Ombudsman Services:Property - "Changes for the better." (434)

To the Business Secretary:
For Clarity - Attempt 434.

434) Ombudsman Services:Property - "Changes for the better."

Dear Mr Javid,
T
he 2014-15 slimmed down OS:Property Annual Report has a section where it talks about, "Changes for the better," and in which the consumer is told that;
"Ahead of the legislative change, we worked closely with leading property organisations to input into a best practice code for the private rental industry. The Code, developed at the request of DCLG and facilitated by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS)  , was intended to put pressure on landlords to perform better in areas such as repair and maintenance, terminating tenancies and honesty when advertising properties."

Back in 2013, The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) through its, "engagement work" and "political influencing" got your predecessor at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS), Vince Cable, to "fix" the letting market. Their;
"RICS Member Briefing - lobbying Vince Cable to fix the letting industry.... to urge him to accept a new clause in the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Bill," painted a grim picture of a clear potential;
"for rogue lettings agents to cash in on the current rental boom due to a combination of consumers' low expectations and a total lack of effective regulation."

Like us, the RICS have a campaign. Theirs is to;
"raise standards across the rental sector."

Ours is for a public inquiry into the RICS and its very own total lack of effective regulation of its very own Members and (Un)Regulated Firms. We want to raise standards across the surveying sector.
Why are rogues who can't or won't regulate their own rogue traders but who manipulate legislation to regulate rogue traders elsewhere allowed to get away with it. If you're going to be hypocritical then be totally hypocritical and the RICS duly oblige. With truly nauseating, self indulgent indignation they tell the world and his dog how exasperated they are at having for so;
"long campaigned for reform of the letting agent sector - achieving better regulation of the sector and eliminating the, "cowboys."

But someone had to grit their teeth, roll up their sleeves and do it. How  public spirited and noble of them

Don't reach for the sick bucket quite yet as there's more of the same to come;
"There are too many corrupt agents who are taking advantage of the current gap in regulation, putting consumers at risk."

Putting consumers at risk!

This is pretty remarkable stuff coming from an organisation once described by the now defunct Consumer Focus as;
"having developed practices which do not work in the customer's interests."
Practices which have their origin in the RICS,
"apparent inability to adequately regulate their Members or Regulated Firms."

Alan Bennett - unlike the RICS - gets it right first time when he says England is better than all the rest at hypocrisy.

Unable to facilitate the adequate regulation of their own members - we and Christopher Hamer seem to be the only people asking why this been allowed to happen - they were, however, able input a best practice code for the private rental sector at the behest of the DCLG (Department for Communities) which is why we copy these emails to The Rt. Hon Greg Clarke who Chairs the Committee.

We've long and patiently campaigned for reform of the private surveying sector and have even asked for Parliamentary accreditation so that we - like the RICS- can;
"undertake a great deal of influencing  work - both publically and behind the scenes - to drive home the need for change to Government and policy makers."

"Drive home the need for change" and "change for the better," it seems that the RICS are writing the OS:Property script - and why not, it is their private redress company after all.

For some inexplicable reason our passes have yet to arrive.

Q. Mr Javid, could we please have our passes so that we might level the playing field and do some behind the scenes influencing work of our own to drive home the need to change Government policy and input a best practice code for the private surveying sector?

Here's a brief history of influencing and engagement work:
- In the time we've been campaigning for a public inquiry into the workings of OS:Property and the role of the RICS, the RICS have been criticised by one branch of Government, Consumer Focus, for its failure to adequately regulate its Members and Regulated Firms.

- That section of Government was then promptly closed down.

-  Another Government Department the OFT, who approved and monitored the RICS "appointed" scheme then informed us that even more questions would be asked by BMG Research than were asked by DJS Research so that the OFT could continue to monitor the effectiveness of the scheme they'd approved on behalf of the taxpayer.

- We then discovered that this hasn't happened since DJS left in 2011. and that

- We then learnt that the OFT was itself shut down on April 1st 2014 and that all the time we've been writing to your Department, the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) to complain about the RICS and its "appointed" company the SOS (now rebranded as OS:Property) its maladministrators have been working behind the scenes with your Department and the Department for Communities and Local Government on inputting a best practice code for the letting sector and the interpretation and implementation of the EU Directive on Alternative Dispute Resolution or (ADR).

Q. Mr Javid, why are the RICS so incredibly successful at influencing Government Ministers, politicians and civil servants and yet so inept at regulating their Members and (Un)Regulated Firms and why are you Greg Clark working so closely with individuals who maladminister private redress but who are still at liberty to input codes of best practice in "civil liberty?"

We'd like to run this one up the flagpole and see if anyone salutes it:
Corrupt government officials are working behind the scenes with maladministrators to criminally exploit taxpayers and that conspiracy theorists now have a new theory to work on.

Yours sincerely,
Steve Gilbert - The Ombudsmans61percent Campaign.