OPERATION OF PART 5 (Hansard, 20 October 2004)

§ Lord Rooker

My Lords, I am happy to accede to the request of the noble Baroness and to explain the arrangements that we have in mind to monitor the operation of the voluntary phase of the home information pack initiative and, thereafter, to monitor and evaluate the effect of the statutory scheme.

Our starting point is to create the baseline. To do that, we propose in the first half of 2006 to carry out a major study into the home buying and selling process. We expect that to be as extensive as the wide-ranging 822 study we carried out in 1998. The 1998 study was the most extensive research ever undertaken into home buying and selling. It involved tracking transactions through the process in a range of property markets across England and Wales, and interviews with buyers, sellers and their professional advisers. We now need to update the baseline so that it is as authoritative as the 1998 study.

Having established the baseline, we propose to initiate with the industry a full dry run of home information packs on a voluntary basis. We propose that that will take place during the second half of 2006. As I implied earlier today, it will be a dry run of the full statutory scheme. Full details of the transactions to which the home information pack duties will and will not apply will be available. The prescribed home information pack forms will be available for use. The certification scheme for home condition reports will be set up and operational and, crucially, the register of home condition reports—to which we shall return under the previous clause—and the home inspectors will be in place.

I say that only because there is a good reason for doing what we propose to do, but neither I nor my noble friend thought that we had given a sufficiently robust explanation to the House and we need to get further and better particulars. We need that kind of arrangement to give confidence to the system, especially for the home inspectors.

We will be working closely with the industry throughout the dry run and, of course, while planning for the dry run. Together with the industry, we will be monitoring the operation of home information packs, identifying any problem areas and devising solutions. We intend to be responsive to the needs of the industry.

By the way, I do not necessarily want to pat people on the back. It is true that we have somewhat teased the noble Earl today to tell us to whom he has been talking, other than his chums, because it would be nice to know if earlier on he was actually speaking on behalf of companies. I know that there have been problems within the estate agents' profession. Most of them are professional people; I fully accept that, notwithstanding what I said earlier in a lighter mode.

I know that there has been historical opposition, and there still is in some parts, but I want to pay tribute, in particular, to Peter Bolton-King, chief executive of the National Association of Estate Agents, who has been in and out of my department and on the phone regularly, chivvying us along, pointing out things that we should be doing and generally assisting in ensuring that we are fully acquainted with the views of the estate agent profession. That will continue and probably speed up a pace as we get together to plan for the dry run.

So we want and intend to be responsive to the needs of the industry and consumers where necessary, and will make changes, if required, through regulations in preparation for introducing a statutory scheme in 2007. We have not stated a date in 2007. Our objective is to introduce it earlier rather than later, but it will not be a failure if it is not in January. We will not introduce 823 it until we are ready and have the commitments in place that I, my noble friend Lord Bassam and Ministers in the other place have given. That close liaison and monitoring will continue following the introduction of the statutory scheme.

At some point between 18 months and two years after the introduction of the statutory scheme, we propose to repeat the study of the home buying and selling process and compare the results against the findings of the 2006 baseline study. All studies will be carried out by experienced and independent researchers, commissioned in the normal way, and the results will be published.

During the whole process, the Secretary of State will be able to use the flexibility provided by the Bill to make regulations to fine tune the statutory requirements if necessary. I hope that your Lordships will agree that that adds up to an extensive programme for monitoring and evaluating both the voluntary and compulsory phases of the introduction of the home information pack. A good deal of information on the preparation for the dry run—there is quite a bit of work still to do—is provided in the letter that I provided to colleagues some time ago.

I have set out a lot of detail, but I hope that it gives a broad picture of commitments, dates and things that will happen in the voluntary period, on the introduction of the statutory scheme and, then, to follow up on the statutory scheme after a couple of years to find out if it is working in the way that we and Parliament intended.