HARASSMENT OF LANDLORD

HC Deb 30 July 1974 vol 878 cc605-23

"(1) In respect of premises to which the Rent Act applies if any person with intent to cause the landlord of any premises to refrain from exercising any right or pursuing any remedy in respect of the premises or part thereof does any act calculated to interfere with the peace or comfort of the landlord or members of his household he shall be guilty of an offence.

(2) The penalties for this offence of harassment shall be on a first conviction a fine of £400: on a second or subsequent conviction a fine of £750; and a term of imprisonment for a second or subsequent conviction shall be twelve months".—[Mr. Rees-Davies.]

Brought up, and read the First time.

Mr. Rees-Davies

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

Its purpose is simple and is in ordinary justice one which should be met by a Government. It seeks to ensure the same protection to the landlord as exists to the tenant, namely, to prevent harassment of the landlord by the tenant. It provides that if any person with intent to cause the landlord of any premises to refrain from exercising any right or pursuing any remedy in respect of the premises or part thereof does any act calculated to interfere with the peace or comfort of the landlord or members of his household he shall be guilty of an offence. The penalties are laid down.

Under earlier legislation—[Interruption.]

On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Can you manage to get the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) to contain himself and stop making a noise? He is engaging in a secondary speech of his own, so much so that I can hardly hear myself speak.

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. George Thomas)

I think that the hon. Member for Bolsover (Mr. Skinner) is innocent. [Laughter.] Order. We have been reasonably good-tempered. This is our last night together for a while, I think.

Mr. Rees-Davies

I am delighted with that statement, Mr. Deputy Speaker. The picture in my mind of the hon. Member for Bolsover ever being innocent was enough to send me into guffaws of laughter. The hon. Gentleman would never have the capacity to plead guilty: he could never believe that he was.

Mr. Thomas Swain (Derbyshire, North-East)

He is always sober, though.

Mr. Rees-Davies

I resent that—

Mr. Deputy Speaker

Order. Let us get back to the clause.

Mr. Rees-Davies

If the hon. Member for Derbyshire, North-East (Mr. Swain) says that outside, he will have a writ on his head so fast that he will not know what hit him.

Perhaps I may re-open. It is very appropriate in the circumstances that I should be moving a new clause which deals with the question of harassment. Harassment does not always come from the landlord.

I am trying to deal with a serious and important matter. In the report of the Francis Committee, which was set up by the previous Labour Government and which reported in 1971, a clear recommendation was made that the legislation to be brought into effect should put the landlord in the same position as the tenant.

Under the heading "The role of the local authorities" on page 111, we read: There is one other aspect of this matter"— the committee is dealing with harassment— which has been touched upon by some witnesses viz. that individual landlords—e.g. elderly ladies—are sometimes harassed by tenants. Instances are given in the memorandum of evidence submitted to us by the National Citizens' Advice Bureaux Council. We recommend that it should be made an offence for 'any person with intent to cause the landlord of any premises to refrain from exercising any right or pursuing any remedy in respect of the premises or part thereof to do acts calculated to interfere with the peace or comfort of the landlord or members of his household'. We on the Opposition side of the House recognise that sometimes the landlord is right and sometimes the tenant is right, but we do not have the extraordinary sort of paranoia that a number of Labour Members have, in which they feel that the landlord is always wrong and the tenant is always right. There are cases that hon. Members will know about from their regular surgeries in which the landlords are harassed by tenants in a number of ways.

There is a lacuna in the law, in that there is a criminal offence of harassment against the landlord but no similar provision where the tenant has harassed the landlord. After careful consideration of many cases and evidence, the entirely objective Francis Committee made that explicit recommendation, which has been completely overlooked.

Under the Rent Act 1968 there is an ordinary civil provision whereby one can recover possession when there has been a nuisance and annoyance occasioned to adjoining occupiers and others by acts calculated and carried out by the tenant, but there is nothing at all to deal with those cases where such acts take place against the landlord or members of his household.

I shall not burden the House with many examples, but there are a number of clear cases of such harassment. For example, it is not uncommon to find tenants who, from time to time, have too much to drink and engage in grossly offensive behaviour to the landlord, very often putting him or her in fear and fright. Many such examples come to the notice of county court judges, but usually they arrive in court as a result of behaviour by the tenants towards other people, such as neighbours.

