Asked by: Tulip Siddiq (Labour - Hampstead and Highgate)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, whether his Department has made an assessment of the potential merits of introducing requirements for residents to be made aware of (a) construction plans and (b) the projected noise pollution from those plans as a prerequisite for building works.
Answered by Stuart Andrew - Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
A planning application for major development must be accompanied by a design and access statement. This will explain the design principles and concepts that have been applied to the proposed development and demonstrate the steps taken to assess the context of the proposed development.
All documents submitted as part of a planning application, including any noise impact or environmental impact assessments, are made publicly available for comment during the mandatory 21 consultation period. This ensures local residents are aware of the application, and its supported documents, and can comment on these. Our National Planning Policy Framework states that planning decisions and subsequent developments should not contribute to unacceptable levels of noise pollution and that developments should take into account adverse noise affecting existing amenities and local infrastructure.
The Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill will increase the opportunities for involvement to ensure development is brought forward in a way that works best for local people. Alongside traditional forms of engagement, digital engagement will remove barriers to engagement and provide new opportunities for local people to engage. We are clear that communities must have a say on development that affects them and they will retain the right to comment on planning applications.
Asked by: Tulip Siddiq (Labour - Hampstead and Highgate)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what plans he has to provide financial support to leaseholders affected by high costs associated with remedial fire-safety works and unsafe cladding in residential buildings of betweeen 11 and 18 metres.
Answered by Stuart Andrew - Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
No leaseholder living in their own flat above 11m will pay a penny to fix unsafe cladding and our new levy will protect leaseholders even if their developer has so far refused to sign up to our pledge.
The Government is also launching a new 11-18m cladding remediation scheme to fund work on buildings where a responsible developer cannot be identified. The new scheme will be funded by expanding the scope of the Building Safety Levy to raise an additional estimated £3 billion, providing the necessary funds to address cladding issues on these remaining buildings. We will announce further detail on the launch of the 11-18m Remediation Fund shortly.
Asked by: Tulip Siddiq (Labour - Hampstead and Highgate)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, whether he plans to announce additional funding for the Building Safety Fund.
Answered by Stuart Andrew - Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
The Government is providing £5.1 billion, including £4.5 billion through the Building Safety Fund, to address the fire safety risks caused by unsafe cladding on high-rise residential buildings. This will be used where the original developer and/or the building owner are not funding the works. On 13 April, the Department announced that leading residential developers had pledged to remediate life critical fire safety works in buildings over 11 metres that they have played a role in developing or refurbishing over the last 30 years in England. As of 13 June, over 45 have signed the pledge.
Developers making this commitment have also agreed to reimburse any funding received from government remediation programmes in relation to buildings they had a role in developing or refurbishing. This action will make sure that funding grants will only be used where there is no industry solution available and there should be no need for additional funding from the tax payer.
Asked by: Tulip Siddiq (Labour - Hampstead and Highgate)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, whether he has plans to abolish leasehold as a form of property ownership.
Answered by Eddie Hughes
Homeownership should provide people with far greater control over their homes and their lives. In the next Parliamentary Session we will legislate to reform the leasehold system, including by supercharging leaseholders’ ability to buy their freeholds and take control of their homes. For new builds, we will ban use of leasehold for houses. For flats we want to see widespread take up of commonhold so people can fully enjoy the benefits of true homeownership from the outset.
Asked by: Tulip Siddiq (Labour - Hampstead and Highgate)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, with reference to leasehold reform, what steps the Government is taking to establish a (a) Redress Reform Working Group and (b) Housing Complaints Resolution Service.
Answered by Eddie Hughes
In summer 2019 the department established the Redress Reform Working Group to help improve redress across the housing market and consider a Housing Complaints Resolution Service. We continue to work on improving redress and meet with members of the Redress Reform Working Group, and the group continues to meet independently and provides updates to the department.
There is a gap in redress for leaseholders where their freeholder does not employ a managing agent and carries out their own property management on their leasehold property. In such circumstances, the freeholder is not required to sign up to a redress scheme. As part of filling the gaps in redress the government intends to require freeholders of leasehold properties who do not employ a managing agent to join a redress scheme and will seek a suitable legislative slot to do so.
Asked by: Tulip Siddiq (Labour - Hampstead and Highgate)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, whether his Department's legislative proposals on leasehold reform will apply to (a) existing and (b) future leaseholders.
Answered by Eddie Hughes
The Government remains committed to creating a fair and just housing system that works for everyone. We will be taking forward a comprehensive programme of reform to improve fairness and transparency in the leasehold market.
