My Lords, I join the debate on the Bill because I am very interested in the subject and have always strongly supported Karen Buck, who has done a marvellous job.
I do not agree with the view of the noble Lords, Lord Best and Lord Tope, that the good thing about the Bill is that people will be able to take their issues straight to the courts. We should have a return to the leasehold system, under which people did not require special measures to get their legal fees paid. The Leasehold Valuation Tribunal did a huge amount of good. There should be an ombudsman to deal with matters prior to people going to court—they could be dealt with more quickly—and court should be a second choice only if the first one does not work. That issue needs thinking about.
My noble friend Lord Horam mentioned properties being split into units as small as possible. I agree particularly that action is needed on these.
Something that has not been mentioned, and here I must declare my interest on the register, is the abuse of the letting system whereby holiday lets are taking over a lot of property in London. The Mayor of London has commented on the great loss of accommodation. I would like to see powers returned to local authorities to determine whether or not people are entitled, and at least to be able to check how many people are living in these places. As I have said before in your Lordships’ House, there are three one-bedroom flats in the block that I have concerns in, and 10 people are bussed in for one or two weeks’ holiday. Sometimes they come all bandaged up—they are national health tourists—but otherwise they come in and make life hell for any long-term residents living in the block. It is important that we restore powers that were taken away from the London local authorities. We should go back to that system and encourage local authorities to be more involved. Although the statement is made regularly that they have all the powers they need, if you ask them, they will say that they do not have the powers. I think Newham is the only London borough that has continuing powers.
Mention was made of mould in buildings. When I was on the Greater London Council, I was responsible for one-eighth of London’s housing. We introduced systems building, which was a marvellous concrete thing that was meant to be great. As chairman, I went out to visit the properties because people were very unhappy with them. Someone’s lovely wedding dress, laid out on their bed for use, had been damaged and virtually destroyed by green mould. It turned out that the whole problem was a lack of ventilation; these places were heated in the morning and then people
went out to work and closed the door behind them, and the lack of ventilation meant that the mould had its perfect growing conditions. Once that was discovered, they were able to deal with the problem and put in small permanent ventilation, and the mould vanished. The problem is that, for every improvement you believe you have made in housing, there is some downside. You have to be aware of that and check that things are going well.
Many speakers, including the noble Lords, Lord Tope and Lord Carlile, mentioned legal aid. Legal aid is not that easy to come by. It is a more serious issue to have to spend the time taking a matter to court than the previous system of someone looking into things. Indeed, I understand that the noble Lord, Lord Best, himself has some sort of ombudsman qualification that he deals with. It is unfortunate that powers have been taken away from local boroughs and I would like to see them reinstated.
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