Fire Safety Remedial Work: Leaseholder Liability

Steve Reed Excerpts

Thursday 19th April 2018 Commons Chamber

[Marsha De Cordova (Battersea) (Lab)]

I am pleased to have secured this important debate. The issue of liability for fire safety remedial work is of great concern to many Battersea residents, as it is to people in many parts of the country, and for good reason. The horror of the Grenfell fire made it clear, if greater clarity were needed, that there should be no complacency on fire safety.

While we await the final publication of the Hackitt review, which is investigating the fire safety regulatory system and identifying who is responsible for failures and what system is needed, the interim report stated that the regulatory system, at present, is “not fit for purpose.” I fear that is the result of successive Governments not treating fire safety with the appropriate importance.

Of the 158 social housing blocks with unsafe cladding, just seven have had the cladding fully replaced. One of the blocks waiting for work to begin is Castlemaine Tower in my Battersea constituency. Its residents have known for 10 months that their building, like Grenfell, has unsafe cladding. No data is available on the progress on privately owned blocks, and Wandsworth Council has not published the number of blocks that have the aluminium composite material cladding that has been deemed unsafe. Given the number of blocks in Battersea, it is imperative the council publish that information. I have requested the information from the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government.

The Government must get their act together and ensure that fire safety work is carried out, but to do that they need to resolve, as a matter of urgency, questions on what work needs to be done, who needs to do it and who should pay for it. It is the Government’s responsibility to resolve those questions and, so long as they do not do so, the risk of another tragedy is prolonged.

Here we arrive at the crucial question of leaseholder liability. I welcome members of the Sesame Apartments residents association to the Public Gallery. They have come to Westminster desperate to hear reassurance from the Government. They are leaseholders of an apartment block in Battersea that was completed just four years ago and that last year was found not to meet fire safety standards after a fire in the block damaged multiple apartments, revealing that compartmentalisation had failed.

Worryingly, the fire occurred while a “stay put” policy was in place. Subsequent testing found that the cladding was defective and in need of replacement. In the light of the fire safety failures, the “stay put” policy was changed to immediate evacuation, and a waking watch system was put in place as a temporary solution.

As we know, such fire safety failures need proper rectification, and that work needs to be paid for. The waking watch and fire alarm system are anticipated to cost approximately £700,000, which is more than £8,500 per flat. Replacing the cladding is expected to cost around £2 million, which is £25,000 per flat. In total, the cost per flat is estimated at between £30,000 and £40,000.

After a tribunal ruled last month that leaseholders of Cityscape in Croydon would be held liable for replacing defective cladding, the residents of Sesame Apartments fear the entirety of those eye-watering costs will fall on their shoulders, which cannot be right. They cannot be held liable for these costs. These are hard-working people who scrimped and saved to buy their flats.

[Mr Steve Reed (Croydon North) (Lab/Co-op)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate. She mentions Cityscape in Croydon North where the leaseholders have a similar problem to the residents she represents. When the issue has previously been raised in the Chamber, the Government have pointed the finger and said that the insurers of the builders, freeholders and managing agents should be bearing the cost of removing and replacing that cladding, but no legal obligation has ever been found on any of them.

The Government are leaving leaseholders hanging with unaffordable debt and living in homes that have become unsellable—homes that they fear are not safe to live in. Does my hon. Friend agree that the Government should act now to get the cladding removed from every building where it exists? They can sort out the legalities afterwards. The only body in a position to act now to keep people safe is the Government. Why do they keep refusing to do it?

[Marsha De Cordova]

I thank for my hon. Friend for making that valid point, which I will certainly be addressing. He is spot on in saying that the Government are the only people who can respond to this issue and deal with the problems that our leaseholders face.

