Petitions Committee

For item 2 on today's agenda, we move to our first evidence session on P-06-1307, 'The Welsh Government should commit to the adoption of the maintenance of new housing estates by local authorities'. We're very pleased to be able to have Hefin David, the Member of the Senedd for Caerphilly, in front of us today. Hefin, we invited you to come to our committee to talk to this petition; you are a noted campaigner within what's quite a tricky area, and it's certainly on devolution's jagged edge, if you like. We're aware you proposed a Bill to the Senedd back in 2018, so we wanted to use this as a scoping exercise to see what the issues are and how they can be tackled. If I start off with my first question to you, perhaps you could update the committee on how you first became aware of the issues that we face, and also, maybe, cite some examples of the particular work that you've done as the Member of the Senedd for Caerphilly.

Thank you, Chair, and thank you to the committee for giving me this unique opportunity to sit on the other side of the fence and answer questions, rather than ask them. I really appreciate the opportunity to do so. I've been campaigning on this issue since 2016, since I was first elected, when residents raised with me the fact that they were paying council tax and estate management charges for the upkeep of their estate. I know Rhys as well has raised it in the Senedd Chamber, and other Members, I'm sure, have these places in their constituencies.

It was residents in Cwm Calon in Ystrad Mynach who raised it with me. Funnily enough, we've just had a liaison committee with Redrow and Caerphilly council this afternoon to go through some of the issues that are ongoing there, which have been ongoing for many, many years. So, that was when I first got involved. There are about 600 houses in Cwm Calon that are affected. There are two other estates in my constituency: there's Cefn Mably, which is just on the border with Newport, which is a gated-type community of only 40 to 50 houses, and there is another estate that has just been built in Hendredenny, which we opposed. We didn't want it built, we thought it was in the wrong place, but it's built now. That's a Redrow estate of about 200 plus houses, and they'll have estate management charges on those.

The three processes are managed quite differently. In Cwm Calon in Ystrad Mynach, it's an estate management company that was appointed by Redrow when the estate was built 15 or so years ago, perhaps a bit more than that, called Meadfleet. Redrow and Meadfleet's relationship is not good, and Meadfleet are responsible for the upkeep of parts of the green areas of the estate. In Cefn Mably, it's actually the residents themselves who run the management process. It's a lot easier when there are only 40 or 50 houses. A lot of those people are directly engaged in that kind of work as well, so they appoint their own people to do the upkeep. The other one is Hendredenny, which is now going through the process of appointing the management company, or has appointed the management company, but they weren't able to tell me today who the company was, so I do need to look into that. I'm expecting people to be starting to raise concerns with me personally. I wouldn't recommend buying a house on an estate that has estate management charges.

Just to go back to the work that I did, we raised it with the Welsh Government in the previous Senedd term, and the Welsh Government did a call for evidence as a result of that, which I think you've probably got in your evidence packs, 'Estate management charges on housing developments: call for evidence'. The summary section, just as a background to this issue, is really instructive. It says, and I didn't know this until the evidence was done:

'Collectively, the 4 management companies who responded manage a total of 164 housing estates in Wales incorporating more than 11,000 properties. One management company indicated plans for the future management of 24 new estates incorporating 4,000 properties'.

So, it's a growing problem. But the interesting thing from residents who responded was that

'72% of respondents indicated their properties were built between 2010 and 2020. Only 1 respondent’s property was built before 2000.'

So, this is a new issue that is growing; I think that's what's demonstrated by this. If you want a reason of political motivation for what's happening, I'll draw your attention to Barnet council back in 2009. They started talking about EasyJet councils, where you pay the basic council tax and then any additional services you pay on top. I don't think it's any coincidence that this kind of process began around the time—. Joel, I apologise, I'm not being critical politically, but it was the time of the incoming Conservative Government in 2010 that these things—and Lib Dems—started taking off. I do feel that this was part of the political culture of the time. It's worth noting that Barnet have just decided to end that outsourcing of services this year. So, it is an issue that is about 10 years old and is growing.

Thank you for that, Hefin. You’ve raised some good points for us to consider as a committee, perhaps away from this meeting. I’ll bring in Joel James now.

