Clause
279
Commencement
Amendments
made: No. 129, in clause 279, page 118,
line 6, after 273 insert and
Schedule (Demolition
notices).
No.
130, in
clause 279, page 118, line 8, after
of insert
, and
paragraph 13(5) of Schedule 5 to,.
No. 131, in
clause 279, page 118, line 13, after
259, insert
(Right to acquire freehold: abolition of
low rent test), (Shared ownership leases: protection for certain
limited equity leases), (Shared ownership leases: protection for hard
to replace
houses),.
No.
132, in
clause 279, page 118, line 13, after
265, insert
(Former right to buy and other flats:
equity share purchases),.[Mr.
Wright.]
Mr.
Wright:
I beg to move amendment No. 133, in
clause 279, page 118, line 14, leave
out from to to end of line 18 and insert
repeals which are connected to the provisions
mentioned in paragraph (b)
above.
Again,
the amendment is of a purely technical nature. Clause 279 sets out the
procedures relating to the commencement of the Bill and allows certain
provisions to be commenced separately by the Secretary of State in
England and by Welsh Ministers in Wales. Those provisions are listed in
subsection 3(b), and the associated repeals in schedule 10 are listed
in subsection 3(c). I hope that is useful to hon. Members and that they
will accept the
amendment.
Amendment
agreed
to.
Question
proposed, That the clause, as amended, stand part of the
Bill.
Lembit
Öpik:
The commencement clause relates to England
and Wales. I have one specific request that I hope the Minister will
grant. Can he assure us that, before the commencement of the
legislation, there will be a meeting at ministerial level with his
opposite numbers in the Welsh Assembly who manage housing? I make that
request because there are interrelations between the jurisdiction in
Wales and that in Westminster. In the past, I have observed some
friction between those two political institutions in establishing the
territory and domain of their jurisdictions, so it would be better to
have those conversations before commencement rather than scrapping
about it once the Act comes into force. I hope that the Minister can
assure us that a high-level ministerial meeting will take place before
commencement of the legislation.
Mr.
Raynsford:
Can my hon. Friend the Minister give the
Committee some indication about the overall time scale for
implementation of the parts of the Bill? As he knows by looking at
clause 279, parts of the Bill will come into effect two months after
the date on which the Bill receives Royal Assent. Other parts are
subject to provisions made by the Secretary of State, which involves
different dates. Can my hon. Friend give any indication about the time
scale over which all the Bills provisions are expected to be
brought into effect? I know from past experience that some
Bills include parts that are never effected, and it would be helpful to
have an indication about the overall time scale by which all the
Bills provisions are likely to be effective. I do not expect an
answer today as it is a complex area, but it would be helpful to have
that indication on Report.
Mr.
Wright:
My right hon. Friend has made a good point. I will
endeavour on Report to advise the House about the enactment of the
various clauses and parts of the Bill. The point raised by the hon.
Member for Montgomeryshire about a high-level ministerial meeting
between English and Welsh Ministers seems perfectly sensible, and I
will do my best to ensure that it happens.
Question put and agreed
to.
Clause
2
79, as a
mended, ordered to stand part of the
Bill.
Clause
280 ordered to stand part of the
Bill.
Ordered,
That
certain written evidence already reported to the House be appended to
the proceedings of the Committee.[
Mr.
Wright.]
Question
proposed, That the Chairman do report the Bill, as amended, to the
House.
Grant
Shapps:
May I say thank you very much for your
chairmanship, Mr. Benton, and also that of Mr.
Gale during what has been an enjoyable and informative Committee? I
also take the opportunity to thank the Clerks and the officials who
have worked tirelessly all month on the Bill. It is the first time that
I have sat on a Committee, and it has been a great honour. I was
fortunate because two titans from the housing world were on the Back
Benches. The right hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich and my right
hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire were a pleasure to
watch in action; they were great mentors. It was particularly
interesting to debate with the right hon. Member for Greenwich and
Woolwich and sometimes to agree with him. I was enormously grateful to
my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire. On one
particular occasion, he rescued me when I had lost my notes.
The way in which the Committee
has proceeded has been very satisfactory. Thanks are due to the
Minister for the way in which he has behaved and acted. It has almost
gone down as a mantra that he will thank an hon. Member for a well-put
argument and say that he wholeheartedly agrees, but then explain why it
is impossible to accept their amendment. He does that with such panache
and in such a well meaning way that it is impossible to feel any
malice.
