Examination of Witnesses (Questions 480-499)
22 FEBRUARY 2005
MR TIM
WINTER, MR
JON ROUSE
AND MR
DAVID SALUSBURY
Q480 Bob Russell: Gentlemen, I would
like to deal with part of the Housing Act 2004, the one that makes
reference to private tenants where a local housing authority can
introduce a licensing scheme. Does anybody have any idea how many
such licences have been issued so far?
Mr Winter: I am not aware.
Bob Russell: Are we aware of any? Whether
they are succeeding or not, we will have to leave in the air.
Perhaps, Chairman we can ascertain elsewhere how many licences
have been so issued. I was going to ask how useful—
Chairman: The Act is not yet enacted.
Q481 Bob Russell: Looking ahead to when
it is enacted, how useful do you think these new licensing arrangements
will be in dealing with anti-social private tenants?
Mr Salusbury: The answer is we
do not know because we do not know what the Government actually
wants to do as far as licensing—particularly of houses in
multiple occupation, HMOs—is concerned. What I can tell
you is that the first consultation round is now completed, and
I have the list of questions here that were sent to my organisation,
amongst others, and there are no fewer than 55 questions in this
document, and each question is multi-choice. There are over 200
questions, which suggests to us that the Government does not really
know how it wishes to implement this; it is asking us to suggest
how it might be implemented when we have advised throughout that
licensing is not the answer for the private rented sector; it
is likely to be bureaucratic, very expensive—and disproportionate,
I think, is the word. That said, we are anxious or keen to co-operate
with the Government. We do have as our central policy working
with the grain rather than against the grain, and we look forward
to further consultations. However, on your actual question as
to whether or not licensing will help, we do not know but we do
not think so.
Q482 Bob Russell: When was that consultation
document issued to you? When does the consultation finish? Do
you know?
Mr Salusbury: We received it at
the end of November and the responses were required two or three
days ago. In fact, as we speak, in ODPM there is a meeting to
discuss the very consultation.
Q483 Bob Russell: So we will need to
return to that, or somebody will, at a later date. I am almost
pleased I can put this next question because there is a general
perception in society that anti-social behaviour only comes from
tenanted households, whether they be in the public sector or private.
I wonder if you could confirm that, indeed, there are problems
of anti-social behaviour with owner-occupiers, and what measures,
gentlemen, are needed to deal with that part of society, bearing
in mind that they constitute something like three-quarters of
all households?
Mr Rouse: Maybe I could start
on that. The first thing is I am very glad you make that point
because our evidence suggests that the link between anti-social
behaviour is not with tenure but with deprivation. There is a
very critical difference. On some estates it is the Right-to-Buy
properties that are causing more problems, in terms of getting
to them and dealing with them, than actually those that are socially
tenanted. That is the first thing to say. The second thing to
say is just a different opinion from my colleague; we certainly
welcome the licensing scheme for private landlords. Clearly, there
is a lot more detail needed in terms of how it is going to work,
but we think it is going to be very helpful in dealing with, for
example, absentee landlords who have effectively lost control
of an area, or are in the housing market renewal areas where there
is a significant number of empty properties which are not being
properly controlled. So we welcome the introduction of selective
licensing, while recognising that it will not apply to the vast
majority of landlords who are doing a very good job, but in some
areas it is a good thing. In terms of owner-occupiers, the key
is to ensure that the tools that are available, including Anti-social
Behaviour Orders, are used as much in terms of owner-occupation
as they are in terms of social landlords.
Mr Winter: We agree with that.
I think selective licensing is potentially very useful. I welcome
the fact that it has been stated loud and clear that it is not
just tenants of social and/or other landlords who are responsible
for anti-social behaviour. I would point out that the Anti-social
Behaviour Order is tenure-free, so you can use that across the
board, and the new Anti-social Behaviour Injunctions, under the
ASB Act, also enable some contact with owner-occupiers.
Q484 Bob Russell: Are there other measures
that are needed in relation to anti-social behaviour where it
is people who are owner-occupiers—albeit, perhaps, with
a huge mortgage but, nevertheless, they are technically owner-occupiers?
Are there other measures that are needed to deal with those—
Mr Winter: I do not think so.
I think the measures are currently available; it is the commitment
to use them that is the important point.
Bob Russell: Thank you.
Q485 Janet Anderson: Mr Salusbury, can
I just go back to what you said when you said you did not think
licensing was necessary? I have to tell you, and I am glad Mr
Rouse raised this, that in my constituency, where we have a housing
market renewal area, there is a significant problem with landlords
who can only be described as irresponsible; buying up cheap, terraced
property, caring very little about the tenants they put in there
because they know they will get the housing benefit, and really
just allowing those properties to deteriorate so badly that that
is one of the reasons why we now have housing market renewal initiatives.
