Fire Safety

Baroness Berridge Excerpts

Monday 9th October 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth]

My Lords, the noble Lord makes a fair point. The position at the moment is that nothing essential has been turned down—I checked that with officials today. Clearly, an inquiry and a review of building safety regulation and fire safety are ongoing. It would make a material difference if one of those were to come forward with something that is essential forthwith. We will look at that situation. I do not think that is an unfair response. It is something that could happen and, clearly, in the light of changed circumstances we would have to look at that anew.

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, rightly, the focus has been on housing associations and social housing generally but will my noble friend the Minister assure the House that with regard to high-rise buildings that are either in shared ownership or actually in private ownership, the Secretary of State has written to those developers to check that there are not safety concerns in those blocks? Some of the fires that we have seen in other countries have been in privately owned dwellings.

[Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth]

My Lords, my noble friend makes an entirely fair point. I think that has been the subject of a letter from my right honourable friend. I will double-check that, if I may, to ensure that that is the case, and if it is not we will certainly need to pick it up.

Grenfell Tower: Rehousing Update

Baroness Berridge Excerpts

Wednesday 5th July 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Berridge (Con)]

My Lords, in the Prime Minister’s Statement on 22 June, she first outlined that the accommodation will be on the same terms as the original accommodation, and we have seen a definition of that today. Unfortunately, I understood “same terms” to be in the personal injury lawyer sense, which is to put the person back into the position they would have been in had none of this happened. People who have been placed in accommodation with more bedrooms should be in the same position—having the same money still in their pocket—as if they were in the house they had been in. Can my noble friend the Minister find a way to short-circuit these processes, as we have done for prosecutions for illegal subletting? People should not have to get discretionary housing payments when they should basically be in the same position as if the fire had never happened. There must be a way to achieve that and get that justice for them, including of course if they have moved further away and they have extra transport costs to get to work. All of that has to be taken into account and we need a speedy, efficient way that is not in bureaucracy and discretion to achieve that as soon as possible.

[Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth]

My Lords, I quote again from the Statement. My right honourable friend the Prime Minister said that,

“everyone whose home was destroyed by the fire will be guaranteed a new home on the same terms as the one they lost”.

That is what we are intending to do. Beyond that, if the home that they go to is larger than the one they were in previously, they will not be charged extra, as I understand it; I was going through this this morning in the department.