Housing and Regeneration Act 2008

The core proposals within the Act are:

1.  The setting up of the new Homes & Communities Agency with a national role as the investment vehicle for social housing and regeneration.

2.  The abolition of the Urban Regeneration Agency and Commission for the New Towns (the bodies that together constitute English Partnerships).

3.  The establishment of a new regulator, the Tenant Services Authority, and a new regulatory framework.

4.  The revoking of the system of ‘registered social landlords’ created by Part 1 of the Housing Act 1996 in respect of England (that system still continues to operate in Wales).

The CML gave oral evidence to members of the Bill committee and briefed certain individuals (such as the Conservative housing spokesman). The CML met with officials from the current regulator, the Housing Corporation, and from government (Communities and Local Government department) on a regular basis to argue strongly for the need for assurance of stability and robustness in terms of regulation. The existence of regulation has in the past been the key element in a risk/return equation for lenders that allows funding at highly competitive rates and this is increasingly important going forward against the backdrop of wider market conditions and growing development activity of housing associations.

Amendments made to the Act in response to CML concerns:

• an obligation has been placed on the Secretary of State to consult lenders when considering new regulatory standards and/or directions;
• if compensation is offered to HA tenants the financial impact on the viability of the HA concerned will first be considered;
• the new Homes and Communities Agency (HCA) will not be able to recover grant from a housing association during a moratorium;
• the expansion of the fundamental objectives of the new regulator to include the promotion of availability of private finance to encourage investment in social housing;
• arrangements to deal with practical issues that arose during the recent HA insolvency (Ujima) including:
  
  
  • a power for the new regulator to appoint an interim manager to manage the affairs of the HA whilst proposals are being developed and agreed.
  • the length of the moratorium is changed to 28 working days.
  • the proposals made during a moratorium cannot mean that a preferential debt is paid in anything other than priority to a non preferential debt.
  • only those secured creditors who can be identified using reasonable efforts will receive notices and be contacted to check agreement (although further amendment needs to take place to qualify this).
  • the powers of the manager have been widened to give authority to effect an amalgamation as well as a transfer of engagement under IPSA 1965.
    
• on transfer of land the Bill now states that the price of transfer assets should be not less than that certified by the district valuer as the amount the property would fetch if sold by a willing seller to a non profit registered provider;
• removal of the need for a pre-warning notice in advance of an enforcement notice; and
• amendments to the clause concerning the powers of the HCA to direct the recipient of assistance to 'apply or appropriate for such purposes as the HCA may specify' making sure that this can only be to the purposes of the provider and therefore avoid leaving secured lenders unprotected.

Next steps

The Bill received Royal Assent on 22 July 2008 and the Housing & Regeneration Act 2008 is now in place.  CML will continue to work with government, the TSA and HCA as new regulatory regime, various protocols and standards are developed as part of the implementation of the Act.  For information on the Bills' programme through Parliament, please see our bill tracker page.