James Naish

Park Home Owners

I will press on and see where we get to. I will not go into detail about many key issues facing park and mobile home owners—I am sure colleagues will touch on them, as they have already started to—but I want to mention, up front, some key items that are common across all sites. The first is maintenance and site standards. Site residents frequently report poor upkeep, damaged roads, drainage issues and neglected communal areas, despite continuing to pay high fees directly to the site owners. One

Park Home Owners

I beg to move, That this House has considered Government support for park home owners. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Sir Alec. I am grateful to the Backbench Business Committee for granting this debate. I want to acknowledge the turnout, which is pretty impressive, given that we were voting so late last night. I hope it demonstrates to the Minister how passionate people are about this topic. I am proud to represent six park home sites. In Rushcliffe, as in many constituencies r

Park Home Owners

Absolutely. I am sure that we will talk a lot about the 10% sales commission, but the hon. Member is right to raise it early on. I am pleased that the Minister leading on the reforms is here. I am sure that he will be listening closely to what Members have to say today. Wherever they are located, mobile home sites are great places to live. They are radically different from the stereotypes of so-called trailer parks from the 1970s and ’80s. Among other things, they offer independence, security an

Park Home Owners

Yes, and I will talk about that in a moment. There has been cross-party consensus on the need to make changes, but it will fall to this Government to make them. I am pleased that in advance of this debate, we saw that move from the Government, and I trust that there will be proper, meaningful change in due course.

Park Home Owners

The hon. Lady is absolutely right. I will talk later about the different reasons that have been given for the 10% commission, which demonstrate in and of themselves that nobody is sure what it is for. It is a hangover from a past era.

Park Home Owners

I trust that the Minister and his team will do exactly that. This is not just about the 10% sales commission; there are broader issues impacting park home residents. I will come on to those matters shortly. Let me say two important things. First, mobile homes can be a very good housing option. They typically offer people a smaller, more manageable home in an attractive, close-knit community. The quality of mobile homes has improved considerably over recent years; the sites are often now home to

Park Home Owners

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The consultation is being run for a reason. I encourage anyone watching the debate or emailing their MPs about it to go further and engage with the consultation, because I am sure that the Minister is looking forward to review those responses.

Park Home Owners

Thank you, Sir Alec. I will press on, but the hon. Member is absolutely right and has touched on some issues that I will talk about. I congratulate him on ensuring his residents got their money back. Most concerning, and often alluded to by MPs, is the imbalance of power. A park home resident may own the home they live in, but they are not in control of the land beneath or around it, and they often have a very limited say in related decisions. When the same person or entity controls the site, th

Park Home Owners

I thank hon. Members for joining the debate. We have covered the whole country—from the south coast all the way up to parts of northern England and to Northern Ireland, which of course has slightly different legislative foundations—and I am really pleased there has been such strong representation. I thank the Minister for outlining the timeline on the commitment towards the end of the year, and for providing clarity to park home owners. Three things have come up repeatedly: the security that par

Local Area Energy Plans

I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to place a duty on local authorities in England to produce and maintain local area energy plans; to make provision about the content of those plans and limitations on that content; and for connected purposes. I am proud that before coming to this place I worked in the energy sector. At SSE I led large industry change programmes, such as faster switching, and at Northern Powergrid I led the customer engagement workstream for its ED2 business p

Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill

From October 2024 onwards, I did my best to engage fully and properly with the assisted dying debate that took place across England and Wales. I met campaigners on both sides of the debate in my constituency, and did my best to explain my conclusions to constituents at all times. Today I am presenting a petition signed by residents who tracked me down in the pouring rain while I was door-knocking in Keyworth a few weeks ago, such was their commitment to this cause. They wanted me to know that wh

Court and Tribunal Transcripts

Clearly, we are talking about having access to accurate court transcripts. I have been contacted by a couple of constituents who work as registered public service interpreters. They feel that the current system is very patchy and that the quality of interpretation services is not good enough. Indeed, someone can still act as an interpreter in the system without professional or vocational training. Does the hon. Member agree that we must raise standards and ensure that there is a strong supply of

Rail Connections to London: Rural Towns

I am sorry for intervening on my hon. Friend, but as my constituency neighbour, I am sure she will understand why I do so. Many of her constituents use East Midlands Parkway station in my constituency to get down to London, and we are fortunate to have that direct line, but it is not electrified, which means that it is not the quickest line and it creates pollution. The procurement of the next phase of the midland main line electrification was delayed by the 2024 general election and then the sp

Rail Connections to London: Rural Towns

I just need to reinforce the point that my hon. Friend makes, because the east midlands already receives the lowest level of transport spending per head of any UK region or nation—just 56% of the UK average. Although I do not want to undermine the campaign of my hon. Friend the Member for Shrewsbury (Julia Buckley), which is extremely important and which I support, would my hon. Friend agree that the east midlands in particular has to be looked at, because places such as his constituency and min