Building Safety The Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing
and Communities (Michael Gove) With your permission, Madam Deputy
Speaker, I would like to update the House on the progress the
Government have made in securing commitments from developers to
remediate properties with building safety defects. Last year, the
major house builders signed a pledge to fix all the medium or
high-rise buildings that they had built or refurbished that were
unsafe. The developers...Request free
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Building
Safety
The Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities
()
With your permission, Madam Deputy Speaker, I would like to
update the House on the progress the Government have made in
securing commitments from developers to remediate properties with
building safety defects. Last year, the major house builders
signed a pledge to fix all the medium or high-rise buildings that
they had built or refurbished that were unsafe. The developers
also promised to reimburse the taxpayer for work already
undertaken at Government expense.
This Parliament has always been clear that those with ultimate
responsibility for those buildings should bear the cost of
remediation. Innocent leaseholders, who are neither responsible
for safety defects nor equipped with the resources to fix the
problem, should not be on the hook. Those who are responsible
must pay. We have worked with developers to draw up a contract
that gives direct effect to the pledge that they made. I was and
remain grateful to those developers who have been so keen to live
up to those obligations, and I am particularly grateful to
Stewart Baseley of the Home Builders Federation for his skilful
work in supporting the commitments made.
We published the legal contract on 30 January this year, and I
gave an initial cohort of developers six weeks to confirm that
they accepted the list of buildings for which they take
responsibility and then to sign the contract. That deadline
expired yesterday. I can confirm that 39 developers have signed
the contract. We have published a list of those developers on
gov.uk and hard copies of the list have been shared with the Vote
Office. By signing the contracts, those developers have committed
to fixing at least 1,100 buildings. They will invest more than £2
billion in that work—money saved for the taxpayer and invested in
giving leaseholders a brighter future. I thank those developers
for their hard work and co-operation in helping us to right the
wrongs of the past. They are making significant financial
commitments and I am grateful to them.
Leaseholders who have been waiting for work to be done to make
their building safe will quite rightly want that work to start
without delay. I know that those responsible developers who have
signed the contract understand that expectation and will be in
touch with leaseholders to set out the programme of expected
works as soon as possible. I take the opportunity once again to
apologise to those leaseholders and others who have waited so
long for this work to be done. While there is still much to do, I
hope today shows that their campaigning and that of so many hon.
Members has not been in vain. While the overwhelming majority of
major developers have signed, some regrettably have not.
Parliament has made clear what that means, and so have I. Those
companies will be out of the house building business in England
entirely unless and until they change their course. Next week I
will publish key features of our new responsible actors scheme, a
means of ensuring that only those committed to building safety
will be allowed to build in future.
Those developers who have been invited to sign the remediation
contract, but who have not agreed to live up to their
responsibilities, will not be eligible to join the responsible
actors scheme. They will not be able to commence new developments
in England or receive building control approval for work already
under way. The House should note that the companies invited to
sign the remediation contract who have not yet lived up to their
responsibilities are Abbey Developments, Avant, Ballymore,
Dandara, Emerson Group (Jones Homes), Galliard Homes, Inland
Homes, Lendlease, London Square, Rydon Homes and Telford
Homes.
While my officials remain in discussions with several who are
making progress towards signing, I am concerned that some
companies do not appreciate the grave nature of the
responsibility they bear. I hope the directors of those firms
will now exercise the same level of responsibility as the leaders
of the building industry. The reluctance so far of some companies
to sign up only underlines the need for the responsible actors
scheme. It will ensure that there are consequences for developers
who wish to be, at the moment, neither answerable nor
accountable.
I will take other steps to ensure that companies live up to their
responsibilities. I will be writing to major investors in those
firms to explain the commercial implications of their directors’
current decisions. I will write to local authorities and building
inspectors to explain that those developers’ projects may not be
started or signed off. I will notify public bodies to be prepared
to reopen tender award processes or rerun competitions. House
buyers will want to know what that means for them, and we will
formally set out the risks involved in purchasing homes from
companies that have chosen to ignore the prospect of
prohibitions.
I accept that the course of action that I have set out today is a
significant intervention in the market for any Government, but
the magnitude of the crisis that we faced and the depth of the
suffering for all those affected clearly justified a radical
approach. To their credit, the leaders of the development
industry have willingly accepted the need for action. The vast
majority of developers, as we should all appreciate, have made
undertakings to the British public to put right the wrongs of the
past. I am glad we can now work together with leaders in the
industry on making sure that we deliver more safe, affordable,
decent homes for the country.