This Bill is designed to extend substantial powers of security to furnished tenants, and in the class of the more transient nature of furnished tenants one is more likely to find bad conduct towards the landlord—particularly towards the elderly landlord.

Many men bequeath property to their widows. This applies in working class areas as well as to other areas. Thus, many properties are owned by widows or elderly men. It is not difficult for them to be unfairly treated—to put the lightest complexion on it—by tenants using bullying tactics.

The new Clause cuts across party lines. Provision in the law for certain conduct by a landlord to be treated as a criminal offence should apply in similar terms to the tenants' behaviour towards the landlord.

Mr. Costain

I support the new clause. We all know of cases like that described by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Thanet, West (Mr. Rees-Davies). I have a specific case, details of which I have sent to the Minister.

An elderly widow in my constituency was left a small block of flats by her husband for her income after his death. She had a heart attack, spent some time in hospital and now lives in the ground floor flat. The tenant living on the third floor is a postman who goes to work at 3.30 a.m. Every morning, when he starts his motorbike, he revs it up outside her window. The doctors have implored him to stop doing it but he persists. There is no redress for her. She cannot get him out because he has protection. Why cannot she have the same protection for herself as he has for his tenancy? I wish that the Under-Secretary of State would listen to the debate.

Mr. Kaufman

I was discussing very briefly with my hon. Friend the points which the hon. Gentleman has mentioned and in which I am very interested.

Mr. Costain

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman and I hope that this persuades him to give us the right reply. The Government now have an opportunity to show that they can do something to overcome the prejudice they have that the landlord is always wrong and the tenant always right. Recently, when I quoted the case of another widow owner of property who was in trouble, one hon. Member opposite simply said that widows should not own property. That is the view which some of his Left-wing back-bench colleagues take. I hope that in this case the hon. Gentleman will show that the Government are not prejudiced and will accept the new clause.

Sir John Eden

My interest in this aspect of the relationship between landlord and tenant goes back over a long time. More than 20 years ago, when I was a political candidate in a London constituency, I was made aware of the abuses which take place. Like my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Thanet, West (Mr. Rees-Davies), I shall not go into the details; they must be known to the Under-Secretary of State. I accept what he said to me when I raised this matter in a debate in the House to which he replied; namely, that there are instances of grave abuse by landlords of their position against tenants. I come across examples of it in my constituency. I condemn them outright and do what I can to help the tenants.

However, I cannot blind myself to the existence of abuses by tenants against landlords. Because I have experienced so many examples of abuse in the time that I have been a Member, I join my hon. Friends in urging the Government to accept the new clause. There is no doubt that abuses are fairly extensive, perhaps much more extensive than the Government have chosen to recognise. I know that they accept that, to some extent, they exist. I wonder whether they have any idea of how widespread is the abuse. Perhaps I see it taking place to a greater extent in an area like Bournemouth than I did elsewhere because a large proportion of people who stay in accommodation for a comparatively short time are not native residents of the area.

Those who are inclined to be abusive to landlords take advantage of the relative age differential between them and the landlords. In nearly every case that I have in mind, though by no means all, the landlord is a retired person. In most cases he has come into possession of the property, which is let, largely as a result of having saved against his retirement and having invested in an additional property to that which he required for his use in order to supplement his income in old age.

This has become such a source of worry and concern to many people in my constituency that when I raised this subject in the House on an Adjournment debate fairly recently it gave rise to a considerable postbag of letters, mostly protesting against what the Minister said in reply in which he pointed out, in effect, that the best answer he could give to these people was that it was the Government's intention to end altogether what he called private landlordism. That is no answer. It is not the answer of a fair-minded person considering objectively and without bias the problem of human relationships.

I hope that since then the Minister has had the opportunity to reconsider his position. I hope that he has inquired of his advisers and friends about their experience and information on this subject.

The type of situation I have described often arises in the poorer districts where people who have taken up a tenancy have chosen to exercise a degree of muscularity to retain their hold on the premises. It is important that something is done to try to help landlords in such situations in which they are clearly victims of abuse. I hope that the Government will accept the new clause.

