Building Safety (Remediation of Unsafe Cladding etc) Bill

Judith Cummins Excerpts

2nd reading
Tuesday 27th October 2026 Commons Chamber

[Kevin Bonavia]

I thank the hon. Member for making a very sensible point. I am pleased that the Bill takes forward the idea of having independent actors to step in, which I would always welcome—the more of that, the better. We cannot have the developers or freeholders of these buildings essentially marking their own homework.

We must ensure that buildings are reviewed holistically and made safe as a whole. As I have said, Vista Tower is facing a second round of intrusive works and the decanting of residents, so we need to ensure that such things can be avoided. That is why it is so important to have compliance plans and, more importantly, to ensure that residents are informed of and are able to influence and shape these plans. I welcome the moves in that regard.

For Vista Tower, there have now been eight years of fighting, with no timeline for ending it. We must therefore make sure that remediation compliance plans guarantee access to assessments, work specifications, delivery timetables and completion evidence, with real and meaningful engagement for leaseholders, while also providing them with accessible routes to challenge decisions and raise concerns about their homes. In that way we can give leaseholders, but also the flats market as a whole, confidence that when work is required, it will be done properly and collaboratively.

Today is a day of real progress—we are filling the gaps one by one—and I am pleased to hear that Ministers are listening. They should carry on listening to make sure that the Bill becomes an Act that finally gives people who are living in fear of the future and uncertain about what is going to happen to their home the release from all of that that they truly deserve.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)]

I call Jessica Toale.

[Jessica Toale (Bournemouth West) (Lab)]

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker. Last, but hopefully not least.

I thank the Secretary of State and the Minister for bringing forward the Bill, and I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington and Bayswater (Joe Powell) for all his work to honour the victims and families of Grenfell, and to ensure that nobody else suffers the horror of such unavoidable tragedy.

I fully support the Government’s determination to accelerate remediation and better protect leaseholders who have been left carrying the emotional and often financial burden of a crisis they did not create. As we have heard from many hon. Members from across the House today, too many people across the country have been trapped in unsafe homes, facing uncertainty, financial anxiety and delays that have stretched on for years. Everyone deserves to live in a safe home and that is why the Bill is so important. I welcome many of the provisions in the Bill, from the clear legal duty of responsibility for unsafe buildings to the stronger enforcement with clear consequences to ensure that leaseholders are not left paying the price for failures that were not their fault.

I do, however, have to be honest about some of the practical barriers that are impacting my constituents and delaying works on the ground. In my constituency, residents in several high-rise blocks have contacted me repeatedly about remediation delays. In one case, a developer is ready to proceed with the necessary cladding works that would make the building safe, but has been waiting for approval from the Building Safety Regulator since the middle of 2024. The decision on certification has been pushed back six times. I have written to the Minister in the other place, Baroness Blake, regarding the case, but it remains a significant problem and the BSR delayed approval yet again only last month.

Another property in my constituency is similarly impacted. The contractor has bought materials and submitted the relevant applications to the BSR in August 2025, but was rejected several months later. The application was submitted again, but it was rejected in May this year. In the meantime, residents continue to live with significant damp, mould and fire safety issues in the building.

These are not isolated incidents and I could relay others—and I will, because this is significant. One building, a social housing building in my constituency, had some botched internal works, leaving really unacceptable conditions in communal areas and embarrassment for residents. One of them brought me in and showed me a piece of exposed wall with mould all over it where they had affixed a nametag that said, “Jackson Pollock 2024”. That building is on a hill, and when they brought in a contractor to remediate the internal bits of the building, they discovered that the building is smaller at the front than it is at the back. They then had to reclassify the building and submit an application to the Building Safety Regulator. I have very little faith in the fact that those residents, who have already been waiting more than two years for the internal works, will get them done in good time.

This is not about weakening standards or cutting corners; it is about robust scrutiny and effective regulation that is absolutely necessary. The point is that residents, leaseholders and good contractors who are trying to do the right things should not be increasingly frustrated by these delays. My residents need certainty that the plans to make their homes safe can actually take place and be done at pace.

We on the Labour Benches all want stronger regulators, but there appear to be genuine questions about whether the Building Safety Regulator has sufficient capacity and specialist resources to process applications as quickly as everyone would like. Concerns about delays with the regulator have been raised elsewhere, including by the Industry and Regulators Committee in the other place. The provisions in the Bill are necessary and long overdue, but if the ambitions of the Bill are to be realised in practice, the Building Safety Regulator must have the capacity and resources to match those ambitions. I would be grateful if the Minister, in her closing remarks, could address Building Safety Regulator resourcing and capacity. Will she also consider meeting Members from across the House whose constituents are experiencing delays, so that these concerns can be discussed directly? The regulator must have the staff, expertise and support it needs to ensure that vital remediation projects are not delayed unnecessarily.

The people living in these buildings have waited long enough. They deserve safe homes. They deserve certainty and to see progress. I am proud to support the Bill and I hope that the Minister will address my concerns in her closing remarks.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Judith Cummins)]

With the leave of the House, I call the shadow Minister.