As those developers have rightly argued, we in Government will
also do more to pursue freeholders who have yet to live up to
their responsibilities and construction product manufacturers,
who also bear heavy responsibility for unsafe buildings. I will
have more to say on that in the days and weeks to come. For the
many thousands of people whose lives have been blighted by the
failure properly to address building safety in the past, today’s
update brings us one more step closer to at last resolving the
issue, and for that reason I commend the statement to the
House.
2.36pm
(Wigan) (Lab)
I thank the Secretary of State for advance sight of his
statement. We want to see every developer sign the remediation
contract and urgently move to fix the unsafe buildings and free
leaseholders who have been trapped for too long. Throughout this
process, we have supported steps to speed that up and provide
support to leaseholders. In that spirit, I welcome the statement
and I do not doubt the Secretary of State’s sincerity in dealing
with this problem, nor the deeply held convictions on all sides
of the House.
However, I fear that the collective will of this House to see
that done is being damaged by what appears to be an increasingly
dysfunctional approach from the Government. Last week the
Secretary of State was on social media threatening major house
builders with a nationwide ban if they failed to sign up to the
contract within a matter of days. He is 100% right to say the
developers should pay, but it undermines his case when his own
Department had not even managed to send the contract to them.
That really matters, because until builders sign, leaseholder
groups remain in limbo. They need more than tough talk; they need
clarity and competence. For the 10 developers who signed the
initial pledge but not the contract, which as the Secretary of
State rightly says includes Galliard Homes, Ballymore
and—shamefully, given its role in Grenfell—Rydon Homes, will he
be using the powers at his disposal to designate the developers
who cannot be granted planning permission? Crucially, can he tell
us from when?
The Secretary of State is right to say this is a step forward,
but there are many more steps to go. Leaseholders need not
another deadline, but real action and hope on the horizon. Can he
spell out exactly what this action will mean for developments
that have already begun under those developers and that have
already received planning consent? Will he be using the powers at
his disposal to issue remediation orders to force them to fix
their buildings in the meantime? Can he also tell us whether the
39 who have signed the contract will be obliged to fix all
critical fire safety defects, as defined by the Building Safety
Act 2022, and what will happen if they do not? There is a gap
between the contract and the Act, and we need to make sure that
the cost of that gap is not borne by leaseholders.
The contract, the Secretary of State says, will cover over 1,000
buildings. Given that his own Department has estimated that there
are between 6,000 and 9,000 unsafe 11 to 18-metre buildings
alone, it clearly only deals with a fraction of the problem. How
does he plan to assist leaseholders in buildings with defects
that are outside the scope of the contract in getting them
remediated? Remediation remains painfully slow—something he knows
and has rightly acknowledged—but the contract stipulates only
that repairs and remediation must be carried out
“as soon as reasonably practicable”.
Again, I push him for hard timescales and deadlines.
On the issue of who is responsible, may I again ask the Secretary
of State why British house builders are being asked to pay, while
foreign developers and the companies that made the materials used
in affected buildings are still not? That is a basic question of
justice.
We should all be moving heaven and earth to right this wrong, yet
the House of Lords Committee that scrutinised amendments to the
Building Safety (Leaseholder Protections) (England) Regulations
2022 found that that instrument contained an unintentional
drafting error that excluded parent and sister companies from
being considered as associated with the landlord. That meant that
landlords could avoid the £2 million net worth threshold above
which they must not pass on to leaseholders costs for repairing
historical defects. Despite that error as a result of a mistake
at the Secretary of State’s Department, no compensation has been
forthcoming for leaseholders who have had to pay remediation
costs, and no plans are in place to alert those leaseholders to
the possibility of applying to a tribunal to seek cost recovery.
What is the Department doing to identify affected leaseholders
and inform them that an appeal route to recover costs is
available to them?
Finally, I say to the Secretary of State that there is, I think,
cross-party agreement now that this is not the only issue for
leaseholders. Leasehold is a feudal system that has no place in a
modern society. It is time that we ended—abolished—the scandal of
leasehold once and for all, and ended the misery for the far too
many people who are trapped in that feudal system. Labour
appreciates what he has done to move this desperate situation
forward, but it remains in his gift to fix it once and for all,
and we would fail in our duty if we did not take every
opportunity to urge him to do so.
