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Lords amendment: No. 49, after clause 11, insert the following new clause—
. In section 4 of the Housing Associations Act 1985 (eligibility for registration), in subsection (3) (permissible additional purposes or objects of association), after paragraph (d) insert—
(dd) providing services of any description for owners or occupiers of houses in arranging or carrying out works of maintenance, repair or improvement, or encouraging or facilitating the carrying out of such works;".
§ Read a Second time.
§ Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Paul Dean)With this it will be convenient to consider amendments (a) and (b) to the amendment.
§ Mr. John FraserI beg to move, as an amendment to the Lords amendment, in line 8, after "houses" to insert "or land on which houses are constructed".
750 I welcome the amendment to housing association powers introduced in the other place because many housing associations undertake other activities. They not only develop and build homes but often assist daughter associations, or, in a less sexist way, issue associations with other housing schemes. For instance, there are many charitable housing associations which are not permitted by their rules to undertake what are called improvement for sale schemes funded by the Housing Corporation and some of the banks. Therefore, they have to form a non-charitable housing association to undertake that work.
However, in practice, the charity provides many of the services to the non-charitable housing association. That is quite right, although they have to go through some convoluted exercises in order to provide their services. Instead of providing services directly, they often have to enter into staff-sharing agreements so that the charitable housing association can assist the non-charitable. In other cases a housing association, whether charitable or not, may want to provide services to the owners of property which by present rules it may not be permitted to do.
We welcome the fact that the amendment widens the powers of housing associations. However, there are two limitations to which my amendments refer. Although the Government are permitting housing associations to provide services to the owners of other houses, there are many circumstances where a housing association assists a developer who is not yet the owner of the house. It may be that one association with a great body of expertise, some architectural staff and a good deal of experience helps a smaller housing association to develop land. I should like the powers of housing associations to he extended to what seems to be a sensible ambit of their activity.
The second problem is the extent to which a charitable housing association is able to undertake non-charitable work for other people. For example, a charitable housing association has an associate non-charitable association which does improvement-for-sale work. The other association is not a house owner but may be the owner of a site. I want the charity to be able to provide services as long as the provision of those services is subsidiary to the charitable objectives of the charitable housing association and to its benefit.
I know that the Housing Corporation had to issue a long circular recently advising housing associations about what they may or may not do. To my mind, a further minor amendment to the law would make life much simpler and allow housing associations, charitable and non-charitable, to continue with the sort of work that enables them to fill gaps in their flow of work and to provide work for their staff. I hope that the Government will further expand the activities of such organisations without subverting the main objectives.
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§ Mr. TraceyI do not think that I can satisfy the hon. Member for Norwood (Mr. Fraser). I am not sure whether his amendments are intended to be probing amendents or whether he expects satisfaction. The new clause extends the category of permissible objectives for registered housing associations to include agency services or services designed to provide home owners or occupiers with practical help or encouragement with their home improvements or repairs.
751 At present, housing associations are able to provide such services only by setting up separately constituted bodies, which is both restrictive and expensive. The measure will facilitate the provision of improvement and repair services to owners and occupiers and give effect to an undertaking in last year's Green Paper on home improvement policy. Individual housing associations will have to decide whether to offer such services and how to finance them.
The Housing Corporation and the National Federation of Housing Associations were consulted about the Lords amendment and are content with it. The hon. Member for Norwood attempts to push further. The amendment has attracted wide support from the voluntary sector and was welcomed by all sides when it was introduced in another place.
Amendment (a) to the Lords amendment would put a question mark over the main amendment. Someone who owned land on which a house had yet to be built would not normally wish to do maintenance, repair or improvement work. It is difficult to understand how the suggestion would work.
Amendment (b) to Lords amendment No. 49 is intended to enable charitable housing associations to provide agency services. If a housing association is a registered charity, there is no restriction on its authority to render services to the public in accordance with its charitable objective. It would, therefore, be free to provide agency services. If the hon. Gentleman wants to push further, I am afraid that we cannot satisfy him. However, we take note of what he says. Lords amendment No. 49 is needed and I hope that the House will agree to it.
§ Amendment to the Lords amendment negatived.
§ Question, That the Lords amendment be made, put and agreed to.