So many of these people are first-time buyers, and many are living in shared ownership properties. They do not have tens of thousands of pounds to pay for the work that needs to be done, and they have done nothing wrong. They bought their flats in good faith and they are in no way responsible for the fire safety failures. To date, the Government have seemingly agreed, saying that, morally, leaseholders should not be held liable for these costs. But my constituents need those words to be backed up by action. For as long as that does not happen, the leaseholders will be beset by fear. After all, how would we feel if we were told that our home did not meet fire safety standards, that we might be asked to pay £40,000 to rectify that and that our largest financial asset, our home, was now a huge liability? That is the situation that residents of Sesame Apartments find themselves in.

I have heard from a teacher who lives in the block and who had hoped to move in order to start a family, but is now weighed down by this liability, unable to sell and trapped in her home. I have heard from a resident, who spoke to me about the heartbreak of the money they had saved for IVF—in vitro fertilisation—treatment now needing to be set aside for fire safety work. I have heard from another whose pride in getting a foot on the housing ladder was crushed when they were told that, just by owning 25% of a shared ownership property, they are now potentially liable for 100% of the costs. Every resident I have spoken to tells me of the stress and fear caused by this liability hanging over their head.

The same is true of leaseholders across the country. Why are leaseholders being put through this ordeal? The Hackitt review is identifying who was responsible for fire safety failures, but this is causing anguish. The review might conclude that the Government are responsible, because fire safety regulations are not fit for purpose. It might conclude that the building inspection regime is responsible, because some local authorities have privatised inspections, leading to a serious decline in standards. Or it might conclude that developers are responsible, because they have been cutting costs to maximise their profits. It might conclude any of or indeed all those things, but what it will categorically not conclude is that leaseholders are responsible—of course it won’t.

These are working people who have had no say over the regulations, or over the design or the building of the property, yet it seems that, legally, they are going to be held responsible for these life-shattering costs. As anyone would, they are attempting to contest that, but they tell me how powerless they feel in that process.

We are talking about a small community of hard-working people, but they are confronted by a web of opaque freeholders, management companies, insurers and unresponsive developers, none of whom wants to take responsibility. The residents do not have armies of lawyers at their disposal. It is a David and Goliath situation, and the law is not working for these people. But it not just about that, as for the corporations involved their profit lines are at stake, whereas for the residents it is their homes and their lives. There is a real concern that if this is allowed to run its course and the Government do not intervene, the working people will be paying for failures that are not of their own making—that is unacceptable.

The Government seem to recognise that, because they have already said on multiple occasions that they acknowledge that it is morally wrong for leaseholders to be held liable for these costs, but those must not be empty words. The Government have the power to intervene and make this right, and it is their responsibility to make this right. They need to do more than just encouraging freeholders not to pass on these costs. They need to do more than support the Leasehold Advisory Service. They need to step up to the plate and intervene on behalf of leaseholders.

There are actions that the Government could take. They could, and should, properly look to see whether the developers or the freeholders that profited from cost-cutting and lax regulations are liable for the costs, or they could cover the costs themselves, which is what the residents I have spoken to believe should happen.

If the Government refuse to do that, the least they could do, as suggested by one of the Sesame Apartments residents, is provide loans to cover the costs, thereby allowing fire safety remedial work to begin immediately. The loans could be attached to the freehold and stretched over the 100-year duration of the leasehold, with repayment instalments reflecting that. That would ensure that if leaseholders were held liable, the additional yearly service charge would be close to negligible. It would achieve the key requirements of any intervention: first, it would allow remedial work to begin as soon as possible, thereby minimising the risk and fear of fire; and, secondly, it would allow leaseholders to get on with their lives and not be weighed down by an unaffordable debt. I urge the Government to take action to achieve those goals.

I conclude with two straightforward questions for the Minister. First, it might become clear from the courts that leaseholders are legally liable for the costs. If that happened, does she think it would be acceptable? Put otherwise, does she think that residents should be held legally responsible for the costs of fire safety work, even though she knows that residents are in no way at fault?