I'm happy to take a political challenge on some of the things I’ve said.

Oh, yes. Thanks, Chair. Apologies, I’m full up with cold, so I’m speaking quite croakily, I suppose. Like Rhys, I’ve got experience of this within my ward from when I was a counsellor. There’s an estate there, built within the timescales that you said, and that’s caused a few issues there. I note that the petition is asking for the local authorities just to adopt them, straight up adopt them, but in the report that you highlighted, the Minister at the time said it’s just not as simple as that. I was just wondering what your view on that is, and what other solutions there are. Because from my experience, the difficulty is that everyone who lives on that estate has entered into a legal agreement to pay that fee. Everyone would then have to come out of that legal agreement. With the estate in my ward, the council have said, ‘We will adopt it, but we want in excess of £100,000 from you to do that, because of the circumstances.’ I just wanted to get your views on that, really.

I think it’s absolutely right that there are these complications. I think it’s what economists call 'opportunity costs of action', politicians call 'unintended consequences', and people see as unfairness. That’s the whole issue around it. The key problem with taking retrospective action—so that means looking back at what has been taken over by estate management companies and getting local authorities to adopt retrospectively—is that you’re going to be unloading a load of local authorities in Wales with extra cost that they didn’t budget for and hadn’t seen coming. So, if we said—how many did I say—the extra 11,000 properties, 164 housing estates, that’s going to be a lot of money that local authorities will have to find, and that is a challenge. It's probably unfair to expect local authorities to take that burden on retrospectively.

The other issue, of course, is that many housing companies, particularly the smaller ones, would not be operating any more. So, the commuted sums that would be required, which the developers would pay the local authorities to take on, might not be available. Because there should be a commuted sum involved. That wouldn’t be around any more. And even where there are larger companies like Redrow, they would have already passed them to estate management companies who are not going to be willing to dispose of an asset that they’re making money from.

So, retrospective action is really, really difficult. In fact, there was a petition that was given to the UK Government in 2018, and that was very similar to this petition, except a bit stronger. That petition was to 'Require local authorities to adopt all Public Open Space and roads on estates'. The UK Government responded that they were minded to look into this as an issue, and they have, and they’ve got a Bill coming up that I’m sure we’ll discuss. But this is what the UK Government said:

‘A requirement on local authorities to adopt public open spaces on private estates would constitute a significant new burden and arrangements already exist to provide for upkeep in a way that can be tailored to the nature of individual developments.'

So, the UK Government is not minded to look at that respectively, nor proactively in the future either. There was quite an interesting statement in the letter from the Minister to you, though, about this petition. This petition, the one that came to you, was actually not quite as strong. It said:

'with the current cost of living crisis we believe that the Welsh Government should support residents on estates like The Mill by encouraging and facilitating the adoption of maintenance by local authorities and to remove these punitive charges.'

It doesn't go as far as that earlier petition. Perhaps they've looked at that and have seen what the response was. There was an interesting response from the Minister in the letter of 1 November to you as a committee, though, in which the Minister said—. I'd better look at the letter to make sure I get the wording right; what did I do with the letter? Here it is. The Minister said that she's going to consider bringing legislation forward, and this will include

Thank you, Hefin. Joel, any further follow-ups?

No, that's it.

I'll come back to that.

Yes, I'm happy to. Rhys ab Owen.

Diolch yn fawr, Cadeirydd. You'll be aware, Hefin, that the UK Government are proposing to deal with a second phase of legislation later this year. What's your view on that second phase of legislation?

That legislation actually looks pretty interesting. It doesn't do what the petitioners have been asking for. It's not doing that, it's not requiring the adoption of open space. What the legislation is doing is looking at the second-order issue, which is the big issue people are facing, and that's the management of estate companies. At the moment, it's a wild west. If we wanted to, as a committee, we could get together—. We'd probably have to resign from politics first, but we could get together and set up an estate management company and we could run it on an estate, just do that. And I think surely there should be some form of regulation, some form of standard that needs to be met before these companies operate. What's often happening is that people in the know, who used to work for developers, are starting these companies and going and making money from it because they know that's easier money than working for a developer.