Mr. Arthur Lewis (Newham, North-West)

I hope that when he replies the Minister will at least accept the principle behind the clause if he cannot accept the clause itself. I represent a poor area, such as the right hon. Member for Bournemouth, West (Sir J. Eden) mentioned. There is much merit in the general argument and point of view he put forward. I have had experience of housing matters over many years. No one can support Rachmanism. If there is Rachmanism by a landlord it ought to be stopped, and if there is a minor form of Rachmanism by the tenant it also ought to be stopped.

I have had a number of such cases in which, as the right hon. Member for Bournemouth, West has pointed out, there are tenants who—let us be fair to them—are a little eccentric, or who, as the hon. and learned Member for Thanet, West (Mr. Rees-Davies) mentioned, may, if they are not dipsomaniacs, like to drink more than a landlord or landlady would wish. Such tenants may not be deliberately objectionable, but they sometimes create problems and do things which become objectionable to the landlord or landlady living in the same house.

I have known of cases in which immigrant problems have been created on this basis. An immigrant may own or control a house and live in part of it, and a tenant may resent being a tenant of a coloured landlord. Such a tenant may go deliberately out of his way to create problems, by doing such things as slamming doors or fixing on or removing locks. He may deliberately allow his children to play in the corridors of the house or run up and down the stairs, causing various problems.

Landladies and landlord have come to me complaining about this and I have taken the matter up with the local authority or the police. The police say that they cannot do anything, and the local authority rightly points out that it cannot do anything. Invariably, tenants behave in the way I have described because they want to get on to a council housing list. They already have adequate accommodation and so cannot get on the housing list in the normal way, especially in my area, where the list is enormous and in any case urgent housing needs must come first. My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary knows of the housing problems in my constituency—he was there only today.

Tenants deliberately create problems so as to try to get the landlord or landlady to confirm that the accommodation is not suitable. Tenants hope that this will help them in their claim to be housed by the council. Some tenants have admitted to me that they have caused trouble or difficulty for landlords or landladies because they regard this as the only way of getting rehoused. I think that this is a bit much, particularly if old people are the victims of such behaviour.

I came across a case at the time of the last General Election, involving a dear old lady. I went round four times to see the tenant concerned. The lady had parted from her husband. Virtually every night of the week she had a gentleman friend in, and the gentleman friend had a girl friend in. There was never any proof that there was anything wrong going on. The landlady told me, "I am convinced my house is being made into a brothel." As far as such a thing could be proved, that was the position; she could not do anything about it.

The lady who was causing the bother came to see me and said that she wanted to be rehoused by the council. She said she had been on the waiting list for six months and had not been rehoused. I said, "I have got constituents who have been 16, even 26 years on the waiting list and they have not been rehoused."

The council has done a wonderful job in difficult circumstances. It is building lovely houses and flats. This sort of practice on the part of tenants is going on in some of the hard-pressed areas. They move into areas like mine. We have people coming from literally all over the world. They get temporary accommodation and then hope to cause a little bit of trouble so that they can be rehoused by the local authority. If the Minister cannot accept this clause I hope he will say that something can be done to deal with a legitimate grievance.

Mr. Emery

It is agreed that there is harassment of landlords by tenants. If that is so I cannot see why we should not insert this simple, reasonable amendment. If the Minister feels it is not correctly drafted I am certain that my hon. Friend would be willing to be guided by him. I would have thought that the principle is something which the Minister would want to accept as a matter of logic, since he has reasonably argued that he wants to be fair to landlord and tenant.

It might be argued that some of the points raised by the hon. Member for Newham, North-West (Mr. Lewis) could be covered under Section 80(2)(b) of the Rent Act 1968, which allows for nuisance or annoyance when the dwelling has been used for immoral or illegal purposes.

I feel that the strength of the clause lies in the words: the peace or comfort of the landlord". That does not seem to be in any way covered by new Clause 1, which we have now passed. While that clause will obviously give some help, it is worth bearing in mind this further point about the peace and comfort of the landlord. Surely his peace and comfort is just as important as that of the tenants—it might be argued that it is of greater importance, because it is his property and his money. If it is illegal for the landlord to harass a tenant it is surely right that we should seek to deal with the reverse situation here.

Mr. J. Grimond (Orkney and Shetland)

I have been following the debate with great interest. There are two points on which I should like clarification. As I understand it, many of the cases that have been quoted relate to harassment which has nothing to do with an attempt to restrain a landlord from pursuing a remedy. However, as the clause is drafted it would be effective only if that were the object.