Secondly, if leaseholders are found to be liable, what do the Government propose to do for those leaseholders who cannot afford the remedial work? I am asking, in essence, whose side the Government are on—David’s or Goliath’s. I thank the Sesame Apartments residents for coming today. I know that they will be listening with interest to what the Minister has to say.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Mrs Heather Wheeler)]

I thank the hon. Member for Battersea (Marsha De Cordova) for speaking so passionately about the situation in which some of her constituents find themselves. I thank all Members for their contributions. I recognise that the recent fire in Sporle Court will mean that fire safety is at the forefront of people’s minds in Battersea, although we understand that on that occasion there were no injuries.

Let me begin by making it clear in the widest sense that the Government are committed to promoting fairness and transparency for leaseholders in England. To that end, on 21 December 2017, we announced a package of measures to tackle abuses and unfair practices in the leasehold market. That includes introducing legislation to prohibit the development of new build leasehold houses other than in exceptional circumstances, and restricting ground rents in newly established leases of flats to zero financial value. We are working with the Law Commission to support existing leaseholders, including by making buying a freehold or extending a lease easier, faster, fairer and cheaper. With that context in mind, it is hugely important that leaseholders, like any other residents, are kept safe in their homes.

The fire at Grenfell Tower was a terrible tragedy. The Government are determined to learn the lessons and take all necessary steps to ensure that nothing like it can ever happen again. I wish to set out some of the steps that the Government have taken since the tragedy. The Department’s building safety programme, set up immediately after the fire, is working hard to ensure that all high-rise residential buildings are safe from the threat of fire, and that residents feel safe in them. To support that, the Secretary of State appointed an expert panel to ensure that the necessary steps are taken to ensure the safety of residents of high-rise buildings. Following the panel’s recommendations, the Government provided advice to building owners on the interim measures that they should put in place to ensure the safety of their residents. We swiftly identified social housing blocks and public buildings with unsafe cladding. All the affected social sector buildings that we have identified have these measures in place.

[Mr Reed]

The Minister will recall the lethal fire at Lakanal House in 2009. In 2013, the coroner who investigated that tragedy urged the Government to change the fire safety regulations that govern the use of cladding—specifically, approved document B. The Government failed to amend that regulation in 2013 and now, five years later, they have still failed to amend it. The criticism was that it was unclear what kind of cladding could and could not be put on a building. For that reason, flammable cladding exists on hundreds of blocks today. Will the Minister explain why the Government have done nothing in the nine years since Lakanal House?

[Mrs Wheeler]

The important thing is that the Hackitt review has already released interim recommendations, which we have accepted. We await the review to report later this summer. That will be the answer going forward.

All the social housing blocks and affected social sector buildings that we swiftly identified had the measures in place. In parallel, we tested different combinations of cladding and insulation to see which of them met the building regulations guidance. We published consolidated advice in September, confirming the results of the tests with advice for building owners. We have also been working with building owners and industry to support remediation work.

At the same time, the Government asked Dame Judith Hackitt to undertake an independent review of building regulations and fire safety to ensure that buildings are safe in future. We are taking forward all of the recommendations for Government contained in the interim report, and look forward to the publication of her final report shortly.

We believe we have identified all affected social housing blocks and public buildings. With regard to private sector buildings, the Government have made the testing facility at the Building Research Establishment available free of charge, and we continue to urge all building owners to submit samples for testing if they think that they may have unsafe cladding. In addition, the Secretary of State wrote to all local authorities in August asking them to identify privately owned buildings with potentially unsafe cladding in their area in line with their statutory duties.

[Mrs Wheeler]

I hear what the hon. Lady says. We have close contacts with Wandsworth Council.

In addition, the Secretary of State wrote to all local authorities in August asking them to identify these properties. The majority of local authorities recognised the urgency of that work and provided relevant information, and we are very grateful for their hard work. However, this is not a straightforward task, particularly when building owners cannot be traced or are unresponsive. We have been in constant dialogue with local authorities ever since. Last month, to support local authorities in that work, we announced a financial support package of £1 million to assist the most affected local authorities in identifying the remaining private high-rise buildings with potentially unsafe cladding.