The UK Government wants to introduce a right for freeholders to apply to a tribunal where they feel the fees are unfair. That doesn't exist currently. The UK Government also intend—and this is the one that really does make a big difference—to repeal section 121 of the Law of Property Act 1925 to ensure homeowners are not subjected to unfair possession orders as a consequence of unpaid estate charges. That is significant, because I'm getting people showing me county court judgments they've received because they've refused to pay their fees. What the UK Government plans to do is remove that right from estate management companies to impose against properties. Because at the moment, you can't sell your property if you haven't paid your fees, and you're likely to have a county court judgment against you if you refuse to pay your fees. That's terrifying for residents. This would remove that, which I think would be really significant and welcome.

The other problem, of course, is that there's no cap on fees. Estate management companies can charge you whatever they want. I said to Meadfleet—. I've got to say that Meadfleet are not a good example of an estate management company. They refused to engage with our community group; they took themselves off in a huff when I complained about them on ITV news. They're a very, very poor organisation. They are refusing to—. I was having a go at them now and I've lost my train of thought. The issue is that they can charge whatever they want. When I said in a meeting to Meadfleet, with them at the one community association they attended, that we planned to cap the charges, they said, 'In that case, we'll just raise our fees to whatever the cap is. So, if you cap it at £300, we'll raise all our fees to £300; if you cap it at £500, we'll raise all our fees to £500. We'll just do that', from the average, which in the petition is between around £150 and £200 at the moment. So, that's the attitude of estate management companies if you cap the fees. I think they need controlling, they need greater regulation, and that wild west is a problem.

Just to come back to you on that point, did the experience you're talking about there with Meadfleet—? The committee may be minded to speak to some of these companies afterwards and ask direct questions to them—

Yes, if they're willing to speak to you.

—and we can make that point.

The better ones should.

The experience you were talking about, did that happen, did your committee cap fees, or not?

No, it would be the Government that would be introducing the legislation to cap the fees. At the moment, there is no recognised cap, so the Government would have to introduce the law to do it. But, also, the other thing that the estate management companies can do is, where they're charging fees on estates, they can move the charges from other parts of their portfolio. So, you're paying for your grass to be cut in Cwm Calon, but if they're making a loss elsewhere or they've got overhead charges from another estate, they can charge it across their portfolio. It doesn't have to relate to the work that's being done on your estate. That's a massive issue. So, you could be living on one estate and paying for another, effectively.

Sorry, Rhys.

Of course, I agree that greater regulation of management companies is very important, but, really, isn't the real issue the fact that we have management companies in the first place, and we shouldn't? Leasehold was a massive problem in Cardiff in the 1970s, and across the United Kingdom. We thought we'd dealt with it, and now with the figures you're quoting to us—the huge increase since 2010—things are only going to get worse, and things are only going to get worse for residents. So, looking at the letter that you quoted earlier from the Minister about proposed reforms from Welsh Government, the truth is that they don't go far enough.

The Minister quotes what Tirion does in the Mill estate—empty bins, flood defences, park—but the truth is, you go a two-minute walk from the Mill estate and there's the Sanatorium park estate, which was built 10 years earlier, but has been adopted by the council. So, the bins there, the park there, the grass there, are all cut by the council. And in the Mill, of course, they pay the same amount of council tax as the Sanatorium gardens residents do. So, do you agree with me that the proposals by Welsh Government don't go far enough? I appreciate that there will be difficulties with doing it retrospectively, but the truth is that, (1) we need to stop it, and (2) we've got to look at it retrospectively.

