Grenfell Tower Inquiry

Pete Wishart Excerpts

Monday 2nd December 2024 Commons Chamber

[Angela Rayner]

The absolute deadline we have put forward as part of our remediation acceleration plan is 2029, but we want to go much further. The Under-Secretary of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North and Kimberley (Alex Norris), and I have met with developers and others, and we continue to push really hard on this issue—it has been one of our No. 1 focuses.

[Pete Wishart (Perth and Kinross-shire) (SNP)]

I commend the Deputy Prime Minister on the way she is introducing this debate. There is another group of people who I do not think have been properly considered yet: those who have lost their property, or could not remortgage it or sell it at the market rate, because they had cladding issues. My constituent Crawford Wilson invested his life savings in a property, unaware at the time that it had cladding problems. This meant that he could not secure a remortgage and could not sell it for anything like the market value. It was finally repossessed, and he lost hundreds of thousands of pounds as a result. What advice could the Deputy Prime Minister offer my constituent, and what is she going to do to try to ensure that that situation is put right?

[Angela Rayner]

I thank the hon. Member for that intervention, which shows how the damage caused by the organisations that cladded those buildings and their systemic failures have had a real impact. That is why, since we were elected in July, my No. 1 focus has been trying to make sure that those buildings are safe and that remediation takes place. Seven years on is far too long for those buildings to still be unsafe, and later in my speech I will come on to some of the issues we are trying to resolve, including the people who are paying exorbitant insurance rates at this time.

Seven years on from the Grenfell Tower tragedy, thousands of people across the country still live in homes with unsafe cladding. The toll that this has placed on thousands of people is, I know, intolerable, with the financial worries, the impact on mental health and the lives put on hold. People have been unable to plan their futures, and may fear going to sleep in case something happens in the night, as it did in June 2017. This is a scandal. It permeates every aspect of the lives of those who live in unsafe buildings—buildings bought or rented in good faith—and it is completely unacceptable.

People must be and must feel safe in their homes, and we are taking a major step towards that with the statement laid in the House today. Our remediation acceleration plan sets out our ambitious measures to fix buildings faster, identify those still at risk and ensure that residents are supported through the remediation process. We are committed to getting homes fixed faster through the remediation acceleration plan. We aim to do that remediation by 2029 at the latest on all residential buildings of 18 metres or over with unsafe cladding, through a Government-funded scheme. By the end of 2029, every residential building of 11 metres or over with unsafe cladding will either have been remediated or have a date for completion, or the landlord will be liable for severe penalties.

We will introduce new legal obligations on landlords to remediate unsafe cladding, with severe penalties, including sanctions for inaction. We are backing this up with new funding and new guidance for regulators to drive remediation forward. We have a plan to tackle the remediation needed in the social sector to support social landlords to ensure that their stock is safe. The building safety levy and developers’ repayment of Government funds will ensure that the cost of fixing these buildings does not fall on the taxpayer. Above all, we will take measures to protect residents and leaseholders, who are the innocent parties in this, during remediation. This is our plan, and the Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North and Kimberley, will be able to share more of its details at the end of this debate.

Developers must play their part in accelerating remediation. They have already committed to fix or pay to fix unsafe buildings at an estimated cost of more than £3.4 billion, but progress has been too slow. Works have started in fewer than half of developers’ buildings known to be unsafe. That is why we have agreed a new joint plan with developers to accelerate remediation and improve the experience of residents, which we are publishing today. For the first time, developers are committing to achieve ambitious stretch targets to assess all their buildings by July 2025, and to start or complete remedial works on all their unsafe buildings by July 2027. To meet these stretch targets, developers will need to more than double the pace at which they have been assessing buildings and starting remediation work so far this year. Already more than 25 developers have signed up to the plan, bringing more than 95% of the buildings that developers need to remediate into scope, which is encouraging.

We are often reminded just how crucial decisive action to replace unsafe cladding is. Just last week, a fire at the Quadrangle building in Greater Manchester, a building that was remediated in 2021 through the ACM private sector cladding remediation fund, thankfully did not turn into an emergency situation. If the building had not been remediated, that situation could have been much more serious. To keep residents safe in their homes until remediation work has been carried out, we are extending the waking watch replacement fund until the spring of 2026. I will confirm the long-term plans at the end of the next spending review.

Too many leaseholders in buildings that need remediation face unaffordable insurance premiums, and this cannot continue. I can confirm that from today we will start working with insurers to consider whether, for the duration of the remediation programmes, the Government might support industry to reduce fire-related liabilities to lower the high insurance bills that leaseholders face. As part of our commitment to minimising unfair costs to leaseholders, I can also announce that we are tackling the problem of the unfair charges from those managing buildings insurance, and we have launched a consultation on that today.

I want the message to go out loud and clear that we expect the industry and those who build and maintain our homes to lead the way in creating a culture that puts the safety of residents first. Money is available to make buildings safe, but, incredibly, some landlords are still failing to act. Through their inaction, they are preventing homes from being made safe. It is outstandingly neglectful and a dereliction of responsibility. We will not stand for this any longer.