The hon. Member for Newham, North-West (Mr. Lewis), who was most interesting, said that the cases to which he drew attention were designed to compel local authorities to take action. Other cases have been quoted in which there appears to be the general intention to annoy. Am I right in saying that the clause would not relate to those cases, as there would be no intention to cause the landlord to restrain from pursuing a remedy or pursuing a right? I understand that we have written into legislation a similar provision regarding the harassment of the tenant. Would not some of the cases that have been quoted be covered by the existing law on nuisance and on other matters which are already illegal?

Mr. Emery

I accept that there are doubts about certain aspects of nuisance. Again, we come to the difficult decision whether to prosecute a tenant on the ground of nuisance. Many times such a course has failed. It is a doubtful and dubious approach for a landlord to take. I have advised people to be careful about the expenses that they have been running up. So much depends on the judicial bench. To put the matter in commercial terms, the law is open-ended and rests very much on the way in which the case has been presented.

The right hon. Gentleman asked whether the clause would allow local authorities to take certain action. It is obvious that that is not its intention. As I understand it, the intention is not to bring the local authority into the matter but to allow the landlord to be able to prove harassment, the limitation of peace and comfort, or any action which would be likely to refrain the landlord from exercising any right. In those circumstances the landlord could go to court.

The hon. Member for Newham, North-West says that some of his constituents go to great lengths to get the local authority to act—namely, to rehouse them. I agree with him entirely. As the chairman of a housing committee I know that when people had an order made against them in these terms it was always necessary to consider whether they had gone out of their way to be evicted.

That is one of the easiest ways of jumping the queue in the housing waiting list. If a person can get himself evicted, particularly if he has young children, the local authority often has to take action to rehouse. There is a lot of difference between the person who has unfortunately been evicted and the person who has gone out of his way to seek eviction so as to jump the queue.

I want to know from the Government Front Bench whether it considers that new Clause 1 could take part of the action suggested in new Clause 5, in terms not of harassment but of being able to take possession. Secondly, is there any other legislation in which the comfort of the landlord is taken into account? If not, why should that not be done by this clause? I am not making a party political point: I am trying to balance the scales.

9.30 p.m.

Mr. Gerard Fitt (Belfast, West)

Only on rare occasions have I attempted to take part in debates on legislation that is concerned with England, Scotland and Wales. My hon. Friend the Member for Newham, North-West (Mr. Lewis) painted a clear picture of harassment against landlords. I have not been present either in the House or in Committee when the Bill has been debated, but has anyone instanced cases of harassment of tenants?

I know of one case which could be multiplied by many hundreds, if not thousands. A young boy who lived in Belfast came to London at the beginning of the troubles and occupied a flat in the Kings Road area, in Oakley Street. The house is let out in 16 flats which are let to four couples and 12 single persons. The landlord does not live on the premises and, therefore, cannot be harassed. Since the announcement of this legislation, the landlords have taken every step they can to increase the rent or to evict the tenants before the legislation becomes law.

I should not mind if the landlord lived in London and was trying to make a small profit from a property that he had bought. For the five or six years he has been there, this boy from Belfast has been under pressure to pay more rent. He has taken the matter to rent tribunals and has won most of his cases. But since the Government announced their intention to bring in legislation to protect tenants from harassment by landlords every device has been used by the landlords to have the 16 tenants evicted or to make life so difficult for them that they would leave their accommodation and the property could be sold.

The young lad from Belfast does not earn much and he cannot afford a high rent, but he is no fool. When the pressure began he tried to discover the owners of the property. He found out that the leaseholder is a company called Hiroko Developments Limited, a Japanese company—

Mr. Deputy-Speaker

Order. I have tried to allow the hon. Gentleman to make his case. I thought he might be telling an Irish story with an unexpected ending, but he is dealing with a different part of the Bill. We are dealing here with the harassment of landlords.

Mr. Fitt

In the case I am illustrating, who is the landlord? I contend that it is those who own the house, the people who collect the rents—in other words, a Japanese company. So far as the tenants are concerned, that company is the landlord. I contend that there is harassment against tenants, and I shall support the Government on this matter.

