Freeholders cried crocodile tears for old ladies and said the pensions sector would be destabilised, says former housing minister. (And commonhold is ready to roll …)

Freeholders cried crocodile tears for old ladies and said the pensions sector would be destabilised, says former housing minister

While Michael Gove warned of “silver-tongued” and expensive lawyers lobbying on behalf of the freehold sector, former housing minister Rachel Maclean (above) was so repelled by lobbying overtures that they spectacularly backfired.

“When I was privileged to hold the position of Housing Minister, I strongly supported the relevant legislation,” she told the Commons, “Because those people sat in front of me and cried crocodile tears, telling me that if we went ahead with it we would destabilise the pensions industry and leave lots of little old ladies with no pensions — which is obviously complete and utter nonsense.”

In what was one of the best speeches of the evening – Ms Maclean warmly thanked her former “brilliant officials” – she extended her charge sheet against the monetisers in the leasehold sector.

She praised the work of the Leasehold Knowledge Partnership and that of the Leasehold Advisory Service, now under “the leadership of the superb Martin Boyd” (also chair of LKP).

She was well aware of the marathon service charge litigation being mounted by LKP trustee and City solicitor Liam Spender.

She was also informed about the challenge in the courts last week by the offshore freeholder John Christodoulou at Canary Riverside – although she named neither – “to wrest control of a building back from a court-appointed manager — a so-called section 24 manager — claiming that it is incompatible with the Building Safety Act 2022.

“That is obviously nonsense. If a freeholder has been found not to be managing his building properly, it shows some cheek to try to ditch a court appointee on such spurious grounds.”

When it came to the reforms, Ms Maclean – who was warmly praised by both Mr Gove and her successor (and close colleague) Lee Rowley – urged the Conservative case for introducing commonhold.

“There is a clear Conservative and free-market rationale for accepting the Law Commission’s recommendations on reforming commonhold so that more developers choose it, rather than leasehold, for new blocks of flats — not because they are forced to do so, but because it is the best option for their business model. Can the Government look at that again? All the work has already been done.”

After a painful evening for freeholders, in which one Conservative MP after another showed as scant regard for the sanctity of their property rights as any Bolshevik, perhaps the only ray of sunshine was the fact that Ms Maclean had been sacked – by Number 10 – and was no longer in charge of the Bill.

But the words of Michael Gove and his deputy Lee Rowley were hardly comforting.