My Lords, I support Amendments 23 and 24 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Andrews. I can imagine the anguish that must be felt by leaseholders in blocks of flats who are facing the disruption of one or even two new storeys being built on the roof of their flats. With freeholders now having permitted development rights for upward extensions, residents face the disruption, noise and hassle of builders, lorries, cranes, skips, scaffolding and so on for months—and now they face the prospect of being unable to buy the freehold of the block because development, or the possibility of upward development, adds to the value of the block and can make enfranchisement prohibitively expensive. The extra value of adding new storeys, or the compensation demanded for not developing where there is potential to add them, generates additional freeholder profits but makes enfranchisement unaffordable, yet the Leasehold and Freehold Reform Bill is all about giving leaseholders a better deal and easier access to enfranchisement.
I note that the previous Secretary of State promised to fix this specific problem through a clause in the Bill enabling leaseholders in a block to agree together that no upward extension should take place. In this way, they remove the extra value for the freeholder. It seems that in the drafting of the Bill the promised new clause, originally an option proposed by the Law Commission, has got lost. So, on behalf of the 2 million-plus lease- holders who could be affected, I strongly support the amendments from the noble Baroness, Lady Andrews, which would fulfil the Government’s earlier promise.