Leasehold Reform

Bob Blackman Excerpts

Thursday 21st March 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Betts]

Yes. We called for an investigation into mis-selling, as did the Government. Let us hope that, between us, we get that done, particularly for older people who may not have understood some of the difficult complications with those sorts of properties.

[Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman—I shall call him my hon. Friend—on his chairmanship of the Committee and on steering us towards this excellent report, in which I was pleased to participate. One point that he did not mention, given the time available to him, was the scandal of companies such as Bellway that sell the freeholds of properties to financial companies two years after they built them, without even notifying the leaseholders. Will he urge the Government to close the legal loophole that allows companies to sell properties to subsidiaries or other organisations without even notifying leaseholders and to ensure that leaseholders can buy the freehold at the same price that would be paid by any subsidiary?

[Mr Betts]

Absolutely. It is a complete scandal, and a number of developers have blatantly admitted that they sold on the property and did not tell the leaseholders what was being done. Ultimately, banning new houses from being built as leaseholds solves the problem, but immediately there ought to be a right of first refusal for leaseholders to buy their freehold at a clear and regulated price. The Law Commission is working on that issue, and we support that.