Housing and the Building industry

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 9:37 pm on 11 February 1981.

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Photo of John Stanley John Stanley Minister (Department of Environment) (Housing & Construction) 9:37, 11 February 1981

It is very significant that the right hon. Gentleman ducks the question. He has given a clear undertaking that the Labour Party will countenance opposition to the right to buy only if it is within the law. We shall hold him to that statement.

I now say a word about the private rented sector. We have heard a great deal about the shortage of rented accommodation. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe (Sir A. Costain) that it is entirely possible to make significantly greater use of the private rented sector than we have been able to do up to now. The private sector can make a significantly greater contribution and would have been making it had it not been for the fact that for years and years the Labour Party has been insufficiently concerned about the availability of rented accommodation and far too concerned about carrying on its vendetta against the private landlord.

The Government have now taken some significant steps in the Housing Act. We have made it much easier for home owners to sublet, and it is significant that we have had a very substantial response. Certainly I do not dismiss the booklets which my Department has published to explain people's very important new rights in the legislation. The demand we have had for those booklets on the right to buy, the tenant's charter and the other aspects of the Housing Act are indicative of the very real interest that individuals have in exercising their new rights under the legislation.

We have made it much easier for people to let their homes when they have to leave them temporarily, for example, to go abroad. I can assure my hon. Friend the Member for Folkestone and Hythe that we have made it easier for those with retirement homes to let their homes temporarily. We have made it much easier for Servicemen to let their homes temporarily if they are serving overseas. We have given all public sector tenants a statutory right to sublet and to take in lodgers. We have created the new system of assured tenancies.

I am looking forward next month to opening the first assured tenancy in Tower Hamlets, carried out by the Abbey National building society. I take this opportunity to announce that my right hon. Friend has just approved an application from a leading national house builder, Wates Limited, to carry out assured tenancies as well. In a variety of ways we have sought materially to improve the availability of rented accommodation in the private sector.

I also want to refer to shorthold. The right hon. Member for Ardwick should be aware that we are begining to get clear evidence that shorthold tenancies are being withheld simply on the strength of the repeal commitment which has been made by the Opposition.

The right hon. Member for Ardwick has been totally consistent. He made it clear during the Standing Committee proceedings on the Housing Bill that he would rather dwellings were left empty than let on shorthold. I can assure him that dwellings are now being left empty rather than being let on shorthold, and they are being left empty because of him.

I want to read to the House a letter which we have received from a solicitor in the West Country. I think that this is all too characteristic: Under the Housing Act 1980 'shorthold' tenancies may now be created, giving the landlord the right to obtain possession on the expiration of the term of the tenancy. The trouble is that Her Majesty's Opposition has already said that if it returns to power at the next General Election it will repeal this part of the Act. What do landlords do in such cases and how is one supposed to advise them? It seems that the best advice is still 'Don't'.