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Clause 11
Amendment made: No. 30, in page 8, line 27, in clause 11, leave out subsection (10) and insert—
'( ) A person is the owner of premises if either of the following paragraphs applies to him—
(a) he is a person (other than a mortgagee not in possession) who is for the time being entitled to dispose of the fee simple in the premises, whether in possession or in reversion;
(b) he is a person who holds or is entitled to the rents and profits of the premises under a lease which (when granted) was for a term of not less than three years.'.—[Keith Hill.]
Clause 13
3.30 pm
The Minister for Housing and Planning (Keith Hill): I beg to move amendment No. 10, in page 10, line 28, leave out 'immoral and'.
Mr. Deputy Speaker: With this it will be convenient to discuss Government amendments Nos. 11 and 21 to 23.
Keith Hill: I also hope to be brief in dealing with this small group of amendments. I want to begin, however, by thanking my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary for her kind words of welcome, and to reciprocate by congratulating her on her well-merited appointment. It is also a pleasure to be working with my hon. Friend the Minister for Crime Reduction, Policing and Community Safety. I congratulate her on her promotion, too. They are two glittering stars in the firmament of the parliamentary Labour party.
Amendments Nos. 10, 11, 21 and 22 deal with the question of immorality. Specifically, it is proposed that the immoral use of premises, as distinct from unlawful use of premises, should be removed as a ground for obtaining an injunction or a demotion. I am grateful to the hon. Member for South-East Cambridgeshire (Mr. Paice) for bringing this to the Government's attention in Committee. I am entirely in agreement with him that there is no necessary link between immorality and either antisocial behaviour or illegality, and it is misleading to imply one. Immorality per se is irrelevant to what the Bill seeks to achieve.
We do not think that it is appropriate that injunctions or demotion orders intended to prevent antisocial behaviour should be used to control the use of premises where no illegal activity is taking place and no nuisance is being caused. It is difficult to see what is antisocial in that situation. If illegality or nuisance begins, an injunction under clause 13 or a demotion order under clause 14 can be obtained without the need for any judgments of morality. Amendment No. 23 is a technical amendment to provide consistency in the way that the Bill deals with matters of Welsh devolution. We are deleting subsection (2) of clause 17 to bring it into line with clause 55.
Mr. James Paice (South-East Cambridgeshire): I welcome the new Minister for Housing and Planning. I was remiss in not referring to him in my earlier remarks, and he rightly chided me privately for that. I
congratulate him on his promotion—I suppose that that is what it is—and certainly on his new position in the Government. Whether he has as much power as he had as Deputy Chief Whip I shall leave for others to judge. It is ironic, of course, that the previous Minister, the hon. Member for Coventry, North-East (Mr. Ainsworth), has gone to the job that the new Minister for Housing and Planning vacated.
Mr. Bercow: I hope that my hon. Friend will agree that the Minister took a sensible approach to the Government's new clauses and amendments. Will he agree, however, that after a period of Trappist silence from the new Minister, which was no doubt put to good effect on behalf of the Government machine, it is extremely welcome that we shall once again hear his mellifluous tones and his gladiatorial approach to political debate?
Mr. Paice: I am sure that my hon. Friend, with his immense command of vocabulary, has encapsulated the views of many of us. I smile inwardly at the presence on the Front Bench of the new Minister for Housing and Planning, together with the new Minister for Crime Reduction, Policing and Community Safety, whom I assume is pleased that her colleague has not been put in charge of cycling, bearing in mind a faux pas that he made previously in the House, which was probably the cause of the period of Trappist silence to which he was consigned. Clearly, however, he has paid his penance.
I am grateful to the Minister for Housing and Planning for his kind words about the amendments, which, as he said, arise from almost identical amendments that I moved in Committee. I remind hon. Members of the words used in Committee by the then Under-Secretary, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, the hon. Member for Harrow, East (Mr. McNulty), when he spoke to my amendments. He said:
- "Currently, I am not persuaded by my own briefing"—[Official Report, Standing Committee G, 13 May 2003; c. 229.]
