Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Bill [Lords]

The police must know the proper procedure. My hon. Friend has raised a powerful point. Chapter 2 of part 3 also abolishes the common-law right of distress for rent and replaces it with a new, more limited power of commercial rent arrears recovery, which will apply only to the seizure and sale of goods in the enforcement of commercial rent arrears. That procedure will not apply to residential premises. Taken together, that package of measures will help to protect the vulnerable from the over-zealous or illegal pursuit of debts. Part 4 concerns the enforcement of judgments and orders. By contrast, it aims to tackle those who have the means to pay their debts but who choose not to. Clause 86 will simplify and streamline the arrangements for deducting payment of a judgment debt directly from a debtor’s salary. In future, deductions from salary will be made according to fixed rates, as they are for council tax debts and magistrates courts fines, rather than setting a specific rate for each debtor. A further difficulty is the lapse in orders where debtors change employers but fail to notify the court or the creditor. Clause 87 will allow Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs to provide the court with the new employer’s details in such cases. Clauses 88 and 89 make changes to the law governing charging orders. They close a loophole in the current law that prevents the charging of a property, if the debtor is maintaining payments under an instalment order. That means that if a debtor with large judgment debts is meeting their regular instalments, they can sell assets such as a second home or shares without paying off those debts in full. That loophole will be blocked, but it will not be possible for the creditor to obtain an order for sale as long as such an individual is paying the instalments. There will also be minimum thresholds below which a creditor will not be allowed to apply for a charging order to introduce some balance. Part 4 will also help the civil courts track missing judgment debtors. It cannot be right for those who owe money and who have a judgment against them to avoid payment by going to ground. Clauses 90 to 97 therefore include measures to allow the courts to seek information from Revenue and Customs and a designated Secretary of State about a debtor. The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions is likely to be designated for those purposes. The courts will also be empowered to request information from other bodies designated in regulations made by the Lord Chancellor to assist in the enforcement of judgments. We anticipate that banks and credit reference agencies are likely to be designated. Safeguards have been built into the process, including the new offences in clause 97, to ensure that information collected in that way is not abused.