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for the thoughtful and detailed
way in which she has responded to the announcement, and for the
support from her and colleagues across the House for the work
that we have undertaken.
The hon. Lady asks about contracts and the speed with which they
have been signed. Again, just to inform her and the House, we
ensured that developers were given a copy of the contract on 30
January, when it was published. A final version was sent to
developers with minor alterations on 21 February. The execution
version of the contract depended on the developers themselves
providing the Department with a list of affected buildings, so it
was the work of developers, not of the Department, that led to
the late signing of contracts, but I am grateful to all who have
now signed.
The hon. Lady asks about the responsible actors scheme, when it
will be implemented and the effect it will have. We will lay
details of the responsible actors scheme next week. I want to
allow some of the 11 who have not yet signed a little leeway to
ensure that they live up to their responsibilities. The letters
that I have written to the directors of the companies concerned
will, I think, help to concentrate their minds to ensure that
they have a chance to sign before we lay the responsible actors
scheme details next week.
The hon. Lady asks if the powers in the 2022 Act will be used for
those who will not have signed by that time. They absolutely
will. She asks if we will fix all critical features. All
life-critical features in medium and high-rise buildings will be
addressed by developers. It is the case that with buildings under
11 metres, there are some fire safety issues, but we have to look
at them case by case—some will be life-critical; some will not.
Our cladding safety scheme, which addresses mid-rise buildings
specifically—those between 11 and 18 metres—should, I hope, deal
with the delay, which she rightly points out, in dealing with the
fire safety issue for that crucial section of our housing
sector.
The hon. Lady makes the point about foreign developers and the
need to tackle them, and I quite agree with her. It is important
that we use all the tools in our power, and we are exploring
sanctions, criminal options and others. The one thing that I
would say is that there is one jurisdiction—not a foreign
jurisdiction but an adjacent one—where action has not been taken
to deal with some of those responsible, and that, of course, is
Wales. I ask her to work with me to ensure that the Welsh Labour
Government take appropriate steps to deal with the situation in
Wales. We stand ready to work with them and with all parties in
that regard.
The hon. Lady also asks about the need to abolish the invidious
and feudal system of leasehold. As someone who was born in
Scotland—mercifully, a country free from that system—I can say
only that this is one area where I hope that England at last
catches up with one part of the United Kingdom that is, in that
respect at least, more progressive.
(Worthing West) (Con)
I declare an interest in having a leasehold property—although I
have no problems with it—and I also have minor shares in some
building companies so that I can get at their boards when
necessary.
I thank the Secretary of State for his continuing work. May I
reinforce a question asked from the Labour Front Bench: how many
buildings beyond the 1,100 still need a way forward? Can we agree
that leaseholders and others want to know that their own homes
are safe and saleable? We know that the task is to find the
problems, fix them and pay for them.
I put it to the Secretary of State that the one group that seems
to be left out of this is that of the insurance companies who
covered the developers, the architects, the builders, the
component suppliers and, for that matter, those who did building
control. I believe that leaseholders’ potential claims need to be
put together, and that we need to get the insurance companies
round the table and say that the surplus money will come from
them, or else they can have expensive litigation backed by a
Government agency, which they will lose.
I am grateful to the Father of the House, who has been
indefatigable in his efforts on behalf of those affected by this
crisis and of leaseholders more broadly. I should say, for his
benefit and that of the House and the Opposition, that developers
will be updating leaseholders on progress towards remediation
quarterly on 31 January, 31 April, 31 July and 31 October each
year—that will be public accountability.
I should also say for the benefit of my hon. Friend and the House
that 96% of the most dangerous buildings—those with aluminium
composite material cladding—have either completed or started
remediation work. There are other high-rise buildings with other
forms of unsafe cladding—1,208 such buildings. They are in the
building safety fund. More than 350 of those buildings have now
been addressed, and more than £1.7 billion of Government money
has gone towards making those buildings safe. Progress, but not
at the pace that either of us would have liked. His point about
insurance companies is well made, and I will follow up
subsequently.
Madam Deputy Speaker ( )
I call the SNP spokesperson.
(Glasgow South West)
(SNP)
I thank the Secretary of State for advance sight of his
statement. I have a couple of quick questions.
