Government and opposition officials agreed to push ahead with the Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act in the final hours before Parliament shuts down for the General Election on July 4. Leaseholds are a form of home ownership that gives the householders the right to live in a property for a fixed number of years but can also mean having to pay service charges to the freeholder, who owns the land. The Act aims to make it cheaper and easier for more people to extend their lease, buy their freehold and take over management of their building, although campaigners warned it did not go far enough.
As the parliamentary session entered the process known as the “wash-up”, the Government had to concede that not all aspects of its intended reforms could progress. In February, MPs urged the Government to go further to restrict ground rents for existing leases and end forfeiture, with housing minister Lee Rowley pointing to ongoing consultations. Speaking on Friday at report stage, Labour frontbencher Lord Kennedy of Southwark said of the legislation: “This is far, far short of what was promised .
.. and the Government should be ashamed of the fact, the way it has behaved over the last few years, and behaved over this Bill, making promise after promise after promise, and delivering very, very little.
” Conservative whip Lord Gascoigne replied: “This is a good Bill as it stands, the Government wants to see it through.” Intervening, Lord Kennedy pushed the minister to confirm whethe.
