Clause 12 - suspension of improvement notices
Housing Bill
11:15 am
Mr John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings, Conservative)
I am surprised at the Minister. Earlier, he accused my hon. Friend the Member for Poole of being pedantic, but surely he is himself dancing on the head of a pin. The Minister is saying that, in law, it will be entirely possible for a landlord to use as a proper defence the fact that he could not reasonably comply with the notice because tenants were obstructing him and preventing him from doing so, yet he is not prepared to accept an amendment that anticipates that situation before it gets to law. Under the amendment, the local authority could say that it had properly served the notice because of the definition of the hazard, as the Minister described, but that it was impossible for the landlord to comply with its instructions because of his circumstance in respect of tenants. Surely that is simply a way of making the process fairer and easier, instead of causing the matter to go to law.