We are progressing work to issue a statutory direction as to local authorities’ reviews of housing conditions in their area in respect of cladding-related issues. We are also working to publish additional operating guidance to support local authorities in assessing the risks to residents posed by potentially unsafe cladding.

These measures will help local authorities to take enforcement action to ensure that hazards in residential buildings in their areas are remediated as quickly as possible. I am confident that these steps will strengthen local authorities’ hands when carrying out this work. I can assure hon. Members that, as soon as we are notified of buildings with potentially unsafe cladding, we work with local authorities and the National Fire Chiefs Council to ensure that interim measures are put in place.

The Government have been clear that remediation should be done as quickly as possible, but it should also be done properly. Let us be clear: the remediation of buildings with ACM cladding is a complex process, involving major construction work which needs to be planned, consulted on and carried out carefully. Rushing any phase of the remediation process could jeopardise the safety of residents. I am encouraged that remediation has started on 103 affected social sector buildings and that, of those, seven have finished remediation work. There is clearly a long way to go, but that is significant progress.

I understand that funding is a concern for Wandsworth Council. In the social sector, all the local authorities and housing associations that we have spoken to have indicated that they have no plans to pass on the costs of essential remediation work to individual flat owners within their buildings. We will consider financial flexibilities for local authorities that are concerned about funding essential fire safety works to the buildings that they own.

In the private sector, we continue to urge those with responsibility to follow the lead from the social sector and not attempt to pass on costs. They can do that by meeting costs themselves or looking at alternative routes such as insurance claims, particularly warranties, or legal action.

[Mr Reed]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mrs Wheeler]

No, I am going to finish.

We are aware of cases in Battersea where freeholders are seeking to do just that.

[Mr Reed]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mrs Wheeler]

No, thank you.

Where building owners are seeking to pass on remediation costs to leaseholders, it is important that leaseholders can access specialist advice to understand their rights. We have provided additional funding to the Leasehold Advisory Service—LEASE—which provides independent, free, initial advice to leaseholders to ensure that they are aware of their rights and are supported to understand the terms of their leases. LEASE continues to provide valuable support to affected leaseholders around the country. On 15 March, the Secretary of State announced an industry roundtable on the barriers to the remediation of buildings with unsafe aluminium composite material cladding.

[Mr Reed]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mrs Wheeler]

No, I will not.

I hope that the points I have made have reassured—

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Reed]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mrs Wheeler]

No, I will not, sir.

I hope that the points I have made have reassured hon. Members just how seriously we are treating the building safety issues that the terrible fire at Grenfell Tower brought to light, and our commitment to supporting leaseholders and all residents throughout this process.

Question put and agreed to.

Grenfell Update

Steve Reed Excerpts

Thursday 22nd March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

Ever since this terrible tragedy, my right hon. Friend the Business Secretary has been looking at this issue. The hon. Gentleman will know that certain criteria have to be in place before a product recall can happen, and I know that, in the light of this tragedy, the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy is looking at this again.

[Mr Steve Reed (Croydon North) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Secretary of State spoke earlier about the need for more empathy and emotional intelligence, but he has shown precious little of that towards the tens of thousands of people across the country who are still living in residential blocks that are covered in flammable, Grenfell-style cladding. There is no point in him pointing the finger at developers and builders, because nobody has yet shown any legal basis under which they can be made to pay, so if the Government do not act, the cladding stays up and we risk a second Grenfell Tower. When will he stop talking, start acting and make these people’s homes safe by taking that cladding down?