Let's answer that in two parts. The unfairness—absolutely right. There is absolutely unfairness in this and it's recognised across the community, and every community that comes to you—almost every community, not every community—will come to you about unfairness in the differences in charges. But the problem, I think—. It's easy for us to say, and as a campaigner, I would find it easy to say, 'Do it retrospectively—do it,' but there will be those unintended consequences that could impact on other services because of the costs involved. I'm not a Minister, I haven't got civil service with me, but I would certainly expect civil service—that's their job—to identify those unintended consequences, and they will be consequences for very real pressured revenue support grants and council taxes. And it could be a knock-on effect that you see council taxes increasing as a result of these kinds of policies. You could say that's fairer; you could say it's fairer that council tax goes up so everybody pays and you abolish fees, but I just think that the extent is so unknown that it is very difficult for a Minister to say to you, 'Yes, I'm willing to commit that budget.' And they have committed budgets already, for adoption, as well—that needs to be said.

The consequences are known insofar as that, probably, the only issue would be greater pressure on the local authority. What other unintended consequences did you foresee?

If you think of what would normally happen, it's that you would have a commuted sum for a local authority to take on a piece of open space. So, you've got a green space of land on an estate, a local authority would be paid by the developer a commuted sum, which is worked out using a formula, there's always wrangling over it, but you get there in the end—nine times out of 10, you get there in the end—and they take it on. The problem is that those commuted sums almost certainly are not going to be available any more, because it's tracing who the landowner is, whether the landowner wishes to sell, and as I said earlier, those estate management companies may not want to sell in the first place, which is very difficult. Are you going to introduce compulsory purchase orders into this? The contracts are already locked in with residents; in Cwm Calon, they signed the contracts when they bought the houses, and the contracts move with the houses, so you'd have to unlock all of that. I think Joel mentioned that earlier. There's a whole host of issues that are not as simple as giving local authorities the money to take on the green land, and I think unpicking all of that diverts your attention from solving the longer term issue. You'd be trying to solve the issue of the past whilst not focusing on the real growing problem in the future, and I think that that is where the battle needs to be won now, is in the future.

I think capping fees would really help people in the Mill. Capping fees would help people in Cwm Calon. I think having access to a tribunal. One of the things that we've found, which I think should be enacted in legislation, is the requirement that developers, estate management companies, Welsh Water—whoever—are required to attend regular meetings with community associations so that they can explain themselves. We've managed to do this voluntarily, but Meadfleet, the estate management company. refused to attend, as was said. There are ways of engaging that can manage those fees. But I think, just going back and retrospectively abolishing them sounds good, and it's something I would get up and say in the Chamber, but if I was a Minister, and I'm sure the committee's glad I'm not, I'd be reluctant to go there because of the scary level of costs that would be involved.

Of course, for a lot of the difficulties you mention, a piece of primary legislation would cut through that straight away, wouldn't it, but let's not go down that route. I just wanted to briefly tap into—

It would still be subject to judicial review.

Well, not if it's—. Well, yes, I'm sure the UK Parliament could do it far easier than here.

I just want to mention a comment you made following on from Joel's comment about signing contracts, and the suggestion being that residents knew what they were doing.

Well, they—

The truth is, you know as well as I do, from speaking to residents, they have no idea what they were signing up to. And how many of us have to—even me as a lawyer—sign things that we haven't properly read? Or, maybe, if I had read it—and people do read it and people don't understand it—. We all know how difficult it is to get solicitors and afford solicitors at the moment. But, that is true. I just don't want that to go unchallenged in a way: that people know exactly what they're doing when they're signing it. We have met, well, I've certainly met and I'm sure that you have also, lots of people who say, 'I had no idea that I was signing up to all these costs'.

I hope I'm covered by parliamentary privilege here today, because I think that they were missold in Cwm Calon. I think they were missold. So, people didn't know what they were signing up for when they were sold this, because this was in the early days; this was before any committee or parliament, or anyone, or council had even discussed estate management charges. They had no idea, and there are questions about what they signed. Now, it comes back all the time to 'Well, your solicitors should have advised you' is the response people are getting, and it's not really good enough.

So, yes, I think there's an issue of misselling. Now, that's not devolved to us, but, responsibility for looking into that is a UK Government responsibility. I would like to think that Government would be interested at some point in looking at the misselling of these; I think they were missold in the early days. I don't think they are so much any more, because there's more awareness of what it involves, and at Hendredenny, people should be aware, to say now, 'If you're looking to buy a house in Hendredenny, be aware of this before you start engaging with the developer'.

