Too many leaseholders will fall through the cracks of the
Government’s “piecemeal measures” to protect leaseholders from
the costs of building safety remediation, says the cross-party
Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (LUHC) Committee in a
report published today.
The Committee’s Building Safety: Remediation and Funding report
responds to the plans outlined by , Secretary of State of
Levelling Up, Housing and Communities in his announcement to the
House of Commons on 10 January.
The report features a series of recommendations for Government,
including calls to:
- Scrap the proposed cap on non-cladding costs for leaseholders
- Implement a Comprehensive Building Safety Fund to cover the
costs of remediating all building safety defects on any buildings
of any height where the original “polluter” cannot be traced
- Compensate leaseholders for costs already paid out, including
for interim measures and for rises in insurance premiums
- Require all relevant parties who played a role in the
building safety crisis to contribute to funds for remediation
- Ensure the Affordable Homes Programme is protected at its
current level and that social housing tenants do not pay the
price through costs or diversion of funds away from maintaining
their homes or other vital services .
Chair's comment
, Chair of the Levelling Up,
Housing and Communities (LUHC) Committee, said: “Leaseholders
should not be paying a penny to rectify faults not of their doing
in order to make their homes safe. Nearly five years after the
tragic Grenfell fire, it is shameful this situation is yet to be
properly resolved. While we welcome Michael Gove’s commitment to
fixing these issues, we are concerned there are gaps in the
Secretary of State’s proposals which risk leaving leaseholders to
pick up the bill.
“Leaseholders are no more to blame for non-cladding defects than
they are for faulty cladding on homes they bought in good faith.
The Government should bring forward a Comprehensive Building
Safety Fund, or upgrade their existing funding plans, to ensure
that the costs of remediating all building safety defects on
buildings where the original ‘polluter’ cannot be traced are
covered and that leaseholders are also compensated for costs they
have already paid out.
“The Government should be looking beyond developers and
manufacturers to contribute to the costs of fixing the building
safety crisis. We recommend the Government identify all relevant
parties who played a role in this crisis, such as product
suppliers, installers, contractors and sub-contractors, and
legally require them to pay towards fixing individual faults and
ensure that they also contribute to collective funding for
building safety remediation. Insurers should also be required to
contribute to funds for remediation.
“The Government needs to stop pitting the building safety crisis
against the housing crisis. Social renters shouldn’t be bearing
the impact of putting building safety right – the Government
needs to act to ensure the tenants of social housing are
protected from the costs of remediation. Residents of social
housing are currently paying the price through the diversion of
funds from maintaining their homes and other vital services
provided by housing associations and councils. The Government
should also come forward with a cast-iron guarantee that the
Affordable Homes Programme is protected at its current level in
the event that the Government fails in its bid to secure
sufficient funds from industry.”
The report disagrees with the Government that only buy-to-let
landlords with one other property should be included in the
statutory protections for leaseholders, arguing there are other
options to exclude wealthy property tycoons without making
landlords of more modest means liable, and calls on the
Government to publish an impact assessment before undertaking
action.
The LUHC Committee’s report highlights the ongoing uncertainty
around building safety and its significant impact on the housing
market and makes several recommendations relating to the EWS1
process and the introduction of the broader, lengthier PAS 9980
process. The report also recommends that it should be the
Building Safety Regulator, and not building owners, that decides
whether a building needs a fire risk assessment and that the
regulator should also set the standard that a building needs to
meet.