On the developers who have not signed, the Secretary of State is
obviously talking about the situation in England. Does he intend
to share that information with the devolved Administrations?
Those companies may have interests in devolved areas.
What happens if a non-compliant building has defects that extend
beyond fire performance matters? Further defects are often
discovered only after the opening works have commenced and
cladding has been removed—I am thinking particularly of acoustic
and thermal non-compliance. Could the Secretary of State tell us
which independent bodies will manage the work to identify such
defects, and how will developers be held to account for them?
Finally, what is the Secretary of State’s plan when owners and/or
developers of non-compliant buildings cannot be traced?
We will certainly share information with the devolved
Administrations. As I mentioned briefly, we want to work with the
Welsh Government, and indeed with the Scottish Government, to
ensure that everyone is in a safe building and that businesses
that are not operating in accordance with their responsibilities
cannot wriggle out of their responsibilities. I look forward to
working with the new First Minister—whoever she is—in due course
to achieve progress.
On non-compliant buildings, the hon. Gentleman is certainly right
that, as we replace cladding, new faults are sometimes
identified. Developers have a responsibility to deal with those
if they were the original responsible actor. That brings me to
his third question. Where it is not a developer who takes
responsibility but a freeholder, our recovery strategy unit is
working to identify all the freeholders responsible. It is only
in the very last instance that leaseholders may be liable for
costs, and even then, they are firmly capped under legislation
that this House passed.
(Wokingham) (Con)
Given the shortage of capacity, what steps are the Government
taking to encourage more businesses and people to come forward to
provide good-quality building and construction work?
My right hon. Friend makes an important point. We need to ensure
that we have in the development sector, and indeed in the
building safety sector, a range of companies and actors
determined to do the right thing. Some of the changes that we are
making—to the national planning policy framework, for example,
and other steps that my right hon. Friend the Chancellor will
announce in due course—are designed to ensure that we have a
diverse and energetic private sector market helping consumers and
leaseholders.
Madam Deputy Speaker ( )
I call the Chair of the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities
Committee.
(Sheffield South East)
(Lab)
I thank the Secretary of State for his statement. Clearly, any
progress in this matter is welcome for the leaseholders who are
still sat there, wondering when something is going to happen to
their unsafe homes. The Under-Secretary of State for Levelling
Up, Housing and Communities, the hon. Member for North East
Derbyshire (), is coming to the Select Committee next Monday. I
apologise in advance that, for personal reasons, I cannot be
there, but I am sure the scrutiny will be just as effective under
the oversight of the hon. Member for Harrow East ().
A number of issues have been raised with the Select Committee.
First, in terms of the agreement that developers are signing, it
was said to us that the remediation standards developers will
have to work to will not be as strict as those under the Building
Safety Act. Can the Secretary of State confirm whether that is
true? Secondly, the Committee spoke to product manufacturers the
other week, who said that they had had no contact with the
Department for the last 12 months. Is that true, and if so, when
will that contact be renewed, so that they can be held to
account?
Finally, the Minister says, “I’m going to look at this” every
time I ask him. Kate Henderson of the National Housing Federation
told the Committee on Monday that the cost of remediating these
matters will be £6 billion for social housing providers. They
have only had a tiny bit of money under the ACM cladding
measures. Will the Secretary of State look at that again?
Otherwise, there will be cutbacks to the house building programme
that they all want to engage in.
I thank the Chairman of the Select Committee for his questions. I
note his apology for not being able to be there to cross examine
my hon. Friend the Minister for local government and building
safety next Monday. I know that my hon. Friend the Member for
Harrow East () will do a brilliant job. They are the Morse and
Lewis of—
Mr Betts
Which one’s which?
Well, quite. I know that they will show endeavour in asking the
right questions.
On remediation standards, I do not believe it is the case that
the developers are being held to any less high a standard than
that which exists in the Building Safety Act, but I look forward
to working with the hon. Gentleman and others to identify any gap
between what the Act makes provision for and anything that
developers have committed to do.
It is the case that I have not been in touch with the
Construction Products Association as a corporate body for a
while. We have been pursuing individual construction product
companies, but of course, our actions have to take account of the
actions of others who may be pursuing them for criminal activity
and liability.