The
Ministers performance has been worthy of a Secretary of State.
I am sad that he was not promoted last
week.
Grant
Shapps:
It is the kiss of death, Minister, but I will
carry on. The Minister would be a very worthy holder of office as
Secretary of State, and I have no doubt that in the future he will be
in the Cabinet, though sadly only for a brief period before we take
over.
Thank you
once again, Mr. Benton, for your tremendous
chairmanship.
Lembit
Öpik:
I, too, extend my heartfelt gratitude to the
Clerks and the officials. I arrived on the scene in the middle of the
process, after my new leaders wise
appointment of me. However, I have been in office longer than the
Ministers new boss, so I feel like an old
hand.
The Clerks are
extremely understanding and generous with their time and have helped us
to put together amendments that achieve the meaning and intent of the
Bill. I am sure that all right hon. and hon. Members feel the
same.
Mr.
Benton, you and your co-Chairman, Mr. Gale, have been
gracious even in moments of great confusion, particularly on Tuesday
when I was caught up short and momentarily distracted and ended up
busking it in a most blatant and obvious way. Nevertheless,
Mr. Gale was still gentle with me. Mr. Benton,
you, too, have shown an expeditious and erudite approach in chairing
the
Committee.
Finally, I
turn to the Minister. As we have already heard from the hon. Member for
Welwyn Hatfield, the Minister demonstrates the strange art of accepting
every point that one makes and then rejecting the amendments that go
with it. It reminds me of a phrase I heard when I was first
electedthe art of diplomacy is to say no in such a way that the
other person apologises. In a sense, I felt that the Minister displayed
that skill. Nevertheless, the people of Hartlepool can rightly be proud
of his performance in this Committee. I look forward to visiting
Hartlepool in less confrontational circumstances than those in which I
first met the Minister, which involved the by-election that thrust him
into Parliament and now into power.
Setting sail with my new
portfolio has been an interesting and instructive experience. I hope
that on Report we can return to some of the areas which, as the
Minister has pointed out, were open to further consideration. At that
point, perhaps the Government will accept a few of the Opposition
amendments that were proposed in good faith, apparently accepted in
principle, but rejected in practice.
Mr.
Wright:
I have three hours and 27 minutes. I give notice
to the Committee that I intend to take every second of that time. I
thank the hon. Members for Welwyn Hatfield and for Montgomeryshire for
their kind comments.
Foremost, I thank you,
Mr. Benton, and your co-Chairman, Mr. Gale, for
your professionalism, courtesy, charm, wit and efficiency in managing
the Committee. During our proceedings, I learned that Mr.
Gale is a trade union shop steward in his spare time. Certainly, he has
been standing up for his fellow hon. Members and their staff and
families in the media this week.
I also thank the Clerk for her
excellent work and the Hansard reporters and the Doorkeepers for
helping to make the business of the Committee, including 280 clauses,
10 schedules and 300 amendmentsmostly my ownvery
smooth. I echo the points made by the hon. Member for Welwyn Hatfield
that this has been a good-natured and well meaning Committee. I pay
tribute to the hon. Gentlemans tenacity, although I think he
spent too long on HIPsI hope that he has his new HIP now. He
has been an excellent Front-Bench spokesman, as has the hon. Member for
North-East
Bedfordshire.
10
am
I want to pay
tribute to my hon. Friends. First, I thank the Whip for the
Committees smooth operation. Despite our forensic scrutiny of
the Bill, we are finishing a sitting early. I thank my hon. Friend the
Member for Sheffield, Hillsborough for her sterling work in providing
me with information. I commend my hon. Friend the Member for City of
Durham, who has almost single-handedly changed Government policy to
ensure that the Homes and Communities Agency will take sustainable
development into account. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member
for West Ham for her impatience with me and for her sterling work on
overcrowding and on ensuring that tenants have decent housing
standards, regardless of where they live. I pay tribute to my hon.
