HC Deb 24 January 1961 vol 633 cc19-22
22. Mrs. Butler

asked the Minister of Housing and Local Government and Minister for Welsh Affairs what action he proposes to take to amend the Rent Act, 1957, in the light of the Report of the inquiry of the Social Survey Division of the Central Office of Information; and whether he will make a statement.

23. Mr. Frank Allaun

asked the Minister of Housing and Local Government and Minister for Welsh Affairs if, following his official inquiry into the effects of the Rent Act, he will now re-examine the working of the Act with regard to decontrol taking place on a change of tenant.

33. Mr. Lipton

asked the Minister of Housing and Local Government and Minister for Welsh Affairs what action he will take arising from the Report of the social survey division of its Central Office of Information on the results of the 1957 Rent Act.

Mr. Brooke

Nothing in the Report suggests that the Rent Act requires amendment.

Mrs. Butler

In view of the facts and figures in the Report, the personal hardship and anxiety caused to many tenants by creeping decontrol, and increased rents—of which many examples have been given in this House, in the Press and to the Minister personally—if he will not do anything else, will the Minister at least consider empowering either rent tribunals or valuation courts to fix a fair rent for decontrolled tenants?

Mr. Brooke

I understand that leave is to be sought tomorrow to introduce a Bill on this subject. I think we ought not to anticipate that.

Mr. Allaun

Does not the inquiry reveal that creeping decontrol is hitting 320,000 families a year—even excluding Scotland—or roughly one in twelve of all such tenants? Does not this mean that the estimate made by the Government spokesman during the passage of the Rent Act was only one-third of the actual number of those who are being forced to seek houses at soaring rents and without security of tenure in the midst of a terrible housing shortage, thus being subjected to exploitation?

Mr. Brooke

I do not quite understand what the hon. Member means by "creeping decontrol hitting 320,000 tenants a year", because in fact creeping decontrol takes place only when the tenant goes out and the landlord obtains vacant possession. What the Report says is that the average rent charged to a new tenant was, in 1959, between two and a half and three times gross value and the average rent charged to a decontrolled sitting tenant was actually below twice gross value. That undermines all that the Opposition have been saying about the Rent Act.

Mr. Lipton

Does not the Report reveal a very serious situation, especially in London where gross exploitation is taking place and great misery is being caused to very large numbers of people? In those circumstances, does not the Minister now think that, in the light of later events, all the optimistic forecasts he made about the so-called beneficial results of the Rent Act have been completely falsified?

Mr. Brooke

I cannot accept from the hon. Member that gross exploitation is taking place in London when, for some five months, London local authorities have been at liberty to make compulsory purchase orders wherever they thought that a landlord was seeking to impose an extortionate rent, thereby making it impossible for the tenant to live there, and yet only a handful of compulsory purchase orders have yet reached me. I entirely agree with the hon. Member that there is a serious housing situation in London and I shall continue to seek to tackle it.

Mr. M. Stewart

Does the Minister notice that it appears from the Report that an alarmingly high proportion of landlords are ignoring the law in regard to information being given in rent books; that a considerable number of them are giving undertakings to carry out repairs which they are not honouring; that in a great many cases rents are being retained at the increased level despite the fact that the repairs which ought to have been done have not been carried out; and that in fact the Act is being enforced as regards those parts of it which might inconvenience landlords only to about two-thirds of its capacity? Is he not prepared to do anything about that?

Mr. Brooke

There is a subsequent Question on the Order Paper about repairs. In answer to the hon Member's supplementary question, and without anticipating that Question, I should say that Parliament can determine what a person's rights are, but we can none of us compel him to claim them.

26. Mr. Frank Allaun

asked the Minister of Housing and Local Government and Minister for Welsh Affairs if, following the Report of the inquiry into the working of the Rent Act, he is satisfied with the rate of necessary repairs being done by landlords; and if he will take steps to improve it.

Mr. Brooke

The Report shows that, following the Rent Act, a great deal of necessary maintenance and repair work on controlled dwellings is being carried out. In so far as misunderstanding exists of the procedure laid down in the Act to protect the tenant's rights if repairs are not done, I am considering how best to give still further publicity to this procedure.

Mr. Allaun

Since repairs requested by nearly half the controlled tenants have not been started or completed, and since the present procedure to compel landlords to do repairs takes nearly nine months, will the Minister consider halving this period? is he aware that many public health inspectors are finding that decontrolled tenants are frightened to apply to them for help lest their landlords give them notice to quit?

Mr. Brooke

The Question relates to controlled tenants. I think that the Report shows that those tenants who have not sought to go through the statutory procedure but have made informal requests to their landlords have been even more successful than the others in getting the repairs done. Of course the statutory procedure is a complicated one; I quite grant that. It is necessary to make provision so that everybody shall know their rights and exercise them if they so wish.

Mr. Fletcher

Is the Minister aware that a great many landlords of decontrolled premises are refusing to grant new tenancies unless the tenant undertakes full liability for repairs? Is not that quite contrary to the Minister's intentions and does it not make some revision of the Rent Act a matter of urgent necessity?

Mr. Brooke

I have already informed Parliament that the Government intend in this Session to introduce legislation to deal with that very point.