HC Deb 14 December 1988 vol 143 cc894-6
4. Mr. Flannery

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will give (a) the number of bids for transfer of local authority property to another landlord registered under parts IV and V of the Housing Act 1988 and (b) the names and locations of the prospective landlords.

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. David Trippier)

Part IV of the Housing Act 1988 is not yet in force. Powers for the Housing Corporation to approve landlords will be commenced in the new year. Voluntary transfers by local authorities take place under powers in the Housing Act 1985, not part V of the 1988 Act. There are a considerable number of such transfers each year, some of which take place under general consents and are therefore not notified to the Department.

Mr. Flannery

Do we understand that the Conservative party not merely openly and publicly advocates vote rigging but will continue to enshrine it in law? What would the Minister say if other organisations even dreamed of such a thing, as they never would, or if the trade unions carried on in the way the Conservative party does? Why does an abstention mean a yes vote?

Mr. Trippier

If a campaign has been waged and different approaches and different appeals made by housing associations and private landlords put to the tenants as opposed to the local authority, people can vote yes for the move to the housing association, for example. If they say no, they will vote under the tenants' choice to stay with the local authority. That is enshrined in the Act. If by the time campaigning has gone ahead they cannot make up their minds, it would be wrong for those people to destroy the chances of tenants who desperately want and seek that change. The hon. Gentleman's point is an extension of the Labour party's campaign of misinformation, which is similar to the campaign that it ran against the right to buy. It failed then and it will fail again.

Mr. Wilshire

Does my hon. Friend agree that if certain councils spent less time churning out propaganda aimed at undermining the Government's housing policies and legislation, and more time dealing with the empty houses that they own, repairing houses and collecting rent, local people would get a far better deal and far better houses?

Mr. Trippier

I agree with all that. If local authorities spent more time turning round the number of empty properties that they have, there would be a net increase of 20,000 houses brought on to the market. It is not only local authorities but certain trade unions, certain members of the Socialist Workers party and certain members of Militant who are peddling this misinformation.

Mr. Matthew Taylor

The Minister has correctly told the House that the present transfers are not going ahead under the 1988 Act. He then said that, nevertheless, tenants who vote against transfers will be able to stay with a local authority. That is not the case with transfers that are happening now, and certainly not the case in Torbay, where well over 20 per cent. tenants voted against but if the Minister allows the transfer to go ahead all those tenants, irrespective of how they voted, will be involved in the scheme. How do the Government intend to protect those people's democratic rights?

Mr. Trippier

The hon. Gentleman would not expect me to prejudge the decisions of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State. All that I can say today is that we shall shortly be in touch with Torbay council about the matter.

Mr. Patrick Thompson

While Labour Members talk about the rights of council tenants, the Government have given council tenants new incentives and opportunities. Can my hon. Friend confirm that we shall continue to do that?

Mr. Trippier

That is the whole point. The Opposition parties—I use the plural advisedly—spend a great deal of time talking about extending benefits to tenants but do nothing, whereas the Government have extended the freedom of choice to those tenants. It has been exercised through the right to buy, which the Opposition do not like to mention because it has been enormously successful. That same freedom will be extended to more and more tenants as the 1988 Act becomes effective.

Mr. Soley

The Minister's propaganda might be more convincing if he could tell the House that he is prepared to extend that right to the tenants of non-resident private landlords, because we shall do that.

I give the Minister this opportunity to do what he undertook in the House to do—to correct the misleading information that he published by joining me at a joint press conference after the National Consumer Council, which is chaired by a former Conservative Member, and the Institute of Housing have analysed the leaflet that he distributed. and which I have described as grossly misleading propaganda. If that is done, we shall then know who is telling the truth—and it will be our side that wins, not the Minister's.

Mr. Trippier

I welcome a debate on those issues at a place and time of the hon. Gentleman's choosing. There has already been one major debate on the subject, when we debated the Lords amendment. The hon. Gentleman will recall that I extracted from him confirmation that he would publicly denounce leaflets or information classified as misleading or misinformation. He will be pleased to learn that I shall be writing to him this week giving examples of leaflets sent to tenants which are clearly misleading. I hope to extract from the hon. Gentleman the public denouncement of them that he promised just a few weeks ago.

Mr. Harry Greenway

Will my hon. Friend draw the attention of the hon. Member for Hammersmith (Mr. Soley) to the highly misleading and downright dishonest document on the Housing Act 1988 published by Ealing council and the meetings at which tenants were told that if they voted to join a housing association their rents would be doubled and they would have no rights? The BBC did not correct that misinformation in its "Panorama" programme and has not made it clear that any secure tenant wishing to remain with the council can always do so. Will my hon. Friend make that clear?

Mr. Trippier

I confess that I have not incorporated in the package that I am sending to the hon. Member for Hammersmith (Mr. Soley) this week the Ealing propaganda to which my hon. Friend refers. Perhaps I will save that for next week. We could keep up the campaign on a weekly basis.