We have already taken action to end unfair practices in the leasehold market, beginning with the Leasehold Reform (Ground Rent) Act 2022, which comes into force on 30 June 2022. The Act will make homeownership fairer and more transparent for thousands of future leaseholders, by preventing landlords under new residential long leases from requiring a leaseholder to pay a financial ground rent. In addition to the Ground Rent Act, thousands of existing leaseholders have also already seen a reduction in their inflated ground rent costs. The Competition and Markets Authority secured commitments from major homebuilders to remove lease terms that led to doubling ground rents, and where houses were sold as leasehold, to support leaseholders to buy the freehold at the original price quoted.
The Government will make it cheaper and easier for leaseholders to extend their lease or buy the freehold of their property, including allowing existing and future leaseholders to extend their lease by 990 years at a peppercorn rent, abolishing marriage value and capping the treatment of ground rent in the valuation calculation at 0.1% of the property value. We will enable leaseholders, where they already have a long lease, to buy out the ground rent without the need to extend the term of the lease.
We have been clear about our commitment to addressing the historic imbalance in the leasehold system and further legislation will follow later in this Parliament.
Asked by: Tulip Siddiq (Labour - Hampstead and Highgate)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, whether his Department’s planned legislation on leasehold reform will (a) abolish marriage value, (b) grant leaseholders the right to extend lease agreements to 999 years, (c) reduce ground rent to a peppercorn and (d) change the valuation process for extending a lease so that the landlord can only charge a nominal amount.
Answered by Eddie Hughes
The Government remains committed to creating a fair and just housing system that works for everyone. We will be taking forward a comprehensive programme of reform to improve fairness and transparency in the leasehold market.
We have already taken action to end unfair practices in the leasehold market, beginning with the Leasehold Reform (Ground Rent) Act 2022, which comes into force on 30 June 2022. The Act will make homeownership fairer and more transparent for thousands of future leaseholders, by preventing landlords under new residential long leases from requiring a leaseholder to pay a financial ground rent. In addition to the Ground Rent Act, thousands of existing leaseholders have also already seen a reduction in their inflated ground rent costs. The Competition and Markets Authority secured commitments from major homebuilders to remove lease terms that led to doubling ground rents, and where houses were sold as leasehold, to support leaseholders to buy the freehold at the original price quoted.
The Government will make it cheaper and easier for leaseholders to extend their lease or buy the freehold of their property, including allowing existing and future leaseholders to extend their lease by 990 years at a peppercorn rent, abolishing marriage value and capping the treatment of ground rent in the valuation calculation at 0.1% of the property value. We will enable leaseholders, where they already have a long lease, to buy out the ground rent without the need to extend the term of the lease.
We have been clear about our commitment to addressing the historic imbalance in the leasehold system and further legislation will follow later in this Parliament.
Asked by: Tulip Siddiq (Labour - Hampstead and Highgate)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, whether his Department is taking steps to help ensure that property developers are not able to avoid responsibility for cladding and other remedial costs by (a) liquidating, (b) declaring bankruptcy and (c) repurchasing the freehold under a new company.
Answered by Stuart Andrew - Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
The Building Safety Act 2022 provides that where a building's freeholder is - or is linked - to the original developer, they must meet costs associated with historical building safety defects in full and cannot pass on these costs to leaseholders.
The Act refers to the position as at 14 February 2022, so any future buyer of the freehold will assume the same liabilities of the previous freeholder. As such, freeholders will not be able to simply sell off their buildings or transfer them to new companies to evade liability.
Should the freeholder declare insolvency, the Act contains provision allowing the appointed insolvency practitioner to apply to the court to require companies associated with the freeholder, such as the parent company, to meet the costs of remediation.
The Act also grants powers to the High Court and the First-tier Tribunal allowing them to extend specific liabilities for one company to associated companies, preventing developers and freeholders from evading their responsibilities by using complex corporate structures such as special purpose vehicles.
The Government has agreed with 45 residential property developers that they will fix life-critical fire safety defects, including cladding, in all buildings above 11 metres that they had a role in developing or refurbishing in the past 30 years. In these circumstances, the ownership of the particular property will be irrelevant, as the liability to remediate is with the developer group, even if the particular subsidiary that did the development becomes insolvent.
Asked by: Tulip Siddiq (Labour - Hampstead and Highgate)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what assessment he has made of the potential impact of changes in the rate of inflation on homeowners on the Help to Buy Equity Loan scheme.
Answered by Stuart Andrew - Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
The changes in the rate of inflation and the impact this will have on homeowners is of great importance. Help to Buy customers pay no interest for the first five years of their loan. Interest fees that begin in year 6 start at 1.75% and increase each year by CPI + 2%. Affordability assessments are carried out by both the main mortgage provider and our Help to Buy Agents at the outset of the loans. These checks assess and stress-test the borrower’s long-term ability to meet their mortgage repayments and future fee payments. We are, however, monitoring the situation closely and will continue working with Homes England ensure we have the correct policies in place to support homeowners.