Fire Safety and Cladding

Debate between Andy Slaughter and Emma Hardy

Wednesday 23rd January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Andy Slaughter]

Returning to the central point, what we all want is the Government to take a comprehensive view of these matters in respect of both existing and new buildings. My understanding is that only a selective number of existing buildings are covered, based on height, use and the type of material used. I ask the Minister to confirm how far their scrutiny goes at the moment, and explain why he thinks it should not go further. The Government did make announcements on new buildings back in October; they talked about high-rise residential buildings, including schools, hospitals, student accommodation and care homes. That excludes certain types of building—such as office buildings, as has been said—and we cannot see why that is the case.

[Emma Hardy]

The announcements fail to recognise that most schools are not particularly high. I do not understand why the Government do not include all schools in this list, or else they are pretty much ruling out every school in the country.

[Andy Slaughter]

Absolutely; and if the Minister did not like us quoting commercial companies in this way, perhaps he will listen to the Local Government Association. It continues to strongly urge the Government to ban the use of any combustible materials, including cladding panels, insulation and other materials, on the external walls of high-rise and high-risk buildings—including all hospitals, care homes, schools both residential and non-residential, and offices—of below, as well as above, 18 metres in height. That reinforces my hon. Friend’s point. I understand that the Government are considering height again, but hopefully they will do that quite quickly and come to the conclusion that it is a somewhat arbitrary determinant, because there are other factors, such as means of escape, that can control how easily buildings can be evacuated. That is why I say this is a very partial solution.

If the Government do not like the LGA, perhaps they should listen to the Association of British Insurers. In all my experience in the time that I have been here, the Government have been the greatest friends of the insurance industry, and that has been mutual, but in the briefing for this debate the ABI says that it

“remains concerned over the limitations of the MHCLG ban, including the exclusion of buildings lower than 18m and limiting the ban to only care homes, hospitals and student accommodation. It makes no sense that someone can live in a high-rise residential building to which the ban applied but commute to work every day in an office block covered in combustible material.”

That is just common sense, but it comes from an industry body. I will wait to hear the Minister’s response on that.

There are other issues that go beyond fire safety. Some Members took the opportunity to raise them during yesterday’s urgent question, and the Minister commented yesterday that he was quite in favour of ’60s and ’70s buildings coming down per se—a radical solution, which was picked up by Inside Housing. I would give a qualified welcome to that: yes, if they are unsafe, unsuitable or not performing their function, but given the extraordinary housing shortage that this Government have presided over, perhaps the Minister should insist that we get rather more going up than coming down.