But, the other thing is, even if they weren't missold, sometimes, you only find out about it after you've sunk a load of fees on searches and solicitors. So, you've spent three or four grand on solicitors and searches and at that point, they say, 'Oh, by the way, there's an estate management charge'. Now, either you give up on what might be your dream house—I hesitate to use that word for Redrow housing—and you're losing all those sunk costs. You're losing three or four grand, and you say, 'Well, I might as well. If it's £100 a month, I might as well just sign for the fees'. So, you are caught between a rock and a hard place as a buyer, and in this market, the buyer does not have the power, which Conservative, or Labour, or Plaid Cymru or Lib Dem can agree that that is unfair. I think there's a fundamental issue at that point, which needs to be addressed.

There is that issue of misselling. Again, it isn't about solving the problem for the future, because I don't think that misselling is going on so much any more, because solicitors are more aware. But I do think that it is an issue that's retrospectively a problem.

Diolch, Hefin. Diolch, Cadeirydd.

Thank you, both. Luke Fletcher.

Diolch, Cadeirydd. Rhys picked up on the very point that I was going to raise, which is that I don't think people do understand what they're going into. And, exactly as you've said, when you've already sunk in a couple of grand, are you really going to pull out and lose that couple of grand when it's already taken you ages to save up for the deposit in the first place?

Yes.

But, you touched on the allocated budgets that are already there for adoption, and I'd be interested in learning a bit more about that, in the sense of how effective they have been. Because I imagine with the unintended consequences that we've touched on, you could pick up on—albeit on a smaller scale—what some of those unintended consequences could be, and those estates that have been adopted.

Well, they've had—. In the estates that, in the past, have had the areas adopted, it's not an issue any more, because you wouldn't need an estate management company. The unintended consequences we've explored, I think, in quite a lot of depth there, but the Welsh Government did give money to local authorities specifically for—and this was mentioned by Caerphilly council and Welsh Government in their letter, and Caerphilly council mentioned it to me today—specifically for adopting unadopted roads, because that was the big thing that we used to talk about a lot. We still do. But this would require more money again, and that's the issue here; you're adding money on top of money to chase those unadopted estates.

Now, what I would like to look at is what the Minister said about the duty on local authorities in future—. The words she used were,

'placing a duty on local authorities to adopt communal infrastructure in return for an appropriate payment from the developer'.

Placing a duty—the key word is 'duty.' Now, that's what Julie James is suggesting in her letter. If you take the word 'duty' out, and just say 'local authorities to adopt communal infrastructure in return for an appropriate payment from the developer', that's what happens already. Now, that's what happens. Where local authorities choose to engage and prefer to engage with developers and adopt green spaces and roads, then a commuted sum is paid. The problem with the process is that you've got to negotiate the commuted sum, which requires a formula first, and then agree with the developer what the commuted sum is—how much the developer is going to pay the council to take on the land. And then you've got to make sure, before they pay that commuted sum, whether that land is to an adoptable standard. And a lot of the green spaces—it's all right, this does actually come back to unintended consequences—are not of an adoptable standard. Now, we, as politicians, cannot instruct experts on what adoptable standards are. We can give guidance through a technical advice note, or through engagement with experts, but on the basis that an individual makes a decision, it's the planning and highways experts who make those decisions about adoptable standards, not politicians. I think that's important, because you wouldn't expect us to take on a clinicians role, as we heard through the pandemic.

So, there remains a sticking point there, because commuted sums and adoptable standards—those debates can go on forever. I imagine you've all got unadopted roads in your regions and constituencies. That is because of the problem of agreeing commuted sums and agreeing adoptable standards. It applies exactly to green spaces. So, if the Minister said, 'Our duty is for the local government to take on those green spaces, with agreement of the commuted sum', that doesn't necessarily mean that it's going to work if the duty is not very strong. So, it's just carrying on doing what you're doing. If the duty is too strong, if it says, 'Local authorities must take on these communal spaces for a commuted sum and you've got to agree it quickly', you could end up with local authorities taking on substandard green areas that costs them a fortune to upkeep, and that money comes from the revenue support grant. So, it creates more problems in that case than it solves. If I was the Minister, I'd be asking my civil servants, 'What's the right duty? Where does the duty sit?' If you on the committee wanted to investigate that, I think that would be the question to ask: 'What do you mean, Minister, by 'duty'? Where does that duty sit?' Ask people who give evidence, 'What do you think a duty should be?' Because I think that is one of the fundamental powers the Welsh Government seems to have and is willing to use that the UK Government isn't.

