Asked by: Alex Easton (Independent - North Down)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, when she plans to bring forward the Leasehold and Commonhold Reform Bill; what recent estimate she has made of when the provisions of the Leasehold and Commonhold Reform Bill will be implemented; and what steps she is taking with Cabinet colleagues to help support leaseholders with short leases to obtain mortgages.
Answered by Matthew Pennycook - Minister of State (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
As outlined in the King’s Speech, the Government will act quickly to provide homeowners with greater rights, powers, and protections over their homes by implementing the provisions of the Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act 2024. This includes a new valuation scheme that leaseholders must follow to calculate how much they should pay to enfranchise and includes measures such as removing the requirement to pay marriage value, capping the treatment of ground rents at 0.1% of the freehold value in the calculation, and prescribing rates for the calculation. A small number of provisions came into force on 24 July, two months after Royal Assent, relating to rentcharge arrears, building safety legal costs and the work of professional insolvency practitioners.
The Government will further reform the leasehold system by enacting remaining Law Commission recommendations relating to enfranchisement and the Right to Manage, tackle unregulated and unaffordable ground rents, and removing the disproportionate and draconian threat of forfeiture. We will also reinvigorate commonhold through a comprehensive new legal framework and ban the sale of new leasehold flats so commonhold becomes the default tenure.
The Government has made clear it intends to publish draft legislation on leasehold and commonhold reform in this session so that it may be subject to broad consultation and additional parliamentary scrutiny.
Asked by: Alex Easton (Independent - North Down)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what steps she plans to take to (a) support communities across the UK in taking ownership of assets at risk of closure and (b) ensure their continued use for community benefit through the Community Ownership Fund.
Answered by Alex Norris - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
The English Devolution Bill will empower communities with a strong new ‘right to buy’ beloved community assets, such as empty shops, pubs and community spaces. We will make further announcements in due course.