Tenant Fees Bill (Third sitting)

Debate between Sarah Jones and Daniel Zeichner

Committee Debate: 3rd sitting: House of Commons
Thursday 7th June 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Sarah Jones]

I will shortly make the case that in some cases people will end up paying more money as a result of the Bill as it currently stands.

So a cap of six weeks’ rent will not make a difference to the vast majority of private renters, and it does not send a message to tenants that this Government want to improve things for them. I would like the Minister to explain his thinking on that.

In areas with higher housing costs, such as London, a six-week deposit based on median rents will see private renters needing to fork out £2,000. Therefore, amendment 7, in keeping with the advice from various experts, seeks to make this part of the Bill more impactful by setting a three-week cap. That would save tenants £575 compared with the Government’s proposals, rising to £928 in London.

I come to my second main point. We have established that, as it stands, this schedule will be fairly ineffective, but in fact it is in danger of making things worse. To emphasise the lack of impact that it will have in its current form, we can again look at the Government’s own impact assessment. It claims that a cap of six weeks’ rent will result in

“money being available to tenants to spend, leading to wider economic benefits.”

The impact assessment estimates that 1.4 million households moving home in the private rented sector in year one will pay £12 million less in deposits than they do currently. If that benefit is spread across all those households, the average saving is £8.50 per household, which would not be a massive boost to the economy.

The original briefing for the Queen’s Speech indicated an intention to cap deposits at four weeks—that is really important. The Financial Times was among publications that reported that

“deposits that tenants leave with landlords or their letting agents will be capped at no more than one month’s rent.”

When the draft Bill came out in May 2018, groups such as the National Landlords Association and the Association of Residential Letting Agents claimed victory in pushing the cap back to six weeks. A National Landlords Association newsletter stated:

“The Government had initially proposed in the consultation to cap security deposits at no more than 4 weeks’ rent. From the beginning of the process, the NLA has been actively campaigning around raising the cap to 6 weeks. This was outlined when…CEO of the NLA…met with the Minister of State for Housing and Planning…in September and pressed him to rethink the level of this cap.”

Perhaps the Minister can explain what arguments the Government took into account when deciding to amend their plans for a four-week cap, and why they did not listen to the evidence given by Shelter, Citizens Advice and others that a lower cap was the only way to effectively tackle the hardship faced by many private renters. Indeed, why did the Minister not listen to the views of tenants themselves?

On Second Reading, the Secretary of State gave various arguments in defence of a six-week cap, but I am afraid that none of them stands up to scrutiny. He argued that a cap of six weeks’ rent will give landlords greater flexibility to accept higher-risk tenants, such as those with pets, but analysis conducted by MHCLG as part of its impact assessment did not find a link between the level of deposit and the riskiness of the tenant. As landlords told us earlier this week, a better system for higher-risk tenants might be to allow an exception to the cap in specific cases, such as pets.

The Government have also argued that a six-week cap will address concerns about tenants leaving without paying their final month’s rent. Experts have argued that that is a rare occurrence, and just this morning, we heard that only 2% of tenants used their deposit as their final month’s rent. The important role played by the deposit protection scheme means that there are already means by which we can resolve disputes.

The Housing Secretary rightly pointed out the need to ensure a balance between financial security for landlords and affordability for tenants, but the data we have on deposits suggests that the proposals are skewed in favour of landlords. Deposit protection scheme data suggests that on average, since 2007, tenants have received more than 75% of their deposit value back. In more than half of cases, tenants receive their deposit back in full, with no deductions. Of course, landlords need the security of knowing that they can recoup costs if needed, and there should be a deterrent for tenants who might otherwise leave properties in a bad state, but the numbers suggest that a much lower-value deposit would still allow landlords to recoup any legitimate costs at the end of a tenancy.

The amount of the deposit could be halved and landlords would still have an ample amount to cover the average deduction. If the average deposit is £1,000, with people paying back a quarter on average, that means landlords receive back £250 on average. If the deposit was halved to £500, they would still have enough for that average to be returned. The majority of the deposit would still be returned to the tenant in most cases, but it would also leave room for a bigger than average deduction if necessary.

Importantly, the Housing Secretary argued that the six-week cap was not a recommendation, despite repeated warnings on Second Reading that it may be interpreted as such and become the norm. The inherent seal of approval of a Government cap could result in landlords thinking it was okay and normal to raise deposits to that six-week level. That is relevant in the context of other fees being restricted by the Bill.

The potential backfiring of the Bill could mean that an average deposit of 4.8 weeks across the country suddenly jumped to six weeks, which would cost tenants hundreds of pounds in extra deposit fees and completely negate the benefit of the main part of the Bill, which bans letting fees. The Government estimate the average cost of letting fees to be between £200 and £300. If the most common deposit of four weeks became six, based on average rents, Londoners would pay £500 more on their deposits, which means that the net impact of the Bill on renters would be negative.

[Daniel Zeichner]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech, but she has a tendency, as all London MPs do, to constantly refer to London, which I entirely understand. I suggest that she looks a bit further up the country to an area such as mine, which displays similar attributes to London. There are always different views on exactly what average rents are, but something like £1,000 to £1,200 is typical in my city. She is making an important point about what the Bill could lead to for young people such as those looking to rent in Cambridge, which they have to do because they are completely priced out of purchasing property. They would have to have about £1,500 or £1,600 up front. That would have a significant effect on one of the economic powerhouses of the country. Will the Minister bear that in mind? If six weeks’ rent becomes the norm, that will have importance not only ethically but for the effectiveness of our economy in difficult times.

[Sarah Jones]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent observation, and I take his point completely. There are many parts of the country where the rental market is pressurised and prices are prohibitively high, so the impact would be the same as it is in London. He is right.

There is precedent for the Government setting a figure that becomes the norm, whether it is a cap or a floor. In many cases such a precedent has been created, and that could occur here. That price level is given inherent Government approval for those on the other side of the deal, who say, “This is what the Government say we can charge”. There are two obvious examples, one a cap and one a floor: tuition fees and the minimum wage respectively. We are all aware of how universities raised their fees to the maximum of £9,000 as soon as they could, despite claims that there would be price competition. Likewise, when the minimum wage was introduced, it was said that it would be an absolute floor but, sadly, for many workers it has become the norm.

If we are trying to make things better for private renters, which I am sure the Minister is, we should not be settling for the status quo, nor should we be considering something that may make the situation worse. We should be the leaders we were elected to be and change the Bill. To reiterate our argument for a three-week cap, if the most common deposit is now four weeks’ rent and the average amount returned is more than 75% of the deposit value, reducing the cap to three weeks would still leave more than enough room to give landlords financial protection while at the same time bringing real benefits to tenants.