Friend the Member for Luton, South for her work on domestic
violenceI hope that we can move that work forwardand to
my hon. Friend the Member for Edmonton. I have taken no pleasure in
hearing my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing, Acton and
Shepherds Bush talk about how Hammersmith and Fulham housing
has deteriorated since he ran it, because that is not particularly good
for the tenants. However, the manner in which he has done that and
bashed the Opposition has been a delight to hear. My hon. Friend the
Member for Denton and Reddish has been a tremendous advocate of work on
social housing and ensuring that tenants receive fantastic value for
money and good standards. My right hon. Friend the Member for Greenwich
and Woolwich has been tremendous; his knowledge of this policy area is
second to none. He has been extraordinarily helpful to me, and I thank
him for helping to improve the Bill through his
contributions.
I
cannot sit down without paying tribute to the right hon. Member for
North-West Hampshire, who has been tremendous and extremely courteous.
He has often played with me as a cat plays with a mouse before killing
it, but has done so with such panache and courtesy that I cannot take
issue with him; he is such a gentleman. I have been reading his blog.
Let me quote some of his
comments:
Not
all the work of an MP is glamorous, any more than is the life of a
popstar. The political equivalent of endless hours in a recording
studio in the East End of London is a month on a Public Bill Committee.
Every Tuesday and Thursday in January is being spent by your MP
examining, line by line, the Housing and Regeneration Billa
modest piece of legislation with 280 Clauses and countless
Schedules.
Given the
choice, I think that I would rather be a pop star than in this
Committee Room, but I know what he
means.
Finally, I pay
tribute to the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire, whom I consider to be a
friend. A few days ago, he received the ultimate accolade, a profile in
The Sunday Times magazine. He has some courage: he called
Mr. Gale dozy, which takes some doing.
Keeping with the pop star theme, I recall a group called Dave Dee,
Dozy, Beaky, Mick and Tich, although it is a bit before my time. Let me
quote the first bit of The Sunday Times magazine
article:
On a
poetically sloe-black, slow black
very Under Milk
Wood
night
in Wales, the young people of Newtown are herding into the pubs. One of
them is the local MP, 42 years old but somehow still a boy in his baggy
jeans and short-sleeved shirt, his arms pale and beefy on a cold
winters night. Lembit Opik is playing pool in his local, the
Grapes, with friends no older than their early twenties. They are
snogging and joshing as their MP takes his shot next to the television
where they let him watch Question Time on
Thursdays.
I
said to the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire this week that I
had been having nightmares about the Office for National Statistics
classification, but I have also been having nightmares about
snogging and joshing and pale and
beefy. I suggest that if we take this pop star theme a little
further, the hon. Member for Montgomeryshire could have a duet with his
romantic interest, and the name of the group could be Dave Dee, Dozy,
Pale Beef, Beaky, Cheeky, Mick and Tich. I thought that that would get
more of a laughit took me quite some time to think
of.
I will not take
up too much time, but I am particularly proud that this is an important
and significant Bill, designed to help all in the country with regard
to their housing needs. Thanks to the high quality
scrutinyforensic, eventhat hon. Members on both sides
of the Committee have applied, the Bill leaves this stage a better
Bill, and I thank all hon. Members for their work in that
regard.
Finally, I
thank my officials, who have worked extremely hard and often extremely
late on the Bill and our amendments to it in the previous months. At
any point in the Committee where I have looked good, it has been thanks
to them. When I have looked bad, it is because I have chosen to go on
my own. It is a tribute to their professionalism that they are keen to
have a meeting tonight at 5 oclock to discuss the Report stage.
That shows how keen, committed and professional they are, so I thank
them all very much for what they have done. I thank the Committee,
Mr. Gale and you, Mr. Benton. I do not think that
there is any more to be
said.
The
Chairman:
On behalf of Mr. Gale and myself, I
express our thanks to the Minister, the Opposition spokesmen and all
members of the Committee for the courtesy and co-operation that has
been extended to us at all times. I have particularly enjoyed the
Committee, because housing is a great love of mine. The Minister has
mentioned visiting my constituency, where we have a huge housing market
renewal project, and it was a delight to have him there on that day.
The Committee has been full of interest, and I compliment all of its
members on their input and wish the Bill
success.
On behalf of
Mr. Gale and myself, I extend our thanks to the learned
Clerk, who has performed excellently, the official staff, the
Doorkeepers and the police who have made the Committee so
effective.
Question
put and agreed
to.
Bill, as
amended, to be reported.
Committee rose at eight
minutes past Ten
oclock.
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