I wish to pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Westminster North (Ms Buck) for introducing this Bill and to my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts) for the debate we had in Westminster Hall yesterday afternoon on supported housing. Although that was clearly not on exactly the same issue, many of the tenants we are talking about in this Bill are very vulnerable people and clearly there is a benefit to society in enabling the maximum number of people possible to lead independent lives. Some of the people who are not currently able to gain redress for inadequate housing run the risk of ending up either in supported housing or in hospital.
Just last weekend, I called on a couple who invited me into their flat to show me the mould that had grown all around their bathroom, under the window in their sitting room and even in the bedroom. This couple live in a council flat in Ipswich, so I was able to pass on their details to the local councillors in the strong expectation that something will be done to rectify the situation. Of course, the council does not always get things right. I believe Ipswich Borough housing is an exemplar of good practice, but even good landlords get things wrong sometimes. That is why it is so important that this Bill will apply to local authority housing properties, in the same way it does to private rented accommodation. Indeed, in some ways, it impacts more on those public sector tenants who need its help than it does on private sector tenants, because whereas a private sector tenant might hold out some hope that they could persuade the local council to act legally on their behalf, a council is not going to take out a legal case against itself.
One would hope that accountable local authorities would take their responsibilities to their tenants seriously enough to rectify any unfitness without the need for legal recourse, but unfortunately that is not always the case; in such cases, council tenants have no recourse to the law at all. This Bill will enable council tenants to take legal action against their landlord if no action were taken to put right any unfitness, just as it will for private sector tenants. I know that Conservative Members would not be willing to accept a Bill that unfairly favoured
public sector housing over private sector housing, and rightly so, and this Bill does not do that. I could wish that, in the interests of fairness and a level playing field, Conservative Members might consider other measures for the private sector, and changes to the law and regulations for the local authority sector, but I think that is for another day.
Of course, although this Bill does afford a very important and necessary protection to council and housing association tenants, the majority of the problem exists in the private sector. In the east of England, 20% of private sector rented stock is in a state that poses a serious risk to its tenants’ health, as compared with just 8% of the council and housing association stock. In my 20 years as a local councillor I was constantly being contacted by distraught residents who showed me mouldy walls, dodgy banisters, awkward and cramped entrance halls, and rickety windows. I would raise these issues with council officers but in almost every case I was told there was no action the council could take with the private sector landlord on these matters. This Bill will empower the tenants themselves to demand safe and healthy homes from their landlords.
I do not believe that there will be any rash of prosecutions as a result of this Bill. I believe it will focus the minds of those landlords, both private and public, who do not currently pay quite enough attention to the welfare of their tenants and encourage them to provide the level of service that 75% of landlords are already providing. All good landlords should welcome this Bill. Why should the 75% who provide fit and proper housing be undercut by rogue operators or see their sector tarred with the brush of inadequate maintenance or shoddy flat conversions? I am delighted that this Bill is receiving support from across the House, and I look forward to it becoming law.
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