Clause 7 - Contents of sellers' packs
Homes Bill
11:00 am
Mr Nick Raynsford (Minister of State, Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions; Greenwich and Woolwich, Labour)
We recognise that there are circumstances in which a seller, perfectly justifiably, would not want information about his property to be disclosed to anyone who is not naturally and correctly involved in the house buying and selling process. We believe that those interests are already covered adequately in the Bill. The amendments would result in a series of unfortunate consequences. I hope that when the hon. Member for Eastbourne thinks about it a little more, he will recognise that the amendments are undesirable and should be withdrawn.
As I mentioned on the afternoon of 18 January, clause 6(3) enables sellers to refuse to show the seller's pack to someone who they believe cannot buy or is not genuinely interested in buying the property, or to whom they would not wish to sell. I pointed out that that complies with anti-discrimination and human rights legislation. It is an important safeguard and we believe that it is the right way forward. However, there is unlikely to be anything in the seller's pack that would cause problems if disclosed to parties other than those directly involved in the transaction.
The hon. Member for Cotswold (Mr. Clifton-Brown) raised two issues. Security systems will not be part of the requirement for disclosure in the seller's pack, as they are not part of the structure of the building but are incorporated into it. The presence of bars to be drawn across a window would probably be covered, but disclosure of that would not cause any anxiety, whereas disclosing the presence of an electronic security system might. The other issue he mentioned was price. He will be aware that price information is publicly available and is obtainable via the Land Registry, so confidentiality cannot be secured.