Housing and Regeneration Act 2008 (Consequential Provisions) Order 2010

My Lords, I shall speak also to the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008 (Registration of Local Authorities) Order 2010. The overall purpose of the orders is to allow the new regulatory framework for social housing regulation to be brought into effect on 1 April 2010. These regulatory reforms were originally proposed in Professor Martin Cave’s report, Every Tenant Matters, published in June 2007. It recommended that a new independent social housing regulator be established to regulate all social housing landlords. The Government implemented Professor Cave’s recommendations through the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008, which provided for the establishment of a new independent regulator and for the creation of a new, cross-domain regulatory framework. The new regulator, the Tenant Services Authority, came into being on December 2008, but it has continued to regulate housing associations using the regulatory powers previously exercised by the Housing Corporation. This transitional period has allowed time for the TSA to develop new performance standards in consultation with tenants and landlords. We now seek Parliament’s approval to bring into effect the new regulatory framework provided by the 2008 Act. That is the overall aim of the two orders before us today. I shall speak to each in turn. The Housing and Regeneration Act 2008 (Registration of Local Authorities) Order would enable the TSA to register council landlords in order that they are subject to regulation. The Housing and Regeneration Act dealt only with the regulation of housing associations. We made it clear during the passage of the Housing and Regeneration Act that we would later legislate to apply the regulator’s powers in the Act, as appropriate, to council landlords. Section 114 was included in the Act to facilitate this, following cross- party support. The principle of having a single regulator for all social housing has received widespread support from both councils and tenants. Our shared goal is to raise the standard of services for tenants no matter who their landlord is. The needs and experiences of tenants will be central to the new regulatory framework led by the TSA. Social tenants have limited leverage in the "market": they cannot choose to move into another home or choose to rent from another landlord. It is important to ensure that tenants are offered opportunities to be involved in decisions that affect them and that they should have the protection that regulation provides where they receive an unacceptable level of service. The policy intent underpinning the order is that the TSA be provided with the powers necessary to enable it to apply a common regulatory framework across all providers of social housing. We have also been clear from the outset that any new regulatory framework operating under the powers should support local delivery and accountability through the local performance framework. The TSA has made it clear that it shares our aims to reduce unnecessary burdens on local authorities. Where differences arise between governance of local authority landlords and wider performance management, our aim has been that they should be addressed by the regulator through application of its regulatory framework rather than by seeking to add complicated provisions to the statutory framework. However, some tailoring of the Act and amendment of other legislation is necessary in connection with the registration of local authorities. The new regulatory framework, which would apply across all providers of social housing, has standards at its core. The TSA consulted on its proposed standards between December 2009 and February 2010. It described the outcomes that the regulator will want to see delivered, as well as any specific requirements it is expected to meet. The TSA has made clear that it wants to place the main emphasis on the relationship between landlord and tenant, a relationship within which tenants help to shape, influence and monitor the service provided. A key element of that approach is that housing providers should agree local standards with their tenants. The regulator may require information of a provider, order an inquiry or commission an inspection. Where the regulator has established that there has been a breach of standards or general mismanagement, it would have a range of enforcement powers to help to ensure that tenants receive an acceptable level of service. The regulations are relatively straightforward in that they largely amend provisions in the Housing and Regeneration Act as necessary for the registration of council landlords. The order provides that council landlords who currently retain ownership of social housing stock will be registered with the regulator from the outset. Existing council landlords would not therefore need to apply to be placed on the register. The order inserts a new duty on the regulator so that it will co-operate with the Audit Commission and, in particular, consult with the commission on matters relating to council landlords. The order does not apply the power in the Act that enables the regulator to set financial management standards for housing associations. The financial governance of councils is already subject to regulation by the Audit Commission. The intervention powers granted to the regulator in the Act provide powers that it could use to address poor performance in the housing association sector. It is our intention that the same powers should apply to councils, but only where they repeat those powers that the Government hold in order to intervene in serious cases of local authority underperformance. In accordance with that principle, the order provides that powers to impose fines on providers and order a landlord to pay compensation to tenants should not be applicable with regard to councils. The order would also not extend to local authorities the powers to suspend and remove officers. Finally, the order transfers from the Secretary of State to the regulator the powers in the Housing Act 1985 to give consent for the transfer of the management of a council’s housing stock to another provider. It makes sense for the regulator to take on this function as it will hold the relevant information about the performance of the landlord. The consequential provisions order makes consequential amendments to primary legislation arising from Part 2 of the 2008 Act, which provided a new regulatory framework for social housing. These amendments are a matter of technical necessity, and most fall into one of two categories—that is, the replacement in England of the term "registered social landlord" with "registered provider of social housing", and the transfer of the Housing Corporation’s regulatory functions to the TSA. First, on registration, the TSA currently regulates registered social landlords, commonly known as housing associations. RSLs are non-profit, private-sector bodies that are independent of government. As part of the new regulatory framework that is due to be in place from April 2010 onwards, profit-making bodies will also be able to register with the TSA—a change that was recommended by the Cave review. All registered social landlords are required to be non-profit-making. Given that profit-making bodies will be able to register after 1 April as well, the 2008 Act introduced the term "registered provider of social housing"—registered provider, for short—to denote bodies that are registered with the TSA. In order to protect the existing non-profit status of RSLs, the TSA will register non-profit and profit-making providers separately, and slightly different rules will apply in some circumstances. Therefore, we need to be able to differentiate between types of registered provider. The term "private registered providers of social housing" will refer to all bodies registered with the TSA that are not local authorities. The term "non-profit registered provider of social housing" will refer to those private registered providers that are non-profit. In amending existing references in primary legislation to "RSLs", we have had to consider whether in future these legislative provisions should apply to non-profit registered providers only, by which I mean only existing RSLs and any similar non-profit bodies that register with the TSA from April, or to all private registered providers—that is, non-profit and profit-making bodies. Our general approach in the order has been to apply these provisions to all private registered providers of social housing. Our aim, as far as possible, is for there to be a level playing field between providers, and that social tenants should not be any worse off due to the status of their landlord. However, in specific cases there are technical or policy reasons to apply the existing references to RSLs to non-profit providers only—for example, in relation to charities legislation, where referring to profit-making bodies would not be meaningful, or in relation to RSLs’ existing anti-social behaviour powers, where we do not believe that it would be appropriate for profit-making providers to exercise these powers without proper consideration and consultation. The second category of consequential amendments is much more straightforward. It reflects the transfer of the Housing Corporation’s regulatory functions to the TSA, or the Regulator of Social Housing, as it is referred to in the legislation. The orders are concerned with making sure that all landlords who provide social housing, whether housing associations or councils, deliver high standards, and I commend them to the Committee.