HC Deb 30 July 1958 vol 592 cc1543-52

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Colonel J. H. Harrison.]

12.52 a.m.

Mr. A. Blenkinsop (Newcastle-upon-Tyne, East)

I am sorry that the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Housing and Local Government is being kept out of his bed this morning, but I make no apology for taking what is almost the only opportunity I can of raising a matter which is affecting many constituents of mine very seriously and causing a very great deal of distress to them, and that is the effect of the improper demands being made by landlords to secure rent increases under the Rent Act, and to threaten eviction, quite improperly, where tenants have, or ought to be able to use, defences provided under the Rent Act.

I want to quote one or two examples and to be brief, because I want there to be time for the hon. Lady the Member for Tynemouth (Dame Irene Ward), who also referred to this matter at Question Time a couple of days ago, to take part.

The first type of case is where a landlord has given an undertaking in the proper form under the Act declaring his willingness to carry out certain repairs. Six months have gone by, the repairs have not been done, and the tenant refuses, as he is entitled to under the Act, rent amounting to one-third the gross value less certain sums covering the increased rent he has been paying over the period while repairs have not been done. This has been declared to be quite proper on many occasions, and yet in very many cases difficult landlords are attempting to secure the increased rent, in spite of the fact that their undertakings have not been carried out, and are threatening in some cases eviction proceedings against the tenant. In some cases, they are marking it in the rent book as arrears. In such cases I am advising tenants that such action is actionable in the courts and that the tenants would be within their rights to take action against the landlord. But it is amazing and tragic how continuous repetition and pressure upon the tenants by the landlord frightens many of the tenants into accepting the position and paying the higher rent quite improperly.

The second type of case is one of which I have an actual case here, and which is typical of others. A landlord has actually served a notice to quit on tenants who still have in their possession an undischarged certificate of disrepair from the landlord. In one case—this time, not a landlord, but an estate agent—Gordon Bannerman, estate agent, of 51, North Road, Durham City, is acting in relation to properties in Walker, Newcastle and has actually served these notices to quit. Although one can advise the tenants that they are fully protected and can ignore these notices, nevertheless many of them are frightened, worried and terrified of what may happen to them. In some cases, they are being told by the landlords that if they cannot get possession now they will get it later, referring, presumably, to the power that the Ministry has to increase the scope of decontrol at a later stage. These threats are being made continuously, in some cases with service of notice to quit.

An extraordinary case has come to my notice of a constituent of mine, a builder, who some years ago built a series of houses. Unfortunately, he failed in business and had to take a tenancy of one of the houses which he built. Under the Rent Act, he is now being forced to quit the house which he himself built, although he has tried to make offers within his limited capacity to buy it and he has offered higher rent.

In cases of that kind, and where there is danger of notice to quit becoming effective under the general framework of the Act, the Newcastle local authority, like other local authorities, is trying to get a full list of the cases and has been inquiring about the possibility of taking over empty properties, where landlords are apparently trying to get high prices for them, to make them available for tenants who are evicted in October. What would be the attitude of the Ministry towards applications of this nature for compulsory purchase in order to try to give some kind of accommodation for tenants who are put out in these circumstances?

The Minister has appealed to local authorities to try to make provision for cases of this sort which arise. Where local authorities are endeavouring to make that provision, I hope sincerely that the Minister will do all he can and will give all possible sympathetic consideration to applications by local authorities for compulsory powers.

Tonight, I merely ask the Parliamentary Secretary to reassert what we know to be the position and to make a declaration that his right hon. Friend and he deprecate the way in which landlords, in all too many cases—I do not say in every case—are attempting to get increases of rent to which they are not entitled and are frightening tenants all over the coun- try. I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will be able to say at least this much tonight.

12.58 a.m.

Dame Irene Ward (Tynemouth)

I am grateful to the hon. Member for Newcastle-upon-Tyne, East (Mr. Blenkinsop) for allowing me to intervene in his debate. I say right away to my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary that I wish that his right hon. Friend, when discussing matters of this kind, would merely state that there are good landlords and bad landlords and good tenants and bad tenants.

It is extremely difficult, in the framework of any legislation, to deal with human nature. My right hon. Friend finds it extraordinarily difficult to approach the problem from that angle, and he gives himself unnecessary trouble and gets unnecessary criticism. For my part, I try to support good landlords and I try to support good tenants. When I find either a landlord or a tenant unfairly threatened, I consider it my right to raise the matter where I can in Parliament.

I wish to make a comment in support of what has been said. I am sorry to have to give the name, but I think it only fair to do so, so that good landlords who are acting properly do not receive any criticism.

