Just before Easter it was decided to form an All-Party Parliamentary Group on residential leasehold and commonhold.
It is proposed that the chairmen will be jointly Sir Peter Bottomley and Jim Fitzpatrick, both patrons of LKP, and LKP will provide the secretariat.
So far 20 MPs and Lords have signed up to join the group, including two former housing ministers: Mark Prisk and Lord Young.
Last week the veteran columnist Peter Bill announced the proposed APPG in his column in Estates Gazette, the property world’s most authoritative publication.
An initial meeting was held between LKP and London Labour MPs Jim Fitzpatrick, Barry Gardiner (Brent North) and Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth).
Now the following have signed up:
Andy Slaughter (Labour, Hammersmith)
Bob Blackman (Conservative, Harrow East)
Catherine McKinnell (Labour, Newcastle North)
Graham Brady (Conservative, Altrincham and Sale West)
Julie Elliott (Labour, Sunderland Central)
Mark Prisk (Conservative, Hertford and Stortford)
Paul Flynn (Labour, Newport West)
Rebecca Long-Bailey (Labour, Salford and Eccles)
Rosie Cooper (Labour, West Lancashire)
Sir David Amess (Conservative, Southend West)
Will Quince (Conservative, Colchester)
Lord O’Neill of Clackmannan (Labour)
Lord Truscott (Independent)
Lord Young of Cookham (Conservative)
Baroness Gardner of Parkes (Conservative)
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Conservative)
If you believe your MP should be a member, please do write to them and urge that they join.
It is vitally important that all MPs who have had some informed dealings with leasehold take part.
The LKP-prompted amendments to the Housing and Planning Bill, which have been accepted by the government, are the first changes to leasehold law since 2002.
Far more substantial reforms should follow.
Related posts:
All Party Parliamentary Group on leasehold and commonhold established today
MPs call for all-party group on leasehold, and to stop right to manage being thwarted
All Party Parliamentary Group: this is how to reform leasehold
All Party Parliamentary Group, April 26: Barratt praised at Citiscape; Galliard reviled at New Capital Quay; Taylor Wimpey scorned over ground rent review scheme
Time to have another look at commonhold, say Lords. But what are Lord Best’s proposals?
Housing and Care 21: We’ve made a mess at Ashfield, so manage the site yourselves
I thank all those that have signed up for the All Parliamentary Group on residential leasehold and commonhold.
Whatever their political aspect, it is still a fundamentally true, that people enter Parliament to help their electorate.
May I suggest to those that do not sign up for it, that one day after their Parliamentary careers are over, they too might find themselves living in a leasehold property or a retirement development.
They may well reflect that they should have done something about leasehold whilst they were in Parliament!
And think of the boon to the economy the ending of leasehold would bring?
Instead of people struggling to pay exorbitant ground rents and service charges(the profits ending up in offshore tax havens, people would have extra money to spend, generating income for local businesses, who in turn pay tax.
Surely it can’t be the case that every country in the world apart from England and Wales has got it wrong about outlawing leasehold?,
Couldn’t agree more- With the Panama papers leaks these MPs can seize the “momentum” to go down in history as true champions of taxpayers and citizen s rights; It is no mystery that offshore companies are very often linked to property (family or corporate) trusts who rake in billions every year doing absolutely nothing besided benefiting from rising property prices..without paying a single penny of CGT or even stamp duty- first-time buyers are trapped and our government budget suffers.. Time to act and shame the big “offshore” freeholders.
I agree about the action bit, but not about the shaming. As someone who has endured for many years with the worst possible, unscrupulous freeholder, the truth is we need definitive legislation about what is and what isn’t possible. Naming and shaming is not an effective solution.
What are the chances that tax dodging will emerge as an issue that cannot be swept under the carpet?
http://www.theguardian.com/news/2016/apr/03/cameron-plans-offshore-summit-as-tax-secrets-are-leaked
We’ve seen some astonishing hypocrisy on this from the Tories, with Cameron speaking out against tax havens but privately lobbying the EU to leave British ones alone.
The connections between tax dodging and leasehold property are there for all to see:: http://www.unmaskthecorrupt.org & http://www.private-eye.co.uk/registry.
It appears that the Conservatives are “intensely relaxed” about corruption. It’s a position that won’t be sustainable indefinitely. There will be more disclosures.
Any other updates on this? Can we expect to see changes in our lifetime? Proper regulation of managing agents, published audited accounts, full disclosure of related companies and directorships with as much as a whiff of conflict of interest, closing the s.48 loophole (which basically means no- one is ever accountable for anything, since we don’t know who the freeholder might actually be, easy to hide behind a solicitors address). Proper consultation with leaseholders for proposed service charge costs. ( the loophole on this is more like a gaping gorge rather than a loophole…)