Fire Safety Bill

Peter Bottomley Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments
Monday 22nd March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)]

There is not the time to say what the Government have done for leaseholders. The Fire Safety Bill, in the form the Government want to return it to, if they get the House to reject the Lords amendments, would place an automatic, unchallengeable financial burden on residential leaseholders in building safety remediation costs, even in circumstances where a lease may have excluded such an obligation. I refer the Minister, if he has time, to the article by Martina Lees in The Sunday Times “Home” section about some of the building costs that are not justified.

The bishops’ amendments are intended to protect leaseholders from being solely responsible for the costs. The Bill strengthens the landlords’ and freeholders’ legal rights over leaseholders. The amendments provide for more balanced liability for costs. These Lords amendments should not be overturned. The alternative, which the Government are asking us to agree, wrongly and disproportionately disadvantages innocent leaseholders. Many are unable to pay, and they are frightened.

This is a Home Office Bill, and the Home Secretary gave this as her reason for rejecting previous Lords amendment 4:

“Because the issue of remediation costs is too complex to be dealt with in the manner proposed.”

I say, and I think people on both sides agree—and probably the Minister does so privately—that what is being proposed cannot be supported. It is too simple: it loads costs on leaseholders, who are the only people who cannot be responsible for putting right a building that they do not own and will never own, and of which in legal terms they are only the tenants.

I ask the Minister to ask his colleagues to let him agree to accepting these Lords amendments, and to let the leaseholders free.

[Mr Clive Betts (Sheffield South East) (Lab) [V]]

I support the Lords in the message it has sent back. The Lords is proposing very important changes to the Government’s position. First, not just leaseholders but tenants should not have to pay. For example, in a block where the social housing provider is the freeholder, according to the Government’s proposals, leaseholders would not have to pay, but social housing tenants—if it is not ACM cladding that is being removed—would have to pay through their rents for the removal of cladding. That tenants have to pay and leaseholders do not simply cannot be right.

We are not quite sure what costs leaseholders in blocks under 18 metres will face, because there is still an awful lot of vagueness and lack of clarity about what the Government’s loan scheme will actually mean. When the Minister for Building Safety and Communities came to our Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee recently, he said that leaseholders would not be responsible for paying the loan, but neither would freeholders; the charge would be on the building. A building cannot be legally responsible for a charge on a loan placed on it. Some organisation or some individual has to be responsible. Is it the freeholder? Is it the leaseholder? There is an awful lot of unclarity about that, and about how we limit leaseholders’ charges to £50 a month. There is a great deal of confusion. The Government are still working that through, so as things stand there cannot be an absolute assurance that leaseholders will not have to pay on blocks of under 18 metres.

Finally, there are issues other than cladding. It is not just that cladding will have to be taken off; very often, the cost of doing other fire safety work on blocks of flats is greater. Again, we were told that if the other work is associated with the removal of cladding, it will be covered by the Government’s financial help. If insulation is a composite part of a building’s structure along with the cladding, presumably it can be removed, as it is associated with the cladding. However, if the insulation is completely separate and distinct from the cladding, the Government funding might pay for the cladding removal but not the insulation removal. Very often, leaseholders simply cannot afford to pay for that, but the Government will not allow any of their funding to go ahead unless the leaseholders can find the additional costs.

None of those positions is acceptable. I support a position where neither leaseholders nor tenants are asked to pay to make their buildings fire-safe.

Fire Safety Bill

Peter Bottomley Excerpts

Consideration of Lords message
Tuesday 27th April 2021 Commons Chamber

[Christopher Pincher]

I thank all hon. and right hon. Members for their contributions today. The House will know that we have a duty to implement clear and effective legislation to support fire and building safety reform. We have an obligation in this place to make good law. While I entirely accept that the motivations of all those who have contributed today are not to damage the Fire Safety Bill, I have to tell them that the practical consequence of passing the Lords amendments would be to do that, because they are ineffective and defective. Let me explain why, before moving on to some of the other points that Members have made.

The amendments would prevent any type of remediation costs being passed on to leaseholders, even if the cost was very minor or if the leaseholder was responsible for damage, and that is not a proportionate response. There is no framework in the Lord Bishop of St Albans’ amendment to distinguish between different works. I think all Members would agree that the taxpayer should not be paying for minor costs, such as replacing a smoke alarm, and that if the leaseholder is responsible for breaking a smoke alarm, in all likelihood they should fix it. The amendment is also unclear on who should take responsibility for remediation works until a statutory funding scheme is in place to pay or direct the costs, and that would result in remediation being delayed, even in the case of minor defects, if routes of cost recovery are unclear.

[Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)]

Will my right hon. Friend give way?

[Christopher Pincher]

If my hon. Friend does not mind, I will not give way, because I have to conclude my remarks. Perhaps if I have a bit of time at the end, I will.

These orphan liabilities would leave leaseholders continuing to live in unsafe properties with no further clarity as to who will pay. It is important to ensure that taxpayers’ money is protected as much as possible and that remediation is not delayed unnecessarily in extended litigation such as we might find ourselves in. It is not the solution that leaseholders need or the one that the taxpayer deserves.

--- Later in debate ---

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

In order to observe social distancing, the Reasons Committee will meet in Committee Room 12.

[Sir Peter Bottomley]

On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. It will be observed that the Government’s majority without the Scots Nats was halved in the last vote.

I would not ask for guidance from the Chair in the Commons about procedure in the Lords, but were the Lords to send back another amendment different from the one we have been considering, but trying to take up the points raised in this Chamber, am I right in saying that the Government could table their own amendment tomorrow, which would absorb the points made in this House, so that leaseholders are not penalised in the way they would be if the Bill went through as it is at the moment?

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I thank the Father of the House for that point of order. Obviously it will be a matter for the Lords and the business managers to say how it will proceed from here.