Mr. Rossi

I do not wish to dispute the facts with the hon. Member for Belfast, West (Mr. Fitt), but since he was speaking about harassment of tenants, that matter is dealt with in other legislation. Protection exists in the sense that if he complains to the local authority, the local authority after investigation of the facts can prosecute before the local magistrates and the landlords can be found guilty of harassment.

Mr. Bruce Douglas-Mann (Mitcham and Morden)

Is the hon. Gentleman aware that in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea prosecutions of landlords are so scarce as to be irrelevant in view of the sort of problem mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for Belfast, West (Mr. Fitt). The only effective remedy available in the situation described by my hon. Friend is action by injunction.

Mr. Rossi

I can rely on the hon. Gentleman to make a party political point when we are discussing a serious matter. I do not know whether the hon. Member for Belfast, West reported the case to the local authority and, if so, what were the consequences. Perhaps that is a step the hon. Gentleman could take.

Mr. Fitt

I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Mitcham and Morden (Mr. Douglas-Mann) that the matter can only be pursued by way of an injunction. The young boy I mentioned from Belfast came to see me the day before yesterday and asked me whether he could borrow some money so that he could take out an injunction.

Mr. Rossi

I suggest that the young man could go to his local authority to seek protection against an act of harassment by his landlord with a view to prosecution in the magistrates' court. The new clause seeks to give that particular remedy—however ineffective it may have proved to be in the circumstances of some tenants—to landlords who are being harassed in their own homes. The clause in no way seeks to take away security from tenants, which is the main preoccupation of the Bill, nor does it seek to take away any protection from tenants. Indeed, it is the natural consequence of giving security and protection to tenants.

In earlier days a landlord had his own remedy against a tenant who behaved badly against him. The landlord could take action for possession. He could convict the tenant even under the common law. That was the landlord's remedy. However, Parliament has made that course no longer possible and, in turn, has left landlords unprotected and without a real remedy. The clause suggests that where that situation is created by Parliament it is right and proper that the landlord be given a remedy and protection in his own home. In other words, whether it be a landlord in his own home or a tenant in his own home, he will have the protection of the law in respect of people who try to make conditions intolerable for him.

Therefore, in as much as Parliament has thought it right and fitting to give magistrates' courts the power to impose fines where a person wearing the label of "tenant" has his living conditions made intolerable by someone else, so we feel that the converse should be equally valid and that if a landlord is having his or his family's life made intolerable, his remedy should lie with the courts.

When we use the word "harassment", we are using a word to connote action of a reprehensible kind which I am sure no Government supporter would seek to defend. We say that where that conduct exists against anyone in his own home it is right that the courts should have the power to decide upon the matter, and that if a court finds the conduct of a person towards another in his own home intolerable or reprehensible, he will be fined whether he has the label of "landlord" or "tenant".

I hope that the Under-Secretary, having heard voices from all sides of the House urging him to accept the clause, will do so in no partisan or party political manner but from the point of view of wanting to give justice to people living in their own homes.

This has been an extremely interesting cross-party debate in which we have heard from hon. Members on both sides of the House and from the representatives of four parties. I listened with sympathy to the speeches of the Opposition hon. Members who support the clause. I listened with equal sympathy to the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Newham, North-West (Mr. Lewis). I visited his constituency today. I saw the problems which affect his constituents. I also saw the sterling and magnificent work being done by his local authority to try to deal with some of the problems.

I thought that the intervention most to the point was that of the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond). If the contentions advanced by the Opposition could not be dealt with in any other way and if they could be dealt with validly and efficiently by the clause, I for one would look upon it with a degree of benevolence. But, as I shall seek to illustrate, the clause will not cope with the problems about which we have heard in ways which I accept. There are other ways in which the problems can be dealt with.

The hon. and learned Member for Thanet, West (Mr. Rees-Davies) will be the first to agree, I am sure, that before a new offence is added to the criminal law it is important that a good case for doing so should be made out and that care should be taken to ensure that the mischief concerned is not already dealt with by criminal or civil remedies.

The "right" or "remedy" in respect of the premises envisaged by the new clause is presumably an application to the rent officer in the rent tribunal for the fixing of a higher rent, an application to the rent tribunal to reduce a period of security of tenure or to the county court for an order for possesion. If the tenant and the landlord do not occupy dwellings forming part of the same premises, it is difficult to see what acts the tenant could commit which would interfere with the peace or comfort of the landlord which would not already be a criminal offence, or at any rate they would constitute grounds for the landlord applying to the magistrates' court to have the tenant bound over to keep the peace.