I shall not reprise the arguments that the Minister for Housing and Planning made—I made them at slightly more length in Committee. It is wrong to confuse antisocial behaviour with immorality. Immorality is based on a personal judgment and the concept moves with the times. We know from other aspects of legislation that courts have great difficulty defining immorality, so we do not want to bestow that problem on the Bill. The Bill is all about addressing nuisance and annoyance, which are clearly defined in law, so I am grateful that the Government have recognised that those concepts should not be confused with the wholly different concept of immorality.
We want to discuss other issues before the first knife falls, so I shall leave my remarks at that, except to repeat my welcome and obvious support for the Government amendments.
Mr. Allen: I welcome my hon. Friend the Minister for Housing and Planning to the Front Bench and I ask him
to bear one thing in mind. I am sure that it is a common phenomenon for hon. Members of all parties to talk to people on council estates who say, "You know, the old rent book used to be very clear. The old rent man used to come round and tell us exactly the duties that we had and correct us when the garden was untidy." In a way, the drift of policy to protect private tenants especially, has gone a little too far the other way.I say with the greatest respect to my hon. Friend—I hope that he will consider this although not necessarily react to it at the Dispatch Box—that many councils, including mine, would prefer to have the ability to use a tighter tenancy agreement. In order to achieve that, the Government must stand behind councils rather than continuing what is perhaps a trend of the past 30 years of always looking after the individual rights of a specific tenant. Sadly, people who use their rights are often those who abuse the rights of everyone else in the community. I am not saying that we need to return to a pre-Rachmanite regime, but as the Bill moves to the other place, will my hon. Friend consider the possibility of councils being able to toughen up their tenancy agreements so that they may take speedy action against some of the families that plague all our constituents?
Matthew Green (Ludlow): I would add my congratulations to the Minister for Housing and Planning, but I did so during Question Time last week. He is unfortunate to be promoted into his job only to discover that he is midway through two Bills, or even three. Even being midway through one Bill would be unfortunate.
I add Liberal Democrat support to the amendments—we have added our names to them—for the reasons outlined by the hon. Member for South-East Cambridgeshire (Mr. Paice) and the Minister. We support the removal of the word "immoral". It was inappropriate and had nothing at all to do with a Bill on antisocial behaviour. I think that the word slipped in because such wording has been used in Bills for several years and there is a tendency to keep rolling on with the same set of words. It is just as well that the problem has been brought to book and I hope that that will prevent the wording from being rolled out in future Bills.
Amendment made: No. 11, in page 10, line 31, leave out 'immoral or'.—[Keith Hill.]
Keith Hill: I beg to move amendment No. 12, in page 11, line 4, at end insert—
'153D Injunction against breach of tenancy agreement
(1) This section applies if a relevant landlord applies for an injunction against a tenant in respect of the breach or anticipated breach of a tenancy agreement on the grounds that the tenant—
(a) is engaging or threatening to engage in conduct that is capable of causing nuisance or annoyance to any person, or
(b) is allowing, inciting or encouraging any other person to engage or threaten to engage in such conduct.
(2) The court may proceed under subsection (3) or (4) if it is satisfied—
(a) that the conduct includes the use or threatened use of violence, or
(b) that there is a significant risk of harm to any person.
(3) The court may include in the injunction a provision prohibiting the person in respect of whom it is granted from entering or being in—
(a) any premises specified in the injunction;
(b) any area specified in the injunction.
(4) The court may attach a power of arrest to any provision of the injunction.
(5) Tenancy agreement includes any agreement for the occupation of residential accommodation owned or managed by a relevant landlord.'.
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Michael Lord): With this it will be convenient to discuss the following: Government amendments Nos. 13 to 20.
Amendment No. 75, in page 45, line 39, schedule 1, leave out from 'possession' to end of line 40 and insert
- 'if it is satisfied
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