The Father of the House is absolutely right. In one of the properties in which I was a leaseholder, we set up as directors and took control of the property. We appointed our own management company, at significantly lower cost, to address some of the massive overcharges we faced.
In 2014, the Competition and Markets Authority estimated that the average service charge amounted to just over £1,100 a year, suggesting that service charges could total between £2.4 billion and £3.5 billion a year.
My hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts) highlighted the 2019 Select Committee report—I was privileged to sit on that Select Committee—which identified that, too often, leaseholders, particularly in new-build properties, have been treated by developers, freeholders and management agents not as homeowners or customers but as a source of steady profit. We concluded by urging the Government to ensure that commonhold became the primary ownership model for flats in England and Wales, as it is in many other countries. Of course, that has not been adopted.