9.45 p.m.

The harassment provisions in the 1965 Rent Act were enacted primarily to deal with cases where a landlord tried to drive tenants out, for example, by changing locks on doors, by making a lot of noise or otherwise making life unbearable for the tenant when the parties share the same premises.

I think that the hon. and learned Gentleman will accept that I am not in any way seeking to ridicule the case that he put forward. I think that he will also accept that, for example, changing locks cannot be done by tenants to harass landlords. Where a landlord and tenant share premises, the tenant will be driving nails in his own coffin if he creates a disturbance since he will be giving the landlord a ground for claiming possession in the case of a furnished tenancy or for asking for a reduction in a period of security of tenure in the case of a furnished letting; namely, that he is being a nuisance and an annoyance to adjoining occupiers. The courts have held that when landlord and tenant share premises the landlord counts as an adjoining occupier for this purpose.

The Government do not think that it has been sufficiently established that harassment of landlords by tenants would be a worthwhile addition to the criminal law. However, I have been impressed by the arguments that have been put forward. While we believe that tenants require protection, we do not contend that no tenant ever behaves badly towards a landlord. Some landlords are vulnerable—even the widows described by the hon. Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Mr. Costain). The position will be kept under surveillance and legislation will be brought forward if evidence of abuse by tenants of their position vis-à-vis landlords comes to light in greater quantities.

Mr. Rees-Davies

The Government have the evidence in considerable quantity from the Francis Committee, which reported in 1971 and in terms said and made the recommendation not only of the law but in the words contained in the new clause.

Whilst I recognise that inside the house the landlord may be the occupier with a tenant and thus can take a civil action for nuisance, he cannot take a criminal action as the tenant can. He may merely want to keep him in order and to do so by taking a criminal action. Therefore, why should he be differentiated from the case of the tenant?

It is no use asking the landlord who is not a co-occupier to get the tenant bound over to keep the peace. Anybody can do that. It is quite valueless. But if the elderly lady goes to collect her rent and is treated to the most disgraceful abuse and is not allowed in or her builder is not allowed in to undertake maintenance or repairs, she can go against the tenant for a new criminal offence of harassment. Those are the three relevant points that the hon. Gentleman has not answered.

Mr. Kaufman

In Committee we discussed the fact that people do behave strangely. A tenant who sought to harass his landlord by failing to admit people to carry out necessary repairs and maintenance would be a bizarre tenant, even by the many standards that have been advanced. I will not quarrel with the hon. and learned Gentleman on this matter because people do behave strangely. However, he has put a point of view which contains some validity and is an argument for further consideration of the matter.

Mr. Emery

In another place?

Mr. Kaufman

I hope that the hon. Gentleman, who has held ministerial office, will not himself become slightly bizarre. It would be false and misleading of me to suggest that we will do it on this Bill in this Session, which has only a short time to run. But I undertake that we will keep this matter under surveillance. It is conceivable that hon. Members will do so too.

We shall not neglect this matter, but even if we were to adopt the slightly revolutionary proposal of the hon. Member for Honiton (Mr. Emery) and take action in another place tomorrow, we could not do so on the basis of the new clause, which is unsatisfactory in a number of respects.

For example, the clause would make a single act an offence, which is not the case in harassment of tenants. My hon. Friend the Member for St. Pancras, North (Mr. Stallard) would like a single act to be an offence in that respect to deal with the winkling which he deplores, but that is not the case. It is difficult to see how such a provision could be made to work, particularly as it would be for the landlord who claimed harassment to prove that the single act was committed with the intent of making him refrain from exercising any right or pursuing any remedy in respect of the premises or part of them.

It is true that many activities, like playing loud music late at night or obstructing stairs and passage ways, if repeated often enough, may be calculated to interfere with another person's peace or comfort, but a single occurrence can hardly be said to be harassment.

Also, it is far from clear whether an act of harassment under the clause would include an act designed to deter a landlord from collecting rents due to him under a tenancy agreement, since that is not a right in respect of premises but a right in respect of the landlord-tenant relationship. Any provision calculated to protect landlords from harassment should include some provision in that respect.

