HMO legislation- slow progress?
1st March 2009
It is almost two years now since I introduced a ‘ten-minute rule Bill’ into the House of Commons to make the changes in planning law that would enable local authorities to ensure that proper planning arrangements would have to be made if a house were to be purchased and rented out to a number of unrelated people (an ‘HMO’).
The present position is only a partial improvement on what went before. Larger HMOs must now be licenced by the Local Authority, and they can apply for special arrangements to licence all HMOs. This, though, only works for existing houses, and only if the Local Authority actually wants to go the extra mile in introducing universal licencing, which Southampton City Council, at present seems not to want to do. Being able to have a say in what happens to a house when it is purchased, and in effect its use is completely changed still doesn’t exist in planning law, and urgently needs changing.
‘Ten minute’ rule bills in Parliament unfortunately never become law; but they are a good way of bringing an issue to Parliament’s and the Government’s attention. I think the bill succeeded in that respect. Subsequently there have been not one, but two reports commissioned by the Government on the problems of, and possible solutions for, areas with high numbers of HMOs, and a promise, early last year of consultations on mechanisms to change the law. One of the reports made very specific recommendations on how the law could be changed, and it is this that I understand will be the basis for consultation, and hopefully, then new legislation.
Of course the Bill I put forward, the follow up correspondence and the subsequent meetings with Ministers (most recently before Christmas last year) has just been a part of the pressure to move the issue on. There has been a subsequent debate in the House on HMOs led by Andrew Smith the Oxford MP, in which I participated; and the National HMO lobby, in which the Highfield Residents Association plays a very active role, has been important in keeping attention concentrated.
So where is the ‘consultation’? I have been told that it is shortly to emerge, but it is proceeding far slower than I would have liked. I have recently put down some questions aiming to get a clear date established, in addition to the unofficial assurances that it is on its way. It is good that the focus still remains on how to change the law to better control HMOs rather than whether to. I hope to have news on this in the very near future. I will of course keep HRA posted!
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Originally published in the Highfield Residents Association Newsletter