My Lords, we are also supporting Amendment 20, and I would like to speak in support of Amendment 22 and electrical checks on behalf of my noble friend Lord Tope.
At Second Reading, the Minister said, in response to this very point:
“Local authorities already have strong and effective powers to deal with poor-quality unsafe accommodation, and we expect them to use them”.—[Official Report, 26/01/16; col. 1270.]
In the Committee stage in the Commons, the Minister of State, Brandon Lewis, said:
“Local authorities already have strong and effective powers to deal with poor-quality unsafe accommodation, and we expect them to use those powers”.—[Official Report, Commons, 10/12/15; col. 707.]
I would like to stress to the Minister and to the Government that this is slightly the wrong end of the stick of the point that this amendment is trying to make. The amendment is trying to beef up existing legislation to ensure that tenants have greater rights. It is less about local authority involvement and much more about liberating the consumer—the tenant—to take action and get repairs delivered. It is not even about the issue of compensation afterwards. It is about where they live right now and having the legal weight behind them to take action and get the repair in the place where they are a tenant. I cannot stress that enough. Therefore, I simply suggest that, if the Minister comes back and says that local authorities have enough power, that does not answer the question I am trying to raise.
This is not new legislation. It is not extra red tape. It is simply about enabling tenants, as I made clear at Second Reading. It revives an outdated law. It is about rights for consumers—something I suggest that this Government should be eager to embrace. Overstretched local authorities could encourage tenants to challenge conditions themselves and free their resources to focus on the very worst conditions. It would therefore act as a deterrent to landlords letting out properties in poor conditions.
The key point is that the clause does not impose new requirements on landlords; it is not a further regulatory burden. The standards set out are effectively the same as those in the Housing Act 2004 via the housing health and safety rating system, the HHSRS. There were 51,916 complaints about housing conditions to the relevant councils in 2013-14 but only 14,000 inspections of PRS properties. In other words, yes, the local authorities have the power, but they do not have the resources, so when complaints are made to them, very few inspections are made as a result, and there is even less enforcement. The prosecutions resulting from that in that one figure average one per council per year. With 4.4 million households in the private rented sector, surely we can provide some better basis for them to go to court and get their landlord to make repairs.
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Local authorities face increasing resource restrictions, and there are varying degrees of enthusiasm among them for applying these kinds of inspections. However, the rent level restrictions have made the relevant section in the previous legislation practically useless, because they are so low. I am sure that the noble Baroness is familiar with the figures, but I will give them to her in case she is not. The section only comes into effect when the rent on property in London is less than £80 a year, or £52 elsewhere. In other words, because the rental level is so out of date, this provision has fallen into non-use, but it could come back into use if the noble Baroness will consider this
I do not want to take up much more of your Lordships’ time in the Chamber, and this is all about issues such as condensation, damp, mould, inadequate heating and bad ventilation, with which the noble Baroness is very familiar. The proposed new clause is complementary to the provisions of the Housing Act 2004 and the powers available to local authorities, but is all about powers for the tenants. It addresses a gap in the current system where tenants are unable to effectively challenge disrepair. This is partly because they have to ask the council to get involved, which uses a cumbersome and slow process and is underresourced to do it, and partly because legal aid is no longer available for these cases.
Updating the law on fitness for human habitation would make it easier for tenants to get injunctions from the courts ordering the landlord to carry out basic repairs, instead of needing a high burden of expert opinion on behalf of the local authority, which is where we currently stand at the moment. Would it impact on landlords? No, it would not impact on the landlords who already behave well and are at an appropriate level. It would have no impact on them—if anything, it would give them greater cover. It would affect those making a profit out of letting properties in poor condition.
In the Commons, the Minister’s main rebuttal was that tenants have powers to get compensation through things such as rent orders, but again this misses the point. The point is that there is legislation already in existence which needs dusting off and updating in terms of the financial levels. Tenants will then have a really good right wrapped around them.
Finally, sadly, in the Commons this went down a cul-de-sac of the sort I described when I started speaking. This issue deserves a much wider debate and I am very pleased to hear that the Opposition will also try to divide on this at a later stage. I beg to move.