RICS has Government by the Short and Curleys

Posted on 25 May 2007 by Ray Boulger

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When asked at Wednesday morning’s lobby briefing if the Government was confident of meeting the revised 1 August HIPs deadline, in view of the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) saying there should be a 12 week consultation period on the shelf life of an energy performance certificate (EPC), the PMOS (Prime Minister’s Official Spokesman) completely ducked the question with the excuse that he did not want to give a running commentary on discussions with RICS as that was a matter for the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) and RICS. However, he added what was important was to recognise that there were increased numbers of inspectors being trained and accredited, and so he was obviously prepared to try to deflect the actual question by answering one that wasn’t asked.

As reported in my previous post RICS has not abandoned its judicial review but merely accepted a stay of execution. If the Government doesn't meet the requirements for the stay of execution, now that a judge has said that the Government does have a case to answer, RICS can simply insist that the full case be heard, which will no doubt take months rather than weeks. THUS IT SEEMS TO ME RICS HAS THE GOVERNMENT BY THE SHORT AND CURLEYS. How incompetent do you have to be to get yourself in that position?

Following the new requirement that only properties with at least 4 bedrooms will need a HIP, Ministers have admitted there is no legal definition of what constitutes a four-bedroom house or larger property. This has led to many comments about properties being marketed with, say, 3 bedrooms and a study / box room / playroom / etc. It will not contravene the Property Misdescriptions Act 1991 to describe a property as having less bedrooms than it does. No doubt when that Act was drafted the Government of the day did not anticipate a future Government might produce such inept legislation that estate agents would find a marketing benefit in under describing a property.

In the unlikely event that the new 1 August start date for HIPs is met all properties with more than 3 bedroom put on the market after that date could be advertised as having 3 bedrooms and, say, 2 HIP replacement rooms. It would be helpful for purchasers and others if The National Association of Estate Agents recommended using standard terminology such as this and I am sure they will have no difficulty advising prospective purchasers that these rooms would be suitable for bedrooms should they choose to use them for that purpose! Websites like Primelocation and Rightmove will need to amend their terminology so that people can search for properties with x number of “bedrooms and HIP replacement rooms.” 

A letter on the Telegraph online letters page from Andy Blandford took an interestingly line and asked: “Since HIPs will be required initially for four-bedroom houses, after years of describing box rooms and cupboards in the attic as bedrooms, are we to be treated to estate agents reducing the bedroom-count of houses by resorting to blatant honesty?”

Another climb down this week by the Government is that sellers will no longer have to wait for any part of the HIP to be completed before marketing their property provided they have ordered one. Previously the EPC had to be in place before marketing could commence, although the legal documentation such as the searches didn’t. As a result I emailed some questions to DCLG ('homeinfopacks@communities.gsi.gov.uk') on Wednesday evening, including:

“If a sale is agreed prior to the HIP being completed, and therefore by definition the purchaser has decided to proceed without seeing the HIP, will the seller still have to complete the HIP?
"If so why, as the purpose of the legislation is to provide purchasers with additional information, which in these circumstances the purchaser has clearly decided is not important enough to defer a decision on the purchase.”

When I get a reply I will share it with you.

The Government is required by Brussels to introduce EPCs by 1 January 2009 (they will cost about £100) but the decision to gold plate them with all the HIP requirements was taken by our Government. As an EU Commissioner said recently "if you want to be in the gold plating business you should be a jeweler or a dentist, not in government or a regulator."

Tony Blair backed his Ministers and insisted that the Government would press on with HIPs but noticeably Gordon Brown kept quiet (nothing new there then when there is a problem to avoid). When Gordon takes over as Prime Minister in just over a month the Government will have a very convenient opportunity to get shot of the rest of HIPs apart from the EPC.

Gordon will of course reshuffle his cabinet and as she has made such a mess of HIPs no doubt Yvette Cooper will be promoted. (The original Minister responsible for HIPs, John Prescott, will have conveniently left the stage by then.) Whoever the new Housing Minister is will of course have to carry out an urgent policy review and no doubt HIPs will be top of the agenda. New Minister – new policies. The new Housing Minister will have about a month from being appointed to announce that he/she has decided after a detailed review (certainly no longer any need for consultation) to scrap everything required for a HIP except the EPC. No doubt DCLG are already working out how best to spin this as a triumph for simplification rather than the humiliation it will be!

Category: HIPs

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