Building Safety Bill

Daisy Cooper Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments
Wednesday 20th April 2022 Commons Chamber

[Stuart Andrew]

The issue is the proportionate measures that can be made in those buildings to ensure that they are safe. We want to make sure that we get this right, and we will be continuing to look at all of these. If the building safety regulator assesses that further work needs to be done, or that the Government need to look at what needs to be done, we will absolutely make sure that we do that, and I make that commitment to the House.

[Daisy Cooper (St Albans) (LD)]

On that specific point, I am grateful that the Minister has said that he will look at this issue of buildings below 11 metres. As part of that, will he commit to focus especially on those buildings where there are many vulnerable residents—whether that is care homes, shelter buildings or perhaps even schools where there are children with special educational needs or disabilities who might find it harder to escape buildings? Will he commit to look specifically through that lens of risk to the vulnerable adults in those buildings?

[Stuart Andrew]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for her engagement, too. She raised this important point with me yesterday. Yes, absolutely, we have officials looking at that, but also, as I have said, the Building Safety Regulator will be assessing buildings such as those. If this becomes an area that needs further consideration, we will look at what measures need to be introduced.

--- Later in debate ---

[Daisy Cooper]

I declare an interest as I am a vice-chair of the Local Government Association. I add my voice to those who have paid tribute to the extraordinary building safety campaigners who have shared their stories, put this issue on the national agenda and shamed the Government into several significant concessions. We are in a better place than we have been over the past couple of years, but the situation is still not good enough. There have been, from the beginning of the debate, a very few principles that the Government should have followed—that homes should be fixed as quickly as possible, that the innocent should not have to pay for the mistakes of the guilty, and that the Government should use their weight to go after those responsible. It is a sorry state of affairs that those principles have not been upheld two pieces of legislation later.

On Lords amendment 184, many of us are in agreement that innocent leaseholders should not have to pay a penny, end of. But the costs cap undermines that principle. Two years ago, when I tried to introduce that principle for the first time in the Fire Safety Bill I was told time and again by Ministers in Committee that it was not the right place, or that it would not work as intended. If we ever needed confirmation that that is code for “we don’t want to do it”, we get that from this Bill.

By arguing for the costs cap, the Government are opening themselves up to legal challenge. It cannot be fair, or in keeping with natural justice, that in some cases the single determinant of whether someone has to pay £10,000 or £15,000—and someone else does not—is the arbitrary fact of whether the Government can find another party to carry the can.

The Government have said that by their calculations the vast majority of leaseholders would not have to pay, so I would like the Minister to respond to these questions in his remarks. He says the vast majority. How many? Where is the Government assessment? Will he publish it and put it in the Library? Where is the web page for every leaseholder to find out whether they will be in the camp that might have to pay?

--- Later in debate ---

[Stuart Andrew]

It is always wise for a Minister answering the Father of the House to take his sage advice, and of course I will speak to my officials.

The hon. Member for St Albans (Daisy Cooper) asked about valuations. I am aware there has been a discussion about how the Bill proposes to assess the value and banding of individual flats. The process set out in the Bill—further detail will be set out in regulations—takes the last price at which a flat changed hands, which will be recorded at the Land Registry, and uprates it in line with the national house price data produced by the Office for National Statistics. We recognise that this may produce a value that differs from the flat’s current market value, but we are using this approach for two specific reasons. First, it uses publicly available data and so avoids any potential for gaming the system. Secondly, it avoids the need to value a large number of flats individually, which would likely be both expensive and time-consuming and could delay the needed changes and improvements to those properties.

[Daisy Cooper]

Notwithstanding the Minister’s explanation that the valuation might not meet today’s market value, which he also gave to me yesterday, does he accept that, precisely because the starting point is the most recent sale price, the owner of a flat might have to pay up to the cap to get remediation done, whereas the owner of the identical flat next door in the same block might not because the two flats sold at different times for different sums of money? That is simply not fair.

[Stuart Andrew]

I recognise the hon. Lady’s point, and I have committed to coming back to her after we have done further work in this area.

I am conscious that there will be a large number of Divisions in a moment, so I reiterate my thanks to hon. Members on both sides of the House. This is an incredibly important issue, and I am aware that my Department has a great responsibility to get it right. I hope that the direction set by the Secretary of State shows that we are determined to get it right for people who have been living in these worrying circumstances for too long.

Amendment (a) made to Lords amendment 93.

Amendment (b) made to Lords amendment 93.

Lords amendment 93, as amended, agreed to.

Before Clause 117

Meaning of “relevant building”

Amendment (a) proposed to Lords amendment 94.—(Stuart Andrew.)

Question put, That the amendment be made.