Building Safety (Remediation of Unsafe Cladding etc) Bill

Carla Denyer Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 27th October 2026 Commons Chamber

[Carla Denyer (Bristol Central) (Green)]

As we approach 10 years since the Grenfell tragedy, I thank the Grenfell community and families for the tireless campaigning that they should not have had to do. I welcome the Bill as far as it goes. It includes important measures that are needed, but there remain serious concerns that it does not do enough for those still trapped by the terrible cladding scandal. The issue of the remediation of unsafe cladding in buildings of less than 11 metres is a big problem in my constituency, but it is not just a Bristol issue.

There are a number of medium-height blocks of flats in Bristol Central with flammable cladding. I am going to tell the story of just one of those flats. It is a mid-rise block that is part of a development of three blocks. The other two blocks are taller—over 11 metres. They have the same developer and were built at the same time. All the buildings have the same dangerous cladding; the taller two are eligible for the building safety fund, but the one that is under 11 metres is not. A leading specialist building surveyor has identified that the shorter building also has severe cladding deficiencies that are in urgent need of remediation.

Until recently, the flat was the home of a 97-year-old woman, who eventually moved into a residential home. Because she owned a flat, she was not eligible for a council-funded care home place, so her children needed to sell the flat to fund her care—except they could not. The Conservative Government’s position was that there is no systemic fire safety issue in buildings under 11 metres. In 2022, the then Government said that they had examined specific buildings under 11 metres and found that

“in the overwhelming majority of cases it has subsequently been confirmed that they do not require remediation.”—[Official Report, 26 March 2024; Vol. 747, c. 1419.]

The Labour Government under Keir Starmer maintained that position, stating in September 2024 that:

“the risk to life is usually lower in buildings under 11 metres, and they are very unlikely to need the same costly remediation.”—[Official Report, 11 September 2024; Vol. 753, c. 929.]

The result is that buildings under 11 metres are not eligible for funding under the building safety fund.

The catch? Try telling all that to the mortgage market. No lender will give a mortgage to a flat in a building with unsafe cladding, regardless of height. Therefore, the children of my 97-year-old constituent cannot sell the flat on the open market. They cannot persuade the company that holds the freehold to pay for the remediations from its own balance sheet—believe me, they have tried. That company has insisted that it will only fulfil its legal obligations and not spend a penny more, and based on the legislation, the company believes it is not liable. The building’s insurance policy will also not cover the cladding work.

Even if the owners of the five flats in this small block wanted to pay for the work themselves—which would be wholly unjust, because it is not their fault—as leaseholders, according to their lease, they are not permitted to contribute more than £15,000 per flat. It is estimated that the work would cost more than £1 million.

What are people meant to do? They are trapped in an intolerable Catch-22 situation. The two adult children of this 97-year-old woman were forced to buy the flat themselves in order to release the equity to fund her care. It is lucky that they could afford to do that, although “lucky” seems like a wild choice of word to describe their situation. They are now stuck in possession of an unsafe flat that they do not live in and never wanted to own, with no recourse to the developers, the insurance, the warrantees or anything else to rectify the cladding faults.

In July 2026, as we have heard, MHCLG launched a separate funding pot to address cladding fire safety risks in buildings under 11 metres, called the cladding safety scheme. The Government said that this delivered on their commitment in the remediation acceleration plan and supported a risk-based approach to remediation. However, the application window for the scheme was open for just three months. It has now closed. The management company of the building in my constituency has applied, but there has been no response, and there is apparently no guarantee of receiving this targeted funding.

The Bill before us proposes sticking with the Conservative and Starmer Governments’ insistence that “relevant buildings” means only buildings of 11 metres or more. Surely the Minister can see that that is not good enough.

I have a few questions for the Minister. First, is she confident that three months was long enough for 100% of those in charge of affected buildings under 11 metres to hear about the fund and apply to it? That includes both for-profit management companies, which, famously, can be pretty sluggish when it comes to repairs in their buildings, and internal management companies made up of owner-occupiers and leaseholders, who are often juggling flat admin alongside a full-time job and being a parent.

Secondly, is the fund large enough to cover all the affected sub-11 metre buildings? Thirdly, if the Government do not make funding available for all the affected sub-11 metre buildings, what will the Minister’s message be to the leaseholders of flats that do not receive the funding?

Finally, will the Minister take steps to end this funding lottery and ensure that the remediation of buildings below 11 metres is incorporated into the main Bill and is fully funded, and that there is a legal requirement on freeholders to do this work?