You say you do not think licensing would help, so what is your
answer to that problem?
Mr Salusbury: I think there is
a wide range of powers already available to local authorities.
For a start, the 1996 Housing Act gives local authorities the
discretion to introduce multi-occupancy housing registration schemes.
Licensing, as currently proposed—and it is still a little
bit vague how it will be implemented—may go some way to
widening the net with a view to ensuring that some of these less
desirable activities are brought within the remit of the local
authority, but I would submit they already have the powers (as
my colleague said, it is a question of the will to use them),
and what licensing will actually do is to make life more difficult
for the vast majority of landlords who are compliant, who are
keen to obey the law; they are law-abiding, responsible citizens—as
has just been acknowledged. The people you have described who
take advantage of the situation in your constituency are not the
sort of people that we would wish in our association to be described
as landlords; that is probably not their defining characteristic,
which is that they are rogue operators and should be dealt with
as rogue operators. The widespread application of further regulation,
which will affect practically every private landlord in the country,
we do not believe is the answer, but we are in dialogue with Government
and we are hoping they will listen to our representations with
a view to making these provisions workable and—all right,
not welcome—acceptable to the law-abiding majority. However,
I do stress that these instances of abuse—and I use that
word advisedly—in your constituency are as unacceptable
to the majority of decent landlords as they clearly are, quite
rightly, to you.
Janet Anderson: Thank you very much.
Q486 Chairman: Just to push you a little
further, Mr Salusbury, do you accept, as a point of principle,
that a private landlord should be as accountable for the anti-social
behaviour of their tenant as anybody would expect a housing association
or a local authority to be?
Mr Salusbury: No.
Q487 Chairman: Why not?
Mr Salusbury: Is the obvious rejoinder
to my very short answer!
Q488 Chairman: That is the disadvantage
of short answers.
Mr Salusbury: On a point of principle
a private landlord is an individual whereas a corporate body can
be given or expected to discharge responsibilities that, possibly,
a private individual cannot reasonably be expected to discharge.
The private landlord is generally a private individual. It is
reasonable to expect the private landlord, through encouragement
or whatever means are available, to contribute to the resolution
of this problem in a strategic way, as society as a whole might
describe, but to lay specific responsibilities at the door of
the private landlord may well be unreasonable and could well be
unworkable, in our view.
Q489 Chairman: In circumstances where
(and, of course, this is by no means all private lettings), effectively,
the landlord's income, including any landlord's profit, is funded
by the state through housing benefit, surely the public have a
right, at least in those circumstances, for the landlord to be
accountable for the impact of their tenants?
Mr Salusbury: I find that difficult
to answer because there is such a large proportion of the population
in this country which is now dependent, in one way or another,
upon the state for part of its income, that it would be hard to
separate out who is and who is not. If the state is going to start
attaching conditions to the payment of such benefits as local
housing allowance, for example, when the express intention is
giving the tenant more discretion to enable the tenant to make
decisions for him or herself, what you have just said would appear
to me to run counter to that general proposition. So, no, I do
not believe that the fact that a tenant may or may not be in receipt
of state benefits places any particular obligation upon the landlord
of the property, other than those which might reasonably be expected
of that landlord through tenancy agreements and good practice
etc—all of which my association would encourage.
Q490 Chairman: Can we move on to another
aspect of this. In the previous session we heard a lot of evidence
about positive intervention with young people by application,
very often, in the context of their family. Can I ask each of
you very briefly about what your assessment is? When you survey
the scene of trying to deal with anti-social behaviour how effective
do you view well-known initiatives like the Dundee Families Project
or other local projects in dealing with dysfunctional families?
How high do they come in your list of the things that need to
be there to be able to deal with anti-social behaviour effectively?
Mr Rouse: I think we go back to
1998, and to the Social Exclusion Unit Policy Action Team report
on anti-social behaviour, which found that one of the areas they
could not conclude on was repeat offenders. I think, as we have
increased our ability and commitment to take enforcement action,
we have become aware that there is a huge danger of recycling
some of the most seriously dysfunctional families, and that those
dysfunctional families do need rehabilitative work like the Dundee
Families Project.
Q491 Chairman: In practice, and you may
not be able to speak for your membership as a whole, how often
is that support available for, I suspect, the minority of places
where enforcement action will not be enough?
Mr Winter: Frequently. As Jon
says, it is the two-tiered approach, if you like. We want to change
behaviour, not to punish.
