Fire Safety Bill

Debate between Peter Bottomley and Christopher Pincher

Wednesday 28th April 2021 Commons Chamber

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

Will the Minister give way?

[Christopher Pincher]

I will, of course, give way to the Father of the House, as I was unable to do so yesterday due to time constraints.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Peter Bottomley]

I am grateful to the Minister, and he knows I am trying to play the ball and not the person. The question is not the small amounts but the large amounts. It is estimated that the cost of remediation may go up to £15 billion. The Government are providing £5 billion, which leaves £10 billion that may fall on the shoulders of leaseholders. We are moving from a situation that might be ironic for some, to one that is irenic for more. The point of the amendment is that it needs to be met by Government, and it needs to be met in good time, or else many people will not be able to meet the demand to pay for the cost of remediation, and forfeiture will follow. That will happen in a shorter timescale than the one talked about by my right hon. Friend the Member for North Somerset (Dr Fox).

[Christopher Pincher]

I certainly accept my hon. Friend’s assurance that he is playing the issue, as he always does, and not the man. As he rightly says, we propose to spend £5.1 billion of public money on remediating the tallest buildings, as directed by the Hackitt report and its recommendations.

We have also said that as a result of our tax on the development industry, which the Chancellor will consult on imminently, we will raise a further £2 billion. We have also said that we will introduce a tall buildings levy. Developers themselves are placing more money on the table. Taylor Wimpey has now placed a further £125 million on the table for remediation, and Persimmon £75 million. The amounts are building up. We have also suggested a very advantageous financing scheme for those buildings below 18 metres that may require some remediation.

I think all Members would agree that the taxpayer should not be paying for every cost associated with the provisions of the Fire Safety Bill, but that is the risk, because the scope of the amendments that have been tabled is far too broad to provide a sensible solution. Lords amendment 4L is also unclear on who should take responsibility for remediation works until a statutory scheme is in place to pay the costs. That would result in all types of remediation being delayed—a really unsatisfactory outcome for leaseholders. Leaseholders also will not thank us for voting through an amendment that will generate lots of litigation that they may need to pay for.

The amendment would prevent the passing on of remediation costs, but it does not define what those costs are. That is a recipe for litigation and a recipe for delay. There is a lack of clarity on the definition of remedial work and what may be attributable to the provisions in this Bill, in other Acts or in none. How would Members suggest that we disaggregate the legislation under which works are carried out and the definition to differentiate between remediation, maintenance or improvement? It is a recipe for litigation and a recipe for delay.

In effect, it may not be possible to relieve leaseholders and tenants from all costs for remedial works attributable to the Bill without breaching subsidy control rules—a form of state aid. Further detailed consideration would be needed about that, too. Practically speaking, drafting legislation is, as many Members will know, a complex matter that cannot be dealt with in the timeframe proposed by the amendment, and to provide an arbitrary deadline is neither helpful nor practical.

There is a common theme uniting these points. The amendments will not work. They will not help leaseholders. They are not detailed enough for a complex and intricate problem of this nature. We have seen the key elements of this amendment time and again, and this House has voted them down time and again. Yet time and again, peers and the Opposition—unintentionally, I trust—seem set on reinjecting uncertainty into the market, which cannot help leaseholders. I respectfully ask the House to reject this amendment, so that we return a further clear and consistent message to the other place.

Fire Safety Bill

Debate between Peter Bottomley and Christopher Pincher

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.

Leaseholders and Cladding

Debate between Peter Bottomley and Christopher Pincher

Tuesday 24th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Christopher Pincher]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his urgent question and for welcoming the proposals that we have tabled in the draft Building Safety Bill. He asks a number of important questions.

First, the hon. Gentleman asks whether the building safety charge will be retrospective. We envisage that the building safety charge will cover ongoing costs that leaseholders may have to pay for legal costs, building safety inspections and the like. In our proposals, we have said that the Secretary of State will be able to prescribe costs to ensure that unfair building safety charge costs do not fall unreasonably on the leaseholder.

We will of course look very carefully at the 80-page report from the Select Committee. I think there are somewhere north of 40 recommendations in the report. We want to look at it carefully and considerately, because we recognise it forms an important part of our answer to the challenge of building safety. I hope that we can develop a cross-party approach to our further scrutiny of the Bill when it comes before Parliament.

The hon. Gentleman asked me whether leaseholders will pay any costs at all. The point of introducing £1.6 billion of public money is to make sure that in the buildings that are most at risk and where there is no means to pay, the state steps in and supports those leaseholders, but, fundamentally, we expect developers and owners to step up and execute their responsibility to pay where buildings have been defective.

I cannot say that there will not be some costs at some point related to some defect in historical building safety that will not fall upon the leaseholder, but we want to make sure, through the public money that we are spending and through the work of Michael Wade, that we find innovative solutions to make sure that such costs are as minimal as possible. We cannot write an open cheque on behalf of the taxpayer. That would send the wrong signal to developers and those who are responsible for these buildings that they do not have to pay because the taxpayer will.

