Oral Answers to Questions

Mike Amesbury Excerpts

Monday 16th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Christopher Pincher]

I am obliged to the hon. Lady for her question and for the tone of it. Of course I will continue to engage with her and will happily meet her, as I think I did in July, to discuss these matters. She raised the EWS1 form particularly, and I think it would be worthwhile if I said a few words about it.

First, it is worth pointing out that the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors EWS1 form is not a Government document; it was devised by RICS and by the industry. Not all lenders require it; some use other tools. Lenders that do require it are working with us to ensure that there are more nuanced tools available to resolve leaseholders’ concerns. I should say, with respect to those lenders that use EWS1 forms for buildings less than 18 metres in height, that that is not something that the Government support. We do not support a blanket approach to the use of EWS1 forms. Lenders should use other tools in order to discuss the safety or otherwise of those sorts of buildings.

[Mike Amesbury (Weaver Vale) (Lab)]

Over three years on from the Grenfell tragedy and one year since the Bolton Cube fire, 203 high-rise blocks are still clad with flammable aluminium composite material, and many thousands more are clad with equally flammable high-pressure laminate. Minister, is it not about time to come clean about the serious limitations of the size and scope of the building safety fund? Up to 1.5 million people, such as Paul in Manchester, are desperate, trapped in this nightmare. What bold, urgent action does the Minister intend to take?

[Christopher Pincher]

I am obliged to the hon. Gentleman for his question. He will know, with respect to ACM cladding, that we have made £600 million available to remediate the most dangerous buildings. Something like 97% of buildings with ACM cladding have either completed or started their remediation. As a result of the expert support we have provided to private building owners, we have supported something like 100 ACM projects to remediation. With respect to the £1 billion fund for non-ACM-clad buildings, I can tell him that we have had a very significant number of applications, which have worked through. A very significant number have now been asked to make further information available, so we can advance those applications. We will get the money out of the door as quickly as we can. We will also encourage builders and owners to remediate the buildings themselves, because that is what they are obliged to do. It should not fall on the taxpayer to pay for remediation. It is the responsibility in the first case of building owners, through their warrantee schemes or through the original builders.