I won't go too much into the duty element of it. I think we'll have to ask that question—

I don't know. I don't know.

I'd agree. I think it's important to understand exactly what that duty means.

But that's a fundamental line in her letter. That's a really important line in her letter, and I don't think you can underestimate how important that is, because it wouldn't be in a letter from a UK Government Minister.

If I could touch on, as well—. Moving away from this element and looking at residents who are currently in these unadopted areas. I think in the same letter—I might be wrong—but in the same letter, the Minister suggested that new powers to challenge charges should be left to a UK Bill. And, granted, of course, that UK Bill is a lot further along the line than we are here, but does that concern you in any way at all?

Not now, but, as the Chair said at the beginning of the meeting, I introduced my Member's legislative proposal in 2018. I didn't realise it was as far back as that. Time passes fast and we get old quickly, but I thought 2018 was the right time to act. We did get the consultation out of that. So, this was directly as a result of that Member's legislative proposal. Rebecca Evans was the Minister at the time and she agreed to undertake it, and it was with a view to taking action. I think the length of time it took—so, it was 30 April 2020 was when responses were given in by, and then we had the pandemic, so, everything went on hold. I remember chasing this; it was the one issue that I focused on a little bit during the pandemic other than the pandemic. It was that strong issue that did come up.

I think if we're going to give the Government some leeway—I suppose as a Labour Member, I should—the pandemic would have slowed them down, but I would have liked to have seen action taken faster between 2018 and 2021, really. But now that ship has sailed, things have moved on. UK Government are saying that they're going to act in the same way that the Welsh Government would have and could have. So, really, now, it's fair enough to wait for that. The danger is, if Welsh Government act now in parallel with UK Government, they could come up with two completely different things, one of which works and one of which doesn't, and you've got a bit of a lottery going on. So, perhaps it is better to wait now, and then, if we're being reasonable, we could blame the pandemic for the delay.

I suppose by letting the UK Government plough on with it, we can learn from their mistakes.

Yes. There we are. That's a good argument against independence. [Laughter.]

I don't think we're going to cover that now, but—[Laughter.]

Never knowingly uncontroversial. [Laughter.]

But I would say—. I would say that the UK Government are not going to do all the things that a Welsh Government would do, and that is on ideological grounds. The reason Barnet Council abandoned outsourcing is because Labour won the authority in 2022. So, there is an ideological issue here, and I'm not being critical about that, we've two different perspectives, and I think, if you've got a Conservative Government, they're unlikely to take a duty action, whereas a Labour Government would. So, the things that the UK Government will do to regulate, the Welsh Government would do, but I would like to see the Welsh Government go a bit further later, and that's where that thing comes back to duty and what they intend to do with that. I think the Welsh Government could probably do more because they'd be more inclined to do more if they're pushed—if you push them.

Diolch yn fawr, Gadeirydd.

Thank you, both. A good exchange there. We'll fly over to the Rhondda—Buffy Williams.

Thank you, Chair. Thank you for joining us this afternoon. I think you've touched on my question quite a few times over the last 20 minutes, but I'm going to ask it anyway. Is the petitioner's suggestion that local authorities should adopt all communal areas on these estates a practical one? Welsh Government seems keener on giving freeholders rights to challenge unreasonable charges.

Yes, I think, if you were to speak to your constituents on an estate with estate management charges, the first thing they would say would be, 'We want to get rid of these charges and we want the local authority to take over this land.' And there are ways locally of trying to get through some of that. We have, through our liaison committee, the Cwm Calon Community Association, we have got Redrow and Caerphilly County Borough Council talking so that Redrow are now not going to hand over as much land to Meadfleet as they were intending, although the relationship between Redrow and Meadfleet has broken down irreparably, actually, so that helps. But Caerphilly council have also said, 'Well, we will take it on for a commuted sum', and we pushed them to negotiate a commuted sum. So, you can do things locally that probably wouldn't work on a national scale.