The hon. Gentleman asks about my noble Friend the Building Safety Minister in the other place. I can tell him that Lord Greenhalgh is working round the clock to find solutions to the challenges that face leaseholders up and down the country. He is determined, with the work that he is doing with insurers, developers and the financial services sector, to ensure that we come up with those solutions, and I look forward to working with him closely as the Bill, which he will introduce to Parliament, works its way through both Houses.

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

It is on record that I am a leaseholder, but I am not affected by these proposals or problems.

The hon. Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Justin Madders) and I chair the all-party parliamentary group on leasehold and commonhold reform. We give our support to the work of the Select Committee, which, in this report, as in its previous one on lease renters, has laid out starkly one of the problems of some particular tenants. Social tenants do not have to pay, ordinary tenants do not have to pay; it is leaseholder tenants who have been lumbered with unimaginable anxiety and with costs beyond possible chance of payment. Until we get a full grip not just on the very high buildings and the aluminium cladding but on all the problems, including the developers who used wood for balconies in ways that were against the house building regulations, we are going to be left with a frozen part of the housing market in every single one of our constituencies.

We are grateful for the work that my right hon. Friend and his colleagues have done, but he should go on paying attention, as I think Lord Greenhalgh has, to the work of the Leasehold Knowledge Partnership, which was the first campaigning charity to get a grip of the scale of the problem. Also, will he say a word about waking watches, which are going on too long and at too high a cost?

[Christopher Pincher]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his contribution and for his ongoing interest in and commitment to this very important area of work. As I said earlier, we do not want leaseholders to carry the burden of these costs. That is why we are working with Michael Wade, who has a 40-odd-year history in the insurance market, to find innovative solutions to what is a very complicated problem. It is why we have also put aside a significant amount of public money in this financial year to remediate the buildings that are most at risk where the owners have no other means of paying.

My hon. Friend also asks about waking watch. We have published data on the costs of waking watch so that leaseholders are able to see the relative differences in charges by waking watch providers. It is entirely wrong that some providers charge so much, and I would point leaseholders to that data so that they can better understand where they may get better service. They may also know that alarm systems can pay for themselves within seven weeks and obviate the need for waking watch.

Town and Country Planning

Debate between Peter Bottomley and Christopher Pincher

Wednesday 30th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Christopher Pincher]

Character and aspect are important, and if the proposed building were to be out of character with what is already there, the local authority would be quite within its rights to deny prior approval.

To ensure that homes delivered under permitted development rights are of the quality that people want and expect, the regulations we have introduced include a requirement for adequate natural light to be provided in all habitable homes.

[Sir Peter Bottomley]

Will the Minister give way?

[Christopher Pincher]

If my hon. Friend will forgive me, I will carry on, but I am always happy to speak to him beyond the Chamber, as we have done on several occasions in the recent past. If I have time, I will give way to him at the end of my remarks.

While independent research by my Department shows that the vast majority of homes built through permitted development rights are no different in terms of quality from those that come through ordinary planning applications, I have heard powerful representations from Members across the House—including from my right hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) and my hon. Friend the Member for Finchley and Golders Green (Mike Freer), who have been tireless advocates on this issue—that there are a small number of developers who abuse these rights to build homes that are unacceptably small.

Those bad developers are damaging the credibility of these rights, which are crucial for regenerating brownfield land across our country. That is why I am pleased to confirm today that the Government will stamp this out once and for all. We will legislate so that all homes built through permitted development rights must meet space standards. They will be required to meet the nationally described space standards that the Government have already published, which will mean that permitted development rights can no longer be seen as a route to undercut housing standards. This Government will fight for increased standards and improved quality of design. We want to build more, we want to build better and we want to build beautiful.

We want to support local authorities through this change. That is why we have separately introduced a fee for new homes created under these rights of £334 per unit. The hon. Member for Weaver Vale (Mike Amesbury) knows that, because he sat opposite me when we debated the SI, and he did not say no to it. The money is there to help local authorities.

It seems that Labour has already decided—it has decided to say no. It is turning its back on the people it used to represent. It does not want to build homes for hard-working, aspirational owners and renters because it failed to build them, and it is ashamed to admit that. Look at the failure of Mayor Khan in London. Look at the failure of the Labour Administration in Wales, where in 2018 they built just 57 council homes. Could they do worse? Yes, they could: last year, they built just 12—not even enough to house a Welsh rugby team. That is the failure of the Labour party to build decent homes for people in this country.

We will not follow Labour’s route. We will continue to support and build the homes that this country needs with an unwavering commitment and priority. We will build homes for first-time buyers. We will build affordable homes for renters. We will reimagine and rebuild our brownfield sites and town centres. These regulations are an important tool in helping us drive up delivery by simplifying and speeding up the planning system. I call upon the House to reject the negative views of the Labour party and support our determination to build and build and build again for the people of this country, who deserve good homes.