The penalty provisions of the clause are not in line with those for harassment of tenants, which are a fine of up to £400 or six months imprisonment on summary conviction and, on indictment, an unlimited fine or a term of imprisonment not exceeding two years. That seems odd, if the intention is to place landlord and tenant on the same footing. In that sense, the penalties should clearly be in line.

In view of what I have said, I hope that the hon. and learned Gentleman will not feel it necessary to press the clause. I have listened with sympathy to all the human cases put forward and certainly will not dismiss them with derision. Some can be dealt with under the existing law, but if that turns out to be unsatisfactory, I undertake that we shall keep the matter under surveillance.

Mr. Arthur Lewis

Because of shortness of time, I did not develop my theme, but my local authority had a lot of this trouble and subsequently introduced a byelaw and appointed harassment officers. Could my hon. Friend investigate this system and perhaps circulate local authorities advising them that this can be done?

Mr. Kaufman

I will certainly consider that suggestion. My hon. Friend's borough is a pioneer in many ways.

For the reasons that I have put for ward, however, I hope that hon. Members will not press this clause. We do not reject it out of lack of sympathy. We just do not believe that it would work.

Mr. Ivan Lawrence (Burton)

I have listened with interest to the honeyed words of the Under-Secretary of State, who has spoken about having the matter "under surveillance", having "a great deal of sympathy", and this being "not a matter which we shall neglect". In the end, however, the hon. Gentleman has come up with nothing.

I ought to declare an interest. I am the landlord of one very small property, which cannot be said to be flourishing. As a result, it is up for sale. If hon. Members would make me an offer, I am sure that without too much pressure I would accept it.

I should have thought that this was a most moderate proposal, at a time when moderation ought to appeal to the Government side of the House. After all, the equity of giving the same right to a landlord as is given to a tenant is, I should have thought, an absolutely obvious one to all hon. Members.

The Under-Secretary said that there was not sufficient evidence about it. But these seemed to be sufficient evidence for Francis in 1971. Not only was it a recommendation of the majority, but the minority report with Francis did not see fit to object to it in any way. The evidence appears to have come, according to page 111 of the Francis Report, mainly or predominantly from the National Citizens' Advice Bureaux Council. These are not the sort of people who can afford to go to solicitors. These are the sort of people who come from quite lowly walks of life or have quite lowly incomes and who attend meetings of this sort of organisation. They seem to have presented substantial and cogent enough evidence for Francis in 1971 to recommend that it should be made an offence for any person with intent to cause the landlord of any premises to refrain from exercising any right or pursuing any remedy in respect of the premises or part thereof to do acts calculated to interfere with the peace or comfort of the landlord or members of his household. I have taken the time to re-read that because the Under-Secretary has taken issue with the wording of our clause. But the wording of the clause is pure Francis. Furthermore, the Under-Secretary has said that the wording implies the doing of only one act and that that would be rather unfair or inappropriate. But it is the same wording that applies to landlords where the word used is "harassment" But the detail of the wording is not used in the Rent Act 1965 which Labour hon. Members, when previously in Government, saw fit to introduce. There cannot, therefore, be any criticism about the wording because, in one regard, it is straight out of Francis and in another regard it is straight out of the 1965 Act.

The Under-Secretary says that there is a distinction between the position of a landlord and the position of a tenant. In my respectful submission, that is a distinction with no difference. Although it is perfectly true that someone who is a landlord can take a lock off a door, and that that is a specific act, there are all sorts of acts that a tenant can do to terrify or frighten a landlord, particularly an elderly woman who has been left premises by her husband in the sort of situation which Members of Parliament all know well.

The point is not that the act itself should be something specific to which to draw attention. The act is just evidence of an effect it has upon the other person. It does not matter what the precise act is so long as it has the affect of either bringing the tenant into fear, which is covered by the 1965 Act, or bringing the landlord into fear, which is covered by the clause.

Furthermore, it is by no accidental process that a tenant may end up in a court of law, for a number of reasons—first, because a good tenant is something for which a landlord very much hopes, and the landlord will not take any steps to end a good tenancy. More important, as a fact of legal practice the landlord will go to the trouble of taking a tenant to court only if he can prove—

It being Ten o'clock, the debate stood adjourned.