Fire Safety Bill

Baroness Keeley Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading: House of Commons
Wednesday 29th April 2020 Commons Chamber

[Barbara Keeley (Worsley and Eccles South) (Lab) [V]]

I want to begin by welcoming this long-overdue Bill. We all know what the consequences can be—[Inaudible.] Nobody here will ever forget the tragedy of Grenfell Tower, but only last autumn a block of student accommodation called The Cube, just over the border from my constituency in Bolton, caught fire. There were no casualties that time, but—[Inaudible.]

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

Order. I have to interrupt the hon. Lady because the sound quality is not very good. Let us try again for a few seconds, and if it does not improve, we will leave the hon. Lady and come back to her later.

[Barbara Keeley]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. Although this Bill is overdue, it does not guarantee action immediately. I understand that the current crisis makes it difficult—[Inaudible.]

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

Order. I am very sorry, but I have to interrupt the hon. Lady again. Those in the Chamber, and presumably those listening in other ways, cannot make out what she is saying, so we will interrupt her speech for the moment and hopefully come back to her shortly.

I am glad to see that in the Chamber we have, without any sound difficulties, Meg Hillier.

--- Later in debate ---

[Barbara Keeley [V]]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker.

Let me try again to welcome this long-overdue Bill. We all know what the consequences can be when fire safety is neglected in blocks of flats. We have heard, and we are clear, that nobody here will ever forget the tragedy of the Grenfell fire, but only last autumn a block of student accommodation in Bolton called The Cube, just over the border from my constituency, caught fire, as we have just heard from the local Member. There were no casualties, but it reminds us how important it is that we address the issue as a matter of urgency.

Although the Bill is overdue, it does not guarantee action immediately. I understand that the current crisis makes it difficult to set a hard date for it to come into force, but that is of little comfort to people living in unsafe accommodation. Will the Minister tell us when he expects the Bill’s provisions to come into force? I am concerned about the cost of the additional work that will be required. To protect people who live in flats, the owners of many blocks will certainly need to carry out work to ensure that they are safe. That work is needed if buildings are not safe, but I am concerned that in too many cases the burden will fall on leaseholders with increased service charges.

In a recent survey of residents by the Greater Manchester High Rise Task Force, more than half of owner-occupiers said that they had been landed with increased service charge costs. One resident reported an increase from £90 to £400 a month; another faced an increase to £1,000 a month to cover the cost of remediation. Those extra financial pressures have had a significant impact on residents’ mental health and wellbeing, on top of the impact of the covid-19 crisis. It is not the fault of leaseholders if their buildings are unsafe.

The Government have previously offered funding to ensure that it is not leaseholders who have to pay for the removal of unsafe cladding, but that only applies if the building is over 80 metres high. As we heard from my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton South East (Yasmin Qureshi), funding would not therefore have been available for The Cube in Bolton—a six-storey building wrapped in high-pressure laminate cladding. If the Government are serious about ensuring that blocks of flats are safe, they need to ensure that funding is available for work on all blocks regardless of height, and I hope that that can be discussed in Committee. The Government must go further in funding work to remove dangerous cladding.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Ladywood (Shabana Mahmood) set out, the costs of waking watches or other interim measures are often borne by residents. Will the Minister confirm that the scope of Government financial assistance in this area will be expanded, as the Greater Manchester High Rise Task Force has called for? Specifically, will the Government fund interim measures and renovations required to ensure fire safety in all residential blocks, not just those over a certain height?

We must also ensure that a change in the regulations leads to a change in practice. The current regulatory system is not up to the task, and we need detail on how it will be changed to enable local authorities and fire services to inspect residential buildings and take action against building owners who do not meet their new obligations. We cannot deal with the regulatory system later. When will we have details of a strengthened regulatory system, which has been promised as part of the Building Safety Bill?

When fires occur, sprinkler systems and fire alarms are crucial to protect life and property. I have been contacted by constituents who are concerned about the installation of mist sprinklers in residential units, rather than traditional fire sprinklers. Mist sprinklers are not subject to a common standard, whereby each case in which they are used must be assessed individually to determine whether they are a suitable solution. My constituents are concerned that such water-mist systems have been installed not because they are right for the job, but because they cost less. It would not be acceptable for people’s lives and homes to be put at risk because the cost to their landlord is lower. Will the Minister confirm that guidance will be published on what is considered a suitable sprinkler system for residential blocks, emphasising the need for the right solution, not the cheapest one?

Like my hon. Friend the Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green), I remain concerned about the financial situation facing Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service, which has seen a cut of more than £22 million of central Government funding in the past 10 years, which amounts to a 36% cut. At the same time, our population has increased, and the built environment in Greater Manchester has become more complex. In addition to the legislation that we are debating and the new regulatory system, we must take account of the increased demand on services such as the Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service. We need the resources to have the right number of pumps and fire officers. As with the NHS, we must give better support to fire officers. They were the frontline at Grenfell—we must give them all they need for fire safety in future.