I want to produce one case of a widow who received a letter, which I will read out, from a firm called Richard A. Jackson, Merlin Jackson and Henry B. Pendrich. The senior agent is also the landlord, and he sent this to a widow who held a certificate of disrepair, and who had been advised what her position was by the local authority, the County Borough of Tynemouth, who were very helpful in this matter. This letter was written on 9th July, headed "Rent Arrears": We are very sorry at the attitude you are taking up regarding the payment of your rent and we do not like the way you are going on regarding same. We enclose notice to quit terminating your tenancy on the 11th August and trust that you will have your rent paid up to date by then and vacate the property without any further trouble. Of course, that is quite a monstrous letter to send to a tenant, and I sent the correspondence to my right hon. Friend. I was very glad, after I had been perhaps unduly critical of him in the House the other day at Question Time, to receive this letter from him, which I thought was very helpful, and I shall certainly proceed on the advice he has given. He said: As you know, the tenant in this case is protected, and the notice to quit is of no effect. But the action of the agents appears strange, to say the least, on the facts as given in the papers you sent me. I see that the letterhead indicates that the partners are all Fellows of the Chartered Auctioneers' and Estate Agents' Institute. This is a body of high professional standing. I think that it might be worth your obtaining a full statement of the story—the Town Clerk's Department might be ready to prepare it"— I have got the full story actually— and then sending it with all the relevant documents to the Secretary of the Institute at 29, Lincoln's Inn Fields, W.C.2. That is what I intend to do.

I merely want to put on record—and I hope the Parliamentary Secretary will be able in some way to answer this—that there are such cases, and it is in the interests of the nation as a whole, and in the interests of proper behaviour of people in this country, that attention should be drawn to the fact when people take unfair advantage of people like the widow concerned in this case, who in spite of the fact she had been told exactly what her position was and that she need not fear the landlord's notice to quit, came to me to ask if I could reinforce the statement that had been made by the local authority. That woman was absolutely terrified.

Although I regret having to raise this matter tonight—because I never like criticising anybody in the House of Commons—I do think that, from the point of view of the integrity of national life, when people behave badly it should be pointed out, and I join in asking the Parliamentary Secretary to give us at any rate some assurance tonight that people who behave in that way should be condemned.

1.4 a.m.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Housing and Local Government (Mr. J. R. Bevins)

I am sure the hon. Member for Newcastle-upon-Tyne, East (Mr. Blenkinsop) and my hon. Friend the Member for Tynemouth (Dame Irene Ward) have done a service tonight in drawing public attention to the rights of tenants under the Rent Act. I should like to say straight away to my hon. Friend—if the hon. Gentleman will forgive me—that certainly my right hon. Friend has never missed any opportunity, either in this House or outside, of making it perfectly clear, with the vast knowledge he has of the operation of landlord and tenant legislation, that there are indeed good landlords and bad landlords, as indeed there are good tenants and bad tenants.

All members of the Government have made it clear, ever since we embarked on the Rent Bill, that a measure of this sort, obviously a radical measure, was bound to require a great deal of give and take, both by landlord and by tenants, and a great deal of good will and understanding on both sides if it were to function satisfactorily and with reasonable smoothness.

I am glad that my hon. Friend is happy at the response of my right hon. Friend to the case she mentioned. I think she was perfectly right to draw it to the attention of my right hon. Friend, and I hope she will be able to achieve something by following my right hon. Friend's advice.

The allegation tonight is that there are a number of controlled tenants who have served notices of defects on their landlords or who have abated their rent in accordance with the Rent Act, when the landlord has failed to carry out his undertaking to remedy the defects or when a certificate of disrepair has been issued and the tenants have been threatened with eviction or, in certain cases, have actually received notice to quit.

I want to say right away, and I want to make this abundantly clear, as the hon. Gentleman would wish me to, and to put it in the simplest, straightest language, that a controlled tenant certainly retains his security of tenure under the Rent Act and that this is in no way prejudiced by any action he may take to enforce his rights under the disrepair procedure of the Rent Act itself.

Indeed, the only way in which the landlord can regain possession is by applying to the court for an order for possession, and the court can grant an order only if it is satisfied about two things; first, that it considers that it is reasonable to grant the order, and secondly, if either it is satisfied that suitable alternative accommodation will be available for the tenant or on one of a certain number of limited grounds, such as non-payment of rent or a breach of a tenancy agreement. But these circumstances, as the hon. Gentleman knows, are exceptional. They certainly do not mean that the security of tenure enjoyed by controlled tenants is in any way affected by the action they take under the Rent Act to get repairs done.