[Sajid Javid]

The first point to emphasise for everyone in that situation, including the hon. Gentleman’s constituents, is that their buildings are not unsafe. That is a result of the interim measures that have been implemented, including with regard to fire wardens. It would be wrong unnecessarily to make people worry that they are living in unsafe buildings, because measures have been taken. He is right to point to the longer-term action that is needed. He talks about legal responsibilities, but there is also a moral responsibility, and that has worked in some cases. I think that there will be more cases in which builders and freeholders step up but, as I have told him before, we are reviewing the situation and looking at what more can be done.

Fire Safety and Cladding

Steve Reed Excerpts

Tuesday 6th March 2018 Westminster Hall

[Mr Gary Streeter (in the Chair)]

Before I call Mr Reed to open our debate on this important matter, you can all see that there is a cast of thousands. This is a very important subject. When Mr Reed has sat down, I will let you know exactly what the time limits will be. You should plan for three or four minutes, and we will see how we go.

[Mr Steve Reed (Croydon North) (Lab/Co-op)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered cladding and remedial fire safety work.

Thank you for calling me to speak, Mr Streeter. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. I am grateful so many colleagues have turned up to the debate, which emphasises how significant this issue is for so many of our constituents.

I first came to the issue because of a block called Citiscape in my constituency. A group of residents came to see me because the block has the same kind of cladding on it as Grenfell Tower: aluminium composite material—ACM—cladding with a polyethylene core. Polyethylene is a kind of compressed paraffin. At Grenfell, this cladding had the equivalent combustibility to 32,000 litres of petrol over the outside of the building, so it is understandable that Citiscape’s residents were so concerned.

The residents were told that it would cost them as leaseholders up to £31,000 per flat to remove the cladding—a bill many of them simply could not afford—and that if everybody did not pay, none of the work would start. One older resident had to cancel his move to a care home because the flat he was going to sell to pay for that move was unsellable because of the cladding on the building. These people are stuck in a building that they describe as a deathtrap, unable to move and unable to afford the cost of making their homes safe.

The industry estimates that some 800 blocks across the country have flammable cladding: 300 are council-owned and will eventually be made safe, although it is worrying that nine months after Grenfell only three have so far been completely re-clad, and around 500 blocks are privately owned, but the Government are doing nothing to help the people living in them.

[John Howell (Henley) (Con)]

The hon. Gentleman has made a good start to an important debate. Does he have ideas for what more could be done to encourage owners and landlords to improve or replace the cladding on the buildings that they own?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Reed]

I am grateful for that question; I intend to cover exactly that in my speech. I am going to argue that it is the Government’s responsibility to remove the cladding because their flawed regulatory system is what allowed it to go up in the first place.

When I challenge the Secretary of State on this, he justifies doing nothing by pointing the finger at freeholders, whom he claims have a moral responsibility to replace the cladding. The problem is that a moral responsibility is not the same as a legal responsibility. Freeholders, like leaseholders, developers, managing agents and insurers, all deny legal liability, and so do the Government. It could take years for the courts to resolve this and all that time people would be left living in fear. On average, there is one fire every month linked to this kind of cladding. Eventually, one will not be put out in time. Is the Minister really going to do nothing and risk a second Grenfell Tower fire?

[Emma Dent Coad (Kensington) (Lab)]

Decades of inaction led to the fire at Grenfell Tower and the loss of, now, 72 lives. All the fine words and sympathy in the world will not save lives. We need regulation now and a commitment of Government finance. What are we waiting for?

[Mr Reed]

I completely agree. I hope colleagues will forgive me if I restrict the number of interventions I take. There are so many people trying to get in on the debate that I would like to leave room for them if I can.

The Housing Minister told the House of Commons last month that he recognises no systemic problem with the fire safety regime. Let us look briefly at what he thinks is good enough. The Building Research Establishment’s fire testing system is so weak that manufacturers can design the testing rigs that test their own materials, and can then keep quiet about how many tests their materials fail before they eventually get a result they want. Developers, builders and buyers are never told, because the test results are treated as commercially confidential. Conflicts of interest are everywhere in this system. The BRE makes money by running tests on flammable materials—

[Karen