Norma Cohen
@NormaCohen3
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PhD from QMUL 2020. Research on WWI finance. Ex-FT Demography Correspondent.Honorary actuary. [email protected] Follows #economics #pensions, #population.
London, England
Joined January 2012
Why are Labour hiding their bright light under a blanket? After an overwhelming victory over deep-pocketed Freeholders in the High Court, the government is failing to celebrate by pressing ahead with Leasehold reform. Have Labour lost the plot and forgotten their promises?
Labour won big at the High Court. Why are they hiding it? writes @HarryScoffin
https://t.co/jiE6ivGoir
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Are you a football fan? Then surely you know what an ‘Own Goal’ is. This Labour government is working on its ‘Own Goal’ on leasehold reform. Despite a spectacular defeat in the High Court for wealthy Freeholders, Labour are silent on the topic and refusing to advance the law.
THROWING AWAY THE TOURNAMENT 🏆 This @UKLabour government isn’t scoring many goals. @Keir_Starmer is unpopular. So why haven’t they been promoting their massive High Court victory against the freeholder lobby of 2 weeks ago? A win for millions. Yet we get silence! Suss.
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Land law can never be as exciting as football. But the overwhelming victory of the Labour government in seeing off a legal challenge by wealthy Freeholders IS to be celebrated. So why is Labour mute on this victory? Will it abandon its pledge to scrap leasehold for Commonhold?
THROWING AWAY THE TOURNAMENT 🏆 This @UKLabour government isn’t scoring many goals. @Keir_Starmer is unpopular. So why haven’t they been promoting their massive High Court victory against the freeholder lobby of 2 weeks ago? A win for millions. Yet we get silence! Suss.
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Is it possible to imagine a group LESS deserving of government financial help than this one? Full Disclosure: I am among the women affected by the rise in women’s’ SPA. What a waste of scarce resources this would be.
bbc.co.uk
Pensions Secretary Pat McFadden says that the rethink does not mean that payouts will necessarily follow.
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In appointing blame for the collapse in demand for new-build flats, one factor must be the legal minefield that surrounds those who buy leasehold. No sensible buyer would touch a leasehold flat without a share of the freehold or at least the right to appoint the managing agent.
@NormaCohen3 10/11/225 Negotiator/Molior: Collapse in London newbuilds. Sales have fallen to record lows as affordability crisis, red tape, cladding/safety rules & tax changes bite. London new home sales down 30% 2024-25. May 2025 only 19 new flats sold in London. https://t.co/rRFy15kFG5
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The legal minefield that Leasehold has become is now a barrier to younger folk hoping to get a foot on the housing ladder. Buying a flat had once been a first step for first time buyers. Their refusal to buy leasehold -for all the right reasons- is gumming up the housing market.
Even developers can’t sell leaseholds - just 19 in London in May, where affordability is worst. So much for @SteveReed’s “Build, Baby, Build”! @UKLabour must abolish the toxic leasehold and fleecehold regimes to put money back in people’s pockets and revive the housing market.
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The legal quagmire that Leasehold has become - leasehold flats now can’t be sold at prices even equal to what occupiers paid - is freezing up the entire UK housing market. Building more houses is only part of the answer. Scrapping Leasehold is a key first step.!
Even developers can’t sell leaseholds - just 19 in London in May, where affordability is worst. So much for @SteveReed’s “Build, Baby, Build”! @UKLabour must abolish the toxic leasehold and fleecehold regimes to put money back in people’s pockets and revive the housing market.
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Legislation in 2024 was designed expressly to prevent this type of demand from prospective freehold investors holding leaseholders to ransom. Why no mention of this?
Weird @MHCLG comment in this piece. A lawyer hoovers up freeholds to people’s homes for £375 a piece and now demands £25,000 to £50,000 to be bought out. Why no mention of the enfranchisement reforms in the 2024 Act? You’ve just won the judicial review!
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This comment, intended as a defence of the Freeholder/Leaseholder law, shows how easily the system is abused. Define ‘Reasonable’. You can’t. It’s too vague. And how many leaseholders have the time & money to take Freeholders to Tribunal? Very few. Time to trash the system.
@NormaCohen3 @simonmaginn Freeholders can’t just slap on any service charge. By law (LTA 1985 s19), charges must be reasonable and you have the right to inspect accounts or take it to tribunal. Know your rights!
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Great chart showing insurers actively buying out corporate Defined Benefit pension schemes, taking liabilities onto their own books. The insurers most active recently are those screaming loudest against ‘Peppercorn’ ground rents. They buy these to hedge.
linkedin.com
Lex says pension scheme sponsors win. I’m not so sure. I see a win, win, win. Today’s FT Lex argues that pension schemes get the better deal when transferring their liabilities, suggesting that...
