Short thoughts on the Labour amendment on Monday:

One of the key impacts of this is an attempt to make the govt face up to the fact that its rhetoric of the last few years (leaseholders shouldn't pay) doesn't match its actions (leaseholders are paying, will pay more) https://twitter.com/LabourSJ/status/1354737967902896129

Rhetoric has changed recently to protecting residents from "unaffordable costs" (prob due to the loans plan), but it has still allowed a position to continue where ministers talk about protecting leaseholders but don't protect them. This forces that contradiction into the open.

The Parliamentary maths mean there is unlikely to be a defeat on this or the Conservative backbench amendment yet, but that's not really the aim. Hope is Tory MPs getting a lot of heat from constituents won't enjoy being whipped against this amendment and will ask for changes

So really it's a tool to turn up pressure on ministers and force backbenchers into the uncomfortable place of nailing their colours to the government mast rather than hiding behind statements that leaseholders shouldn't pay

Imagine govt argument against amendment will be this bill isn't the right vehicle. To which the response should be, which is? Without legislative change leaseholders will pay - either through loans or just being billed. There is no other plan coming.

An aside - one thing I'm particularly pleased to see is that the amendment contains calls to prioritise buildings according to risk, as it's clear to me that this is the critical failure from which many others flow.