I’ve made no secret of the housing challenge facing Woking – or my determination to find solutions. My casework team and I handle numerous housing-related issues every week from residents right across the constituency.

From high rents to rising mortgage costs, damp, mould or a lack of available housing, there are a huge number of different challenges that need resolving. I’m working hard to find solutions as one of 11 MPs that sit on the Housing, Communities and Local Government Select Committee.

Select committees are one of Parliament's most powerful tools – they enable genuine cross-party scrutiny of Government departments, bills and policy. They play a vital role in improving legislation.

Over the past few months, I've been part of the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee's investigation into the Government's draft Commonhold and Leasehold Reform Bill.

It’s a piece of legislation aimed at ending the historic "feudal" system of homeownership – and it does make a significant step towards giving leasehold homeowners greater control of their buildings.

Unfortunately, in its current form it does less to protect leaseholders than serve as an explanation of why this Government is barely holding on. The Government must go further and faster because, in its current form, the bill fails to deliver on the promises Labour made in their manifesto.

That’s appalling, which is why my committee has recommended a series of changes to ensure it deliverers what the public was promised – they include:

Bringing the Government's proposed ground rent cap of £250 into force by late 2027, with the 40-year transitional period for zero ground rent cut to 20 years.

Property management agents must be properly regulated, and the Law Commission's recommendations to strengthen leaseholders' rights enacted in full.

Commonhold should become the default tenure, the Land Registry modernised, and the Government must urgently clarify the position on shared ownership and voting rights.

Here in Woking, our call to introduce an independent regulator for property management agents is particularly relevant. Residents have told me first-hand of management agents who have clearly failed to deliver acceptable levels of service.

I speak with many leaseholders who are concerned that without urgent reform, they will be trapped in homes with rising costs that won’t be able to sell. If the Government take our recommendations on board, I believe it this piece of legislation will go a long way to solving this problem.

Successive governments have failed to tackle the unfair leasehold system, cap ground rents, and put homeowners in control of the management of their buildings.

Too many people in Woking constituency (and across the country) have worked hard to get on the property ladder only to see their homeownership dream turn into a living nightmare because of the unfair leasehold system.

It’s time for change. That’s why I was proud to put my name to a report that provides a blueprint to deliver it. I will continue to hold the Government to account and push them to live up their manifesto pledges.

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