§ Jacqui SmithTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions if he will investigate what arrangements the West Midlands Leasehold Valuation Tribunal will make to administer the valuation cases to be submitted on behalf of the Redditch Leasehold Action Committee; and what targets he has set for the maximum time that the leaseholders concerned should expect to wait after submission for decisions. [20462]
§ Mr. RaynsfordLeasehold Valuation Tribunals are statutorily independent bodies. I understand that the West Midland Leasehold Valuation Tribunal proposes to deal with these cases in batches of about 10 to 25, as submitted by the Agent for the Leaseholders. Applications on this scale have never had to be dealt with before, and the Tribunal has been in touch with the Agents for all the parties concerned throughout. Despite having no 195W powers to issue directions, it is proactively seeking to encourage the parties to identify and narrow the relevant issues prior to the hearings.
The first batch is to be dealt with on 5 February 1998 and the intention is to hear subsequent batches at the rate of one per week.
The West Midland Tribunal, of course, also has to deal concurrently with cases from other parts of their area.
On this basis, the earliest cases will have taken approximately 12 months from receipt of the applications at the Tribunal offices to issue of the decisions, but these cases have been held back at the request of the parties awaiting the decisions on three earlier applications submitted by freeholders.
It is anticipated that, as hearings progress, later cases should be decided in about half that time.