To protect vulnerable leaseholders, the leasehold market must be reformed
3 min read
In five years time, leasehold and commonhold reform should enable fairer lease-rental and exploitative freeholders should have no forum to raise costs for leaseholders, writes Peter Bottomley MP.
Jim Fitzpatrick MP and the campaigning charity Leasehold Knowledge Partnership’s (LKP) trustee, Martin Boyd, and Chief Officer, Sebastian O’Kelly, have worked across the spectrum for a decade for recognition of the issues that have caused residential leasehold status to be so dangerous, worrisome and expensive for so many ordinary households.
Sir Ed Davey MP, Andrew Selous MP and Justin Madders MP have also come forward with others to lead government to initiate change.
The women who founded the National Leasehold Campaign won the attention of the BBC’s Victoria Derbyshire programme.
Radio Four’s ‘You and Yours’ and ‘Money Box’ helped too, together with Private Eye and several newspaper journalists and Tortoise open journalism.
Gavin Barwell was the Housing Minister who restarted the movement towards great justice and to reduced injustice. Until then, there had been wholesale abuse and the regrettable custom of otherwise responsible builders selling freeholds of houses unnecessarily marketed on a leasehold basis, too often with significant annual ground rents that double every ten years.
Now the Law Commission has been tasked to find ways forward on several issues.
The ministry of Housing has declared some action. One good and necessary initiative was the decision by the then Secretary of State, James Brokenshire, to prevent poor vulnerable leaseholders in high-rise blocks with dangerous cladding from the high expense of replacement.
LKP have kindly served with Katherine O’Riordan as secretariat for the all-party group on leasehold and commonhold reform.
After the tragedy of the Grenfell Tower conflagration, LKP gave the best advice to worried leaseholders; even after the Government provided a large sum to LEASE, the Leasehold Advisory Service that has now changed to be on the side of leaseholders.
LEASE no longer provides a forum where greedy freeholders can learn how to more effectively raise costs and problems for their vulnerable leaseholders.
MPs are impressed by the recent Select Committee report led by Clive Betts MP.
In all my years of public and parliamentary endeavour, I have not seen a more influential and clear report with practical proposals based on insights and a strong sense of justice.
We need follow through. The odd factor is the Treasury have not yet spotted that their revenues will rise when the leasehold market is righted and that the overdue progress in commonhold or strata title will also help.
I look for the chair of LEASE to invite the APPG Secretariat to come with MP officers to LEASE to explore how to co-operate in the interests of those we serve.
Within five years, our common work should make lease-rental fair, make lease extensions extendable and make the exploiters leave this field of housing.
Sir Peter Bottomley is Conservative MP for Worthing West.
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