Nov

Tories promote home ownership, whilst Labour clamp down on renting rules…

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Election manifestos:

Tories pledge to
“re-balance “ the property market towards home ownership, helping
more starters onto the housing market, while Labour plan a crack-down
on private landlords.

No real surprises in
the Conservative manifesto, very much a continuation of present
policies, with few concessions for private landlords. The emphasis is
on helping tenants feel more secure in their tenancies with the
abolition of Section 21 ‘no fault’ evictions – a process that
is already under way – and help-to-buy.

“We will encourage
a new market in long-term fixed rate mortgages which slash the cost
of deposits, opening up a secure path to home ownership for
first-time buyers in all parts of the United Kingdom,” says the
Conservative manifesto.

More homes will be
offered to local families, “enabling councils to use developers’
contributions via the planning process to discount homes in
perpetuity by a third for local people who cannot otherwise afford to
buy in their area. Councils could use this to prioritise key workers
in their area, like police, nurses and teachers.”

The Right to Buy
will continue for all council tenants. “We will also maintain the
voluntary Right to Buy scheme agreed with housing associations… And
we have extended the Help to Buy scheme from 2021 to 2023 and will
review new ways to support home ownership following its completion.”

Shared ownership
will be reformed and simplified “setting a single standard for all
housing associations, thereby ending the confusion and disparity
between different schemes.

Leasehold reforms
will be continued while “A Better Deal for Renters”, including
abolishing ‘no fault’ evictions and only requiring one ‘lifetime’
deposit which moves with the tenant will be continued, to “create a
fairer rental market: if you’re a tenant, you will be protected
from revenge evictions and rogue landlords, and if you’re one of
the many good landlords, we will strengthen your rights of
possession.,” say the Conservatives.

Meanwhile Labour have pledged to “put bad landlords out of business”, to introduce open-ended (indefinite) tenancies, abolish no-fault evictions and cap rent rises for private tenants, to “put bad landlords out of business” and bring back rent controls in England for the first time in over 30 years. Council house building will be boosted under Labour, funding 100,000 new council houses a year by 2024.

Labour’s “private
renters’ charter” would oblige all landlords to carry out an
annual “property MOT”, similar to the vehicle safety checks
of that name, with fines of up to £100,000 or rent clawbacks if
their let properties are found to be unsafe and below standard.

Renters unions
funded by the state would be encouraged, so as to balance
tenant-landlord power in the market, and in areas of high rental
demand where rents are high, councils would be given additional
powers to control rent levels.

The Labour party
claims that one-in-four private rented homes in England are classed
as “non-decent”, with dampness, cold, forms of disrepair or
are otherwise unsafe for occupation.

John Healey Labour’s
Housing spokesman told the BBC, “these are standards that cannot
be allowed to go on for longer, While most landlords provided decent
and secure accommodation, he said successive governments had allowed
‘rogue landlords to flourish’, while tenants had fewer rights and
protections than if they were hiring a car or household goods.”

“This is about
making all properties and all landlords operate to the sort of
standards that the better ones already do. When one in four kids are
growing up in private rented accommodation, this is the type of home
which must be better, more secure and more affordable,” Mr
Healey said.

According to Norman Smith, The BBC’s assistant political editor, Labour’s policy reflected a view within Labour that the private sector “could not be trusted in many areas and the state had to step in”, a major dividing line with the Conservatives.

Richard Lambert, CEO of the National Landlords Association comments:

On the Labour
manifesto:

“While the NLA
supports any policies that crack down on criminals operating in the
private rented sector (PRS), the Labour manifesto is too extreme, as
well as unrealistic and will be hugely damaging to housing supply in
the UK.

“It begs so many
questions: from rent-caps to open ended tenancies, how does Labour
intend to make these policies work? How will Labour ensure landlords
who are already compliant don’t take the full brunt of these
changes? Will they give housing enforcement the priority and the
resources it desperately needs? Does Labour intend to reform the
courts so that if a landlord needs to end a tenancy, it can be done
quickly and efficiently to?

“Currently, what
Labour proposes will force landlords to be more selective about the
tenants they take on and will drive many from the market altogether.
We cannot stress enough that punishing law-abiding landlords who live
and work in the PRS will be something the Labour party will come to
regret.”

On the
Conservative manifesto:

“The Conservatives
claim that the changes announced in the manifesto will ‘create a
fairer rental market’, but fairer for whom? To say that we are
disappointed that the Conservatives have pledged to continue with
their plan to abolish Section 21 is an understatement. Despite a
robust lobbying campaign on behalf of the two million landlords in
the UK, the Conservatives seem hell-bent on continuing to punish hard
working and law-abiding landlords.

“We will reserve
judgment on the so-called “lifetime deposit”. The Conservatives
has yet to confirm what this will look like or how this will work in
practice.

“The NLA cannot
get behind a manifesto that so badly cripples landlords’ ability to
run a functioning letting business.”

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