T3. Miss McIlveen asked the Minister of Finance whether she intends to introduce legislation pursuant to the recommendations of the 2011 Northern Ireland Law Commission report to allow limited contracting out of the Business Tenancies (Northern Ireland) Order 1996. (AQT 153/22-27)

If the Member agrees, I will write to her on that question.

I appreciate that this may come from left field, but I would appreciate it if the Minister could also write to me on whether she has any intention to bring forward legislation to bring into law the recommendations of the Northern Ireland Law Commission, following its review in 2013 relating to apartments, to address the problems experienced by those who own and live in apartments and other properties with elements of shared ownership. I declare an interest as someone who owns an apartment.

The Member is talking about the management of those properties. Some initial scoping work has been undertaken to introduce legislation to give freeholders of private and mixed-tenure estates equivalent rights to those of leaseholders. No further work has been progressed in the interim, due to budgetary constraints faced by my Department.

The regulation of property management companies is a policy area of interest to a number of Departments. In the coming weeks, I will engage with officials to assess how the issue can be addressed in the context of the competing priorities and available resources.