So, coming back to the Mill, if there are areas that are not yet adopted and were intended to go to estate management, you may be able, as a good regional constituency Senedd Member, to engage with them and get that done locally. The problem comes in when you try a blanket approach, because of all those things that we've already talked about. So, I would urge any Member of the Senedd to work across party, work with your regional colleagues in the constituency, try and get those liaison committees established—they should be there by law, but they're not—get them established, get the people around the table and try and get those commuted sums paid to the local authorities to take them on. But whether it's feasible to do it on an all-Wales basis through legislation—. I think it just brings in all those things that I said to Rhys and said to Joel and to Luke. I'd love to be able to say 'yes', but the real world just comes in and gets in the way, you know.

But there are all these things. Let's not forget there are all these things that can still be done: you can regulate that wild west; you can stop groups of people just setting up estate management companies; you can have a tribunal; you can cap fees; you can make liaison compulsory. So, there's a whole load of things you can still do that will help people who are suffering today with these problems and prevent them from getting worse in the future. So, there are still things you can do, but the big thing comes back to, if you want the headline, 'What is that duty going to be?'

Thank you.

Thank you, Buffy. Yes, certainly, Joel James.

Thank you, Chair. I just wanted to come back, really, in terms of the retrospective adoption. I know, again, from my own experience, it was only the one estate in my ward, and it was a relatively mixed bag. There were some there that said, 'I don't like the idea of paying this service charge. There isn't a cap, so it's different every year', but then there are others then who say, 'Well, I quite like living on this estate. We have a nice park. When we report problems, they get fixed straight away. I just don't like paying the same level of council tax as everyone else.' So, do you think an easy solution is that they would then just get a council tax discount rather than—?

No. No, that's not going to work. We did look at that. First of all, the council tax discount wouldn't be given to individuals, it would be done through a rebate scheme through a resident-run estate management group claiming for a rebate against the costs that they are paying out. So, what would have to happen would be that all residents would agree that the cost would be paid to whoever's doing the work—the grass cutters, whoever it is—and then, against that, you offset against council tax. The problem is, every single resident would have to agree it and then you'd have to bid for it and then you'd have to share that money out yourselves, so it becomes a very, very complex thing to do. And the irony is that the people who would probably be most able to do that would be people living in very, very large houses in very, very small estates who run their own—you know, Cefn Mably, perhaps. It wouldn't be the middle and lower income householders who would be able to do that.

So, I just don't think it's practical. You can't just give a council tax rebate because you've got estate management charges; there's a whole load of things you've got to do to demonstrate that that money is being paid and offset, so it would be a huge challenge to do it. We've certainly pushed it; I've certainly asked in the Chamber for it, and residents have asked me to do it, but we've had that honest conversation with each other. I think the most important thing you can do as a Senedd Member is speak honestly with residents and say, 'Yes, I've tried this, but this is the honest answer'; the same with the retrospective application.

Okay. Thank you, Joel. Hefin, the committee appreciates your honesty with us today. I think it's been very helpful. You've given a clear indication as to what does duty look like, and that's something for the committee to consider later on, in our private session, about where we take this. Before we give you the opportunity to perhaps says anything else, what I would like to know is: where do you see the committee's work going? We have an indication of people we could speak to—you've mentioned estate management companies—the Welsh Local Government Association, housebuilders themselves and obviously residents. What do you see, if the committee is minded to do further work—you can't preempt any decision the committee will take—what does that look like to you?

Yes, as I've said, your first port of call, I think, is—. The first terms of reference you want to look at is what is meant by

'placing a duty on local authorities to adopt communal infrastructure in return for an appropriate payment from the developer.'