Q492 Chairman: We are interested in what
happens on the ground, in practice, and I suspect that some of
us, as MPs, feel the theory is there and there is support available
for the dysfunctional family, but in practice there is not, which
is why we need to be demanding some enforcement action.
Mr Winter: Certainly there are
not rehabilitative projects, and in that sense the announcement
in the last week or so of a further 50 projects to be supported
around the country is very much welcome.
Q493 Chairman: Do you have a measure
of how big the gap is between what will be available as a result
of the latest announcement in 50 areas and what is needed? The
Head of the Youth Justice Board was able to tell us how many areas
could use youth inclusion projects and how many will actually
have them. Do you have any idea?
Mr Winter: I am afraid I do not.
Mr Rouse: I do not know the answer
to that, I am afraid. I was going to make a different point on
the previous question, if you do not mind, which is just to flag
up the absolute, critical nature of Crime and Disorder Reduction
Partnerships, in terms of getting that balance between prevention
and enforcement support correct. One of the things that we are
doing is trying to fund consortia of housing associations where
they are too small, really, to do this off their own back. We
have got one going in Coventry and one going in Derby, as pilots,
and they are proving extremely successful in terms of ensuring
that all the landlords in the area, all the social landlords,
are working in concert with the social services department, the
police and so on.
Q494 Chairman: Just to go slightly into
that discussion, have you ever considered in any local areas extending
that to private landlords?
Mr Rouse: We have not got the
powers to do that, unfortunately, because we only regulate registered
social landlords.
Q495 Chairman: But there would be nothing,
in theory, would there, in a local CDRP area to prevent private
landlords being involved in those discussions.?
Mr Rouse: Absolutely not.
Q496 Chairman: I wondered if you or Mr
Salusbury were aware of any areas where that has happened.
Mr Rouse: I am not aware of any
areas where that has happened. I would suggest that is something
that needs to be looked at under selective licensing. If you have
got a larger landlord who is subject to an area where there is
selective licensing then part of their responsibilities under
that licence could be to actually participate in the Crime and
Disorder Reduction Partnership.
Q497 Chairman: Can I ask about mediation,
which is earlier in the tiered process to the full-scale family
support work? How effective, really, is mediation, or is it just
one of these things you have to go through for a few months before
you get round to doing anything about the problem?
Mr Winter: As a trained mediator,
can I declare an interest? Define "effective". An 80%
success rate is the general rule-of-thumb figure that comes out
for appropriate referrals: early referrals and referrals where
there clearly is the will to mediate on both sides. It got a bit
confused in mediation, in some senses, because for Anti-social
Behaviour Orders, at one stage, people subject to them at court
were invited to go and mediate, which was odd. There is, perhaps,
a misconception about mediation; when it is enforced it becomes
completely different. Mediation should be a voluntary process
but it is a very important part of tackling neighbourhood disputes—inter-generational
disputes particularly. I think the language of mediation and the
understanding of the skills of mediators who listen to people
in a way that others, perhaps, do not, should be well-used throughout
the process in tackling nuisance and anti-social behaviour.
Q498 Mr Taylor: Could I put a supplementary
point on that? As one who has spent a little time in the Lord
Chancellor's Department, I am very, very interested in mediation
and the movement away from adversarial techniques. How far would
it be true, Mr Winter, in your experience, that mediation only
works if there is in the background an alternative, harder way
of doing this, so that at least the person attempting to initiate
the mediation can say: "Look, there is a nice way of doing
this and there is a particularly unpleasant way of doing this,
and I am offering you the nice way"?
Mr Winter: Many mediators would
say that that forces the issue in an unnecessary way, that it
withdraws the voluntary commitment to finding the solution on
which both parties can take ownership—what the mediators
call "a win-win situation".
Mr Rouse: I am not sure I agree
entirely with that, to be honest. It is the first point we have
disagreed on, I think, this afternoon. The evidence of the Shelter
project, for example, in Rochdale is it is the combination of
mediation and Acceptable Behaviour Contracts that set out the
responsibilities of the various parties that is most effective.
In that case, 88% of the referrals are still in their own property
as a result. However, it is worth saying that the Rochdale project
cost £300,000 per annum, and if you compare that to the £25,000
each that is going to the new 50 priority areas under the Home
Office, it gives you some idea of what may or may not be doable
with those resources.
Q499 Mr Green: You said that 80% of appropriate
referrals are successful. What percentage of referrals are appropriate?
Mr Winter: I was trying to get
over the problem that some situations would not be suitable for
mediation, clearly: if there is a power imbalance, if people are
addicted to drink, drugs, or whatever; if there can be no guarantee
that when they wake up the next day they know what they have agreed
to, that is not an appropriate case to mediate—those sorts
of things.
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