A new research report on the regulation of letting agents has been published, and placed in the House of Commons library.
The report, by Wendy Wilson and Catherine Fairbairn, points out that there is no statutory regulator of private letting or managing agents in England, and no requirement for them to belong to a trade association.
The Westminster government has also said that it does not intend to introduce regulation on the grounds that it would involve too much red tape. The previous Labour government did, however, propose full mandatory regulation of letting and managing agents.
The report says that growth in the private rented sector means there is increasing attention being paid to lack of regulation in the private rented sector, and that it is the focus of a current CLG select committee.
The report is intended to provide factual, unbiased information to MPs. It covers no new ground but would be useful reading for anyone wanting to be brought up to speed on the debate over the regulation of the lettings industry.
http://www.parliament.uk/briefing-papers/SN06000
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Comments
No one will read this, but you are absolutely right. It seems that anyone can set up something called an Ombudsman - sounds impressive but, actually, utterly meaningless. That is unless you are a Statutory Ombudsman who reports to Parliament. Curiously the property industry has got one of those, but for reasons best known to the politicians and their civil servants, he predominantly only currently deals with public sector housing disputes.
About time there was some joined up thinking really?
Don't bother with that research it reads like a naive A level essay by a pair of schoolgirls. The only bit that is missing is the phase 'we fink'
The Property Ombudsman is nothing more than a commercial service supplier of redress. The authors of the report have failed to understand that RICS have a redress scheme which is not TPO, NALS "their own regulating body" uses a different redress scheme supplier.
If this represents the depth of knowledge and understanding of our industry it explains why government will not regulate the industry. It is not a matter of too much red tape it is the case that they are ignorant of the facts but in a position of such authority they can not be challenged.
What a shame that when Government changes there is not wholesale change in the civil servants that support them.
If ever there were an opportunity for Ian Potter to stand up and represent our profession it is right now.