Mr. Blenkinsop

The position of security of tenure would not be affected in the case in which the tenant—as quite often has happened—offers a smaller amount of rent which the landlord refuses to accept? The landlord cannot then say, "I have not taken the rent"?

Mr. Bevins

That is so, I believe.

Certainly I deprecate, as does my right hon. Friend, in the strongest possible way any attempt to frighten tenants by serving notice to quit which the landlord or his agent knows perfectly well cannot be legally enforced—as I suspect may be the case in the instance mentioned by my hon. Friend. I do not know, of course, because I do not know all the circumstances of that case, and there may be more to it than I am aware of, but on the facts as I have heard them so far, that would appear to be so.

If any hon. Member of this House is in possession of evidence of malpractices such as my hon. Friend or the hon. Gentleman suggested, malpractices for which firms of estate agents or others are responsible, and those people are members of responsible professional associations, I think those Members should certainly attempt to verify the details as far as they are able to do so and then send them to the professional body of which the firm concerned is a member. For I can say quite honestly to the House that all the professional bodies with which we have had contact during the passage of the Bill and at even earlier stages are most jealous of their reputation and jealous of the reputation of their members.

One word on the question of rent abatement, to which the hon. Gentleman referred. The position is that if a certificate of disrepair is issued or if a landlord has not carried out an undertaking to do repairs within six months then the tenant is legally entitled to abate the rent. On that there is no question whatever. First, the tenant can reduce the rent by deducting the amount of the increase, or in some cases by reducing the rent to one-and-a-third times the gross value. Secondly, he can recover each week the rent which he has over-paid between the time he applied for the certificate and the date when it was issued, or between the date when the landlord gave the undertaking and the end of the six months, as the case may be. This second deduction of the over-payment that has been made continues until the total amount over-paid is reclaimed, or the certificate of disrepair is cancelled, or the landlord does the repairs, whichever happens to come first.

If the landlord gave an undertaking which he claims is carried out and which the tenant thinks the landlord has not carried out, either the landlord or the tenant can apply to the local authority to certify whether or not the work has been done. There is no need for the tenant to apply for this certificate before he starts deducting the rent, but if the landlord threatens to sue him the local authority certificate can be used as evidence.

I entirely agree that in all these matters there are bound to be a number of tenants who, for one reason or another, are not yet versed in their legal rights, and there may be the odd landlord as well. In fairness to my right hon. Friend and the Ministry, I am entitled to say that we have done all we can since this contentious legislation was considered by the House to make sure that tenants were aware of their rights under the Act. There are about 5,000,000 to 5,500,000 houses, controlled or decontrolled, excluding owner-occupied and local authority houses, and about one in four of the occupiers have bought the pamphlet, "The Rent Act and You', which, in questionnaire form, tells in simple terms what the tenant's rights are. The B.B.C. and many newspapers have also been helpful in dealing with various phases of the Rent Act, as have the local authorities, and the Citizens' Advice Bureaux, to whom I would pay my tribute for the voluntary work which has been done during the last year or so.

It may well be, in spite of all I have said, that further publicity regarding certain of the tenant's rather more detailed rights would be helpful, and my right hon. Friend has asked me to say that he proposes to re-examine this matter in the light of what has been said to see if we can do anything further which might be helpful to the general body of tenants.

The hon. Gentleman also asked whether we were prepared to authorise the compulsory purchase of houses by local authorities for the tenants of de-controlled properties who are dispossessed. I think my right hon. Friend has already said in this House that the purchase of de-controlled houses where notice to quit has been served is within the power of local authorities, if they think the exercise of these powers is necessary for the sake of their housing needs. I appreciate that the point made by the hon. Gentleman goes rather wider than that and that he may have been thinking in terms not only of that particular category of house, but of other houses which happen to be vacant and which might be available for de-controlled tenants.

On that I would say that we would be prepared to consider any orders made for compulsory purchase in these cases. Naturally, we should have to have regard to the objections, if there were any, from the owners, especially where they might wish to live in the houses themselves. In Birmingham, where they have been most active in this matter, the corporation normally takes the line that it is generally possible in these cases to purchase by agreement. That is more generally likely to happen throughout the country, but my right hon. Friend does not exclude the possibility of looking favourably on the merits of compulsory purchase orders in the case of other houses.

I hope that what I have said may be of some little assistance. I entirely agree that this position needs to be explained simply, and anything that we can do to promote that end we shall do.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at a quarter past One o'clock.