29th
Jan 2014
The campaign that started late last year to take the companies on that for no reason at all unfairly increased tracker rates to a new high, has at last reached parliamentary ears.
Landlord Mark Alexander who started the campaign, met up with two MP's in Westminster, Jason McCarthy MP for Colne Valley and David Morris MP and aide Andre Walker.
McCarthy has always been very positive and supportive of the campaign, Alexander's meeting with Morris and Walker lasted a full 90 minutes with the discussion fully focussed on the issue of tracker rate hikes and how it has severely impacted on many thousands of landlords.
The campaign is gaining support from more and more MP's with over 20 expressing their dissatisfaction with the increases. They are trying to do their best to help their constituents who have been badly affected by the actions of both the Bank of Ireland and the West Bromwich building society.
Two MP's have already called for a debate to held in the House of Commons. One MP said:"Campaigners have been lobbying their MPs over the last few months and much support has been pledged.
It has come to light that despite many MP's personally writing to the CEO of the West Bromwich, the only form of reply that was received back basically said that the rate increases were legal and required to fund other parts of their business that were suffering badly.
Alexander wrote on a landlords' website “Senior banking barristers and an eminent banking QC have poured over the terms and conditions and believe what these lenders are doing to increase their profits is an illegal breach of contracts. In both cases the terms of the mortgage offer letters contractually and legally take precedent over conditions specified in the lenders mortgage conditions booklets which are generic to fixed, standard variable and tracker rate mortgages. It is terms in the more generic booklet that West Brom and Bank of Ireland are ‘hanging their hat on’ in respect of their hikes to the margins being charged to their borrowers over the Bank of England base rate.”
Solicitor Justin Selig has lodged over £100,000 received from the campaign group which will cover the cost to begin the legal action. This money will not be enough if the case go to appeal.
Mark Alexander and David Morris MP have already drafted an "Early Day Motion" which the MP has submitted and will be shortly made available for the public
If more MP's support the "Early Day Motion" then there is every chance that it will be brought up for debate in the Commons and the possibility of the motion being passed,.
Mark Alexander said :"There is a lot more to be done on our side too. I need all campaign members, whether directly affected or not, to contact your MP again and to ask them to add their support to Early Day Motion number 976,
“I strongly recommend following up any electronic correspondence with a telephone call because MPs are bombarded with thousands of email every day and they can very easily be overlooked.”
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