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These ‘Institutional Investors’ are NOT pension funds. They are the insurance companies who are making big profits by buying out the assets and liabilities of employer Defined Benefit schemes. They knew exactly what they were buying and the risks these posed.
But @hmtreasury didn’t get the memo. Shameful that @RachelReevesMP and her colleagues are allowing officials to humour the freeholder lobby to scupper a @UKLabour manifesto commitment. Trying to kill a major pro-growth reform that will block a mass shift to commonhold!
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This statement is just plain wrong. Ask any Leaseholder who has watched their service charges double or triple in the years since they ‘bought’ their flat. Freeholders are under no requirement to get value for money in service charges. But the law says they can demand anything.
@NormaCohen3 Freeholders are not able to demand unlimited money. Only the money that was agreed to be paid by the leaseholder when the contract with them was signed.
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Potent message here; the housing shortage will not be solved by ‘Build, Baby, Build’ alone. @UKLabour needs to make flats ownership legally safe. It’s not now! End Leasehold now!
We met Alia, a leaseholder, today. @UKLabour may have support from client media and front groups, but they’re making themselves politically vulnerable. Organising an economy around structurally high housing costs, rent-seeking and precarity will lead to backlash. More soon!
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Given the overwhelming legal judgement in the High Court which backed government’s right to curb Freeholder excesses, it’s a bit puzzling why Starmer’s government isn’t moving quickly to write those curbs into law. And why is LBC almost the only media outlet covering this story?
CALLING @Keir_Starmer, CAMPAIGNER AT HEART You saved men from the gallows. You’re now pushing through the Hillsborough Law. Now’s your time to tackle another injustice: leasehold. It’s pro-growth. Smash the blockers and @hmtreasury. Free the 5.3 million. You need this win!
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The sensible and fair High Court judgement backing government efforts to curb the confiscatory powers of Freeholders is welcomed. Now we look forward to speedy passage of a comprehensive Leasehold reform bill that scraps leasehold altogether.
insidehousing.co.uk
The government has welcomed a judicial review of the leasehold act after freeholders lost their argument that the legislation undermines their human rights.
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A respected pensions expert explains why failure to curb Freeholders’ ability to extract unlimited cash from occupiers is itself a ‘pensions scandal’. Hopefully @Keir_Starmer is listening!
henrytapper.com
I have received a message from my friend Harry Scoffin, a young man who spoke at Pension PlayPen on rapacious behaviour of freeholders to leaseholders. Here’s what young Harry has sent me Thi…
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Whinging, deep-pocketed Freeholders are claiming that efforts to limit their ability to demand cash from occupiers will cost them ££billions. Nonsense! The political risks of buying residential property have been known for decades. They made investments with eyes wide open.
With sky-high housing costs and the IMF inflation warning, Starmer and Reed must outsmart a Treasury captured by corporate lobbyists and short-term thinking to deliver radical pro-growth reform, crushing leasehold greedflation by peppercorning ground rent.
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Deep-pocketed Freeholders like to claim that pensioners - Grandma and Granddad - are the ones most harmed by efforts to limit their own ability to demand unlimited cash from occupiers. Utter nonsense! The facts are that <1% of pension assets are invested in residential property.
With sky-high housing costs and the IMF inflation warning, Starmer and Reed must outsmart a Treasury captured by corporate lobbyists and short-term thinking to deliver radical pro-growth reform, crushing leasehold greedflation by peppercorning ground rent.
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Interviewed on LBC, Lord @michaelgove says the High Court verdict slamming Freeholders legal challenge to legislation aimed at curbing their powers to extort cash from occupiers is ‘a vindication’ of efforts to stand up for Leaseholders rights. @FreeLeasehlders
.@michaelgove, who spearheaded the Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act 2024, gives government a thumbs-up on its High Court JR win against the freeholder lobby last week. Surprising @UKLabour isn’t making more of this victory. Lord Gove has done more media on it than any minister!
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There has been a recent victory of common sense and fairness in the High Court. It slammed down Freeholders efforts aimed to crush legislation restricting their ability to extract cash from leaseholders. Now government needs to move with speed to get the bill passed.!
A pro-growth govt would use this High Court win to cut housing costs and put cash back in people’s pockets by fast-tracking reforms to phase out extractive freeholders and end leasehold. Mass shift to commonhold. Smash the blockers. Revive flats market. https://t.co/IkdAHB6c6A
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