why anyone should object to the changes. However, there are of course some who have opposed some of the detail of the legislation, and at a time when trust is such a crucial element in the relationship between tenant, agent and landlord it is worth touching on those objections.