I think that's a fundamental question that has been put in that letter and is a significant policy development. So, I think we need to know more about that, and I would really welcome it if you'd pursue that. And then, beneath that, I think it is looking at those fundamental things that are going to make a difference to the lives of people in these communities. So, you are looking at, then, what are the consequences of capping fees, what are the consequences of tribunals, what are the consequences of having liaison committees established as statutory bodies, that kind of thing. Could you do that? I'd be really interested in that.

And then, finally, if you want to talk about the people you interview, I found that the National Residential Landlords Association, particularly Douglas Haig, were really helpful in giving me advice on some of these things, and I found them really, really good early on, to help me understand the basics to get where I am now. They keep an eye on these things because they can have landlords who are subject to the same charges, and they are interested and engaged with these things. You said the 'housing developers'. One thing I'd say: don't forget that, on the whole, it's the larger developers that seem to be the ones—. I say 'seem', because I don't know for certain, but it seems to be the larger developers, the Redrows and the Persimmons, that are introducing these charges. I've even heard that Persimmon tried to persuade local authorities that it is the best way to go, through estate management charges; the smaller ones don't seem to be doing it. So, Llanmoor Homes have told me they wouldn't do it, but they are building smaller states with fewer green areas—perhaps that could be the reason. But I would speak to the smaller ones as well as the big ones, the WLGA, and I would really recommend that you speak to an active community group that are based on an estate. I could not recommend more highly the Cwm Calon Community Association and also the—. I've spoken to Alun Davies as well about this, because he's got a Redrow estate, I think it's in Ebbw Vale, I'm not sure, but he's actually found some loopholes there. So, it might be worth speaking to the members of the community group there too.

That's very useful and we'll certainly consider—

It's not one of those sexy visits to Brussels, but you could end up going to a housing estate in Ebbw Vale to meet residents and talk to them about what's happening there and see some of the green spaces. You're welcome to come to Ystrad Mynach and have a look at Cwm Calon. I can even show you around—I can walk you around and show you the green spaces; you can see for yourself how those 600 houses are affected.

Thank you for that lovely invitation. As I say, we can't preempt—the committee will go into private session later on to discuss where we will take this inquiry or piece of work, if we decide to do so, but we'll certainly consider that. I think you are right—it is important to speak to small and large companies. I do have, in my own constituency, small house builders, if you like, building smaller estates, who do introduce these charges. I think it's clear from Members today, if not everybody who represents members of the public in this place, that they certainly know someone—if they don't directly represent them, they certainly know someone who's been affected by this.

Before we wrap up today's session with Hefin, any further questions from Members? No. Hefin, an opportunity for you to delight us with your knowledge in this area once again.

All right. The reason I know things about it is because I've been engaged with this for the last six years, and I'm involved with it day to day with residents. So, there's nothing better than getting your hands dirty and finding out what's going on in your regions and constituencies. But I really feel that—. If I was sitting there on the side where Rhys and Luke and Joel are sitting, I'd be disappointed in myself with some of the answers I gave today, because I'm not saying, 'Yes, we will sort this out, we will abolish fees.' I'd love to be able to say that, but you've got to be practical about what can be done in the current really, really straitened financial circumstances we're in. So, I hope that some of the ideas I've put forward today might be a very real practical step in trying to resolve this issue and trying to make life fairer for those people who are living on those estates, paying council tax and fees for the upkeep of their areas.

Well, again, we appreciate your honesty—I think it's always good to have honest sessions, with those practical outcomes, and of course we'll take those into consideration. We've covered a lot, I think, and a lot of useful information from yourself, Hefin. I will wrap this part of the evidence session up now, before we move on to item 3 on today's agenda. There will be a record of proceedings, as you'll be aware from the normal standard procedures of committee—review it. Of course, we're here if there's any further information, following today's session, if you want to follow up with the clerks afterwards—that would be more than useful to us. And we'll engage further with you about the next steps that we may take—

I'd be more than happy to come back, at any time, if you'd find it useful.

It's been a really good session. Can I thank you again for taking the time out of your schedule, and, again, commend the work you've been doing since 2016? It's been clear, not only to us as a committee, but to others out there as well, so, diolch yn fawr.

Thank you.