---

Leaseholders' Rights Bill

With the leave of the House, may I congratulate the Minister on her mammoth speech, even though it was deeply unhelpful? The people affected by the problems that we have discussed are public sector leaseholders, who have come to me, to the hon. Members for Hendon (Mr. Dismore), for Brent, North (Barry Gardiner), and for North Southwark and Bermondsey (Simon Hughes), and, interestingly, to the hon. Member for Dunfermline and West Fife (Willie Rennie)—[Interruption.] Not Renfrewshire; I know about Renfrewshire. It is on the other side of the country. Of course, unless the law has changed in Scotland, there is no leaseholding law there. However, I congratulate the hon. Member for Dunfermline and West Fife on doing a noble job with regard to a very unfamiliar situation. I thank my hon. Friend and colleague the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill). All of us have public sector leaseholders in our constituency who have consistently complained for years, after the 2002 Act just as much as before it, about the deficiencies in their input into the homes in which they live. The right hon. Lady tried nobly to defend the current system. Although I appreciate enormously her offer to brief the Minister for Housing and to write to me about various matters, she and the Department must understand that the situation for public sector leaseholders is deeply unsatisfactory. At some point legislation will have to be introduced, possibly much more extensive than my Bill, which I readily acknowledge is defective, to give those leaseholders a fair crack of the whip in the management of their own homes. Those who read the debate or may have been listening to it will be desperately concerned that the right hon. Lady thinks there is a fair balance at present. They know well that that is not the case. As there is a certain eagerness to get on to other private Members' Bills, I shall not seek to divide the House. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion. Motion, by leave, withdrawn.