On the hon. Gentleman’s point about the National Housing
Federation, I have been in conversations with the Chancellor of
the Exchequer about what more we can do to support the social
housing sector. How richly those conversations bear fruit, we
will have to see.
(Ipswich) (Con)
The Secretary of State is well aware of the situation with
Cardinal Lofts. Today at 10 minutes past two, a formal
prohibition notice was served, so any remaining constituents of
mine in that building will be obliged to leave. One of the worst
things is the lack of timescale for how long my constituents will
be in limbo. They cannot plan their lives—their lives are on
hold. Will the Secretary of State work with me to try to get that
certainty as soon as possible and look into compensation that
goes beyond covering temporary accommodation? The extent to which
their lives has been affected is unacceptable. He will also know
that Railpen was aware of these issues for two years before it
decided to take any action at all.
My hon. Friend is right, and he has been a fantastic champion for
the residents of Cardinal Lofts and other people affected by
this. I think I am right in saying that Railpen is the ultimate
owner of the freehold for this building. It is the pension fund
for those who work in the rail sector. There are good trade
unionists on the board of that pension fund to whom I appeal to
show the same degree of energy in helping working people as my
hon. Friend. While pension funds of course have fiduciary
responsibilities and all the rest of it, it is vital that we do
right by the residents of this building. I hope I will have the
chance to visit Ipswich soon, to make good on that
commitment.
(West Ham) (Lab)
I thank the Secretary of State for his care in this matter, but I
still have hundreds of constituents who are in financial limbo
and mental turmoil because of safety problems that are not of
their making. Frankly, West Ham is a building site at the moment.
Stratford, West Ham, Plaistow and Canning Town all have major
building contracts ongoing. If the developers are not on the
“goodie” list of those who have signed the right bits of paper,
what happens to that development and the oversight of it? I know
that my constituents would want me to ask this: what will he be
able to do for those who have not been fully covered by the
remediation contract?
I am grateful to the hon. Lady for standing up so well for her
constituents, as she always does. Actions have to have
consequences. The overwhelming majority of developers have done
the right thing by signing this contract. It would be wrong for
anyone who has wriggled out of their responsibilities to be
allowed to continue to make a profit when others are shouldering
these responsibilities. It is the case that if a company is not
on, as she puts it, the goodie list, that will be it—development
will have to pause, and we will make sure that their shareholders
and investors pay the price for the irresponsibility of their
directors.
On the broader point, if the hon. Lady, on behalf of her
constituents, would like to get in touch with my Department and,
in particular, our recovery strategy unit, there may well be
developments or buildings in her constituency that are not
covered by this where there are freeholders or other people
responsible whom we need to track down. We look forward to
working with her.
(Harrow East) (Con)
I warmly congratulate my right hon. Friend on the progress he is
making. Leaseholders are the most important people we have to
look after. There will be people who have paid out huge sums of
money to companies that are on the goodie list of those who
signed this contract. They will want to know what happens to
them. There will be people who have received estimates for huge
amounts of money they are expected to pay. What happens to them?
Most importantly, there are leaseholders who reside in buildings
the developers of which we do not know and are not covered by
this. Will my right hon. Friend set out the position for those
people and give us a guarantee that, if we cannot trace the
developers, the Government will step in and put this right for
the people who live in these properties?
My hon. Friend makes a very good point. One thing that I was
aware of before doing this job but have become clearer on since
is that there are actors in the property market operating in the
UK who hide behind opaque corporate structures, operate offshore
and set up special purpose vehicles in order to get building done
and then disappear from their responsibilities afterwards. That
is why we set up the recovery strategy unit, and it is no
criticism of any of our predecessors, because we have not faced a
situation quite like this before. The whole purpose of the
recovery strategy unit is to identify the ultimate beneficial
owner of the building who should take responsibility. Developers
who are operating as responsible plcs have all signed this
contract. That is great and a real step forward, but there is
still more to do.
On the point about leaseholders, we have a system that we have
legislated on—it is not perfect, but it is a big step
forward—which means there is a cap on the individual liability of
any leaseholder, and the taxpayer has committed significant sums.
I think—and I suspect this is a view shared across the House—that
the building safety crisis shines a light on sharp practice by a
small minority of people in the broader property sector that we
need to take several steps to deal with, including improved land
transparency legislation and other steps that will ensure we do
not have a butler economy in this country, whereby people
operating in the property sector put profit ahead of people.
Madam Deputy Speaker ( )
I need to reiterate that I can only call Members who arrived at
the beginning of the statement. It is the responsibility of
Members to make sure they get here in time to hear the Secretary
of State’s statement from the beginning. I assure Members that I
and the other Deputy Speakers are even-handed about this.
(Leeds Central) (Lab)
I very much welcome this statement, but I want to ask the
Secretary of State about people living in buildings under 11
metres. The Government were not prepared to extend full coverage
to them but said they would look at those buildings on a
case-by-case basis—a commitment that the Secretary of State
repeated this afternoon. Could he tell us how that is going? How
many of those buildings have had assistance? What criteria are he
and his colleagues using in deciding where to offer help? Does it
include, for example, cases where the developers or builders went
bust years ago? Does it include buildings where the leaseholders
still cannot sell their flats because mortgage companies will not
lend on them, despite the Royal Institution of Chartered
Surveyors advice?
The right hon. Gentleman makes a very important point. In most
cases, a building under 11 metres which might, for example, have
cladding on it, or might have some of the materials that in other
circumstances would be systemically unsafe, does not have safety
risk. We need to look proportionately at each building, and that
takes time. Thanks to the energetic efforts of the Minister for
building safety, my hon. Friend the Member for North East
Derbyshire, we have reached agreement with a majority of lenders,
which are now lending against properties, because through the
engagement we have had with them, there is now a more
proportionate way of deciding whether or not to lend against
those buildings. As we have discussed in the past, however, let
us look at individual cases, and if constituency cases and
examples have come to light that the right hon. Gentleman feels
are not captured by the steps we have taken so far, I look
forward to working with him to address them.
(Battersea) (Lab)
I thank the Secretary of State for his statement and the progress
he is making on this issue, but action is still needed to address
what has become a two-tier system of building safety support for
leaseholders. As has already been mentioned, leaseholders in
Battersea who reside in buildings under 11 metres or in a
development that has become an enfranchised building do not
qualify for the support for which other leaseholders rightly
qualify. They feel abandoned by this Government. If the
Government are looking at this issue on a case-by-case basis, I
would love to understand a bit more how it will work, because I
want to ensure that those leaseholders are getting the support
they need.
The hon. Lady makes a very important point. In the legislation,
there is a category of non-qualifying leaseholders: people who
have more than one property. We wanted to attempt to draw the
line in order to ensure that, for example, significant
investors—people with significant means—were not benefiting from
a scheme that was designed for every man and woman, as it were.
However, I have some constituents who are in the same boat as the
hon. Lady’s, and we are looking at the situation to try to make
sure that we do not have people at the margins who are being
treated unfairly. I cannot make any promises at this stage, but
the hon. Lady raises an important point, and we are aware of
it.
(Caithness, Sutherland and
Easter Ross) (LD)
I address the right hon. Gentleman as a fellow Scot, and I
welcome the new spirit of accord that there will surely be
between himself and the new First Minister, whoever she or he is.
As I drive through the right hon. Gentleman’s home city of
Aberdeen, I see the high-rise flats. I do not know what condition
those flats are in, but it occurs to me that a similar dialogue
between a Scottish local authority such as Aberdeen City Council
and a suitable one south of the border could be very constructive
when sorting these problems out. Will the Secretary of State
undertake to encourage that sort of co-operation?
Yes. The hon. Gentleman makes a very important point, and he is
absolutely right: co-operation between councils, between the UK
Government and local authorities in devolved areas, and between
the UK Government and devolved Administrations is the way
forward. We all deserve Governments who are working together to
resolve this issue. He makes a very good point: in Aberdeen, as
well as in Dundee, Glasgow, Edinburgh and some other areas, there
are high-rise buildings that are in precisely this situation. It
would be a pleasure to work with the Lib Dem coalition council in
Aberdeen to try to make sure that that council can benefit from
the experience of local authorities in England.
Sir (East Ham) (Lab)
During the Secretary of State’s statement on 30 January, I asked
about the problem of excessive insurance charges being imposed on
leaseholders. He recognised the problem, and promised
“additional Financial Conduct Authority and Government
co-ordinated action”—[Official Report, 30 January 2023; Vol. 727,
c. 55.]
to address it. Can the Secretary of State update us on progress?
By the way, he has not yet replied to my letter to him on this
subject, dated 13 January.
I apologise to the Chair of the Work and Pensions Committee for
the discourtesy. I will have a word with my private office team;
it is my fault that he has not received a reply.
I hope to update the House shortly on the progress we are making
with the FCA and others on insurance costs. When I made the
statement last time around, I explained the steps we are taking
with managing agents and intermediaries, but the right hon.
Gentleman is right—as is the Father of the House, my hon. Friend
the Member for Worthing West ( )—that there are broader
issues in the insurance market that we need to address.
(Cardiff South and Penarth)
(Lab/Co-op)
It is important that we see which developers have actually
commenced or completed works, not just signed up to the contract.
My understanding is that only 11 of the non-ACM buildings in
England have been remediated and signed off, so will the
Secretary of State publish a full list of the works that are
under way from different developers?
Secondly, the Secretary of State made a bit of a gibe at Wales,
but the reality is that we need to work together across the UK on
this issue. What is he doing about the pipeline of contractors
and surveyors? A remediation project in my constituency had to be
stopped recently because a contractor was having an issue
separately in England. This issue does not require gibing between
the two Governments: it requires working together.
The hon. Gentleman makes two very important points. On the first,
we will work with those who have signed the contract to publish
an update on the work that has been done, and as I mentioned, we
will share quarterly updates with the House and with everyone
affected in order to hold developers to account. Given the
willing heart with which most have signed, I am very confident
that we will see good progress.
On the point about the situation in Wales, again, I always enjoy
working with Ministers in the Welsh Government to achieve our
common ends across the United Kingdom. I absolutely take the hon.
Gentleman’s point in good part.
(Weaver Vale) (Lab)
Looking at the finer details of the developer contract that some
developers have signed—I think the Secretary of State said 39 had
done so—I see that it does not cover all the fire defects laid
out in the Building Safety Act. Why is that, and who is going to
pay for that work?
That point has been made by other hon. and right hon. Members. I
do believe that developers are living up to their
responsibilities to deal with life-critical safety defects in
medium and high-rise buildings, but as we have discussed, some
buildings fall outside those categories. We are working on
bespoke solutions for those.
(Sheffield Central)
(Lab)
As the Secretary of State knows, not only are developers
frustrating leaseholder rights. In response to his last
statement, I raised the case of Mandale House in my constituency;
leaseholders in Daisy Spring Works have the same, or a similar,
problem. The common factor is the managing agents, Y&Y
Management, which also has freehold interests. That company is
not simply denying leaseholders their rights: it is doing so on
the basis of challenging the legality of the Secretary of State’s
own legislation. Those leaseholders do not have the resources to
challenge Y&Y’s lawyers, so I have shared the relevant
information with the Secretary of State’s Department. Can he
reassure me that he will use all of the resources at his disposal
to tackle Y&Y and ensure its leaseholders get the rights
under the Building Safety Act that he intended?
Absolutely. I want to be really fair to the hon. Member: he is
doing the right thing. He has highlighted an abuse and has
contacted the Department in a co-operative and detailed fashion.
The Minister for Building Safety, my hon. Friend the Member for
North East Derbyshire, has been looking closely at that case.
There is more that we can do, and I thank the hon. Member on
behalf of his constituents for being tenacious in trying to get a
good deal for them.
(Eltham) (Lab)
I have a Galliard development in my constituency, and my
constituents will be concerned that Galliard has not signed. They
would like to hear from the Secretary of State what that means
for them. They have life-critical safety defects in the building,
which is shocking, because that building construction was paused
as a consequence of the tragedy at Grenfell, yet Galliard went on
to develop a building that has those defects. What does today’s
statement from the Secretary of State mean for my constituents
who are waiting to hear from Galliard about the state of their
buildings?
This is a sad note on which to come to the conclusion of the
statement, because Galliard is one of the companies that has been
the most recalcitrant throughout, and I sympathise with the hon.
Gentleman’s constituents. Other companies have done the right
thing and have done so with a willing heart, but Galliard has
held out—it has briefed against the Department and all the rest
of it. Unless Galliard signs, it will face consequences, and its
business model will be fundamentally challenged by the
legislation that we in this House have passed. Ultimately, with a
company such as Galliard whose owners, directors and investors
are determined not to play ball, the consequences will come for
it. I want to be clear with the hon. Member and this House that
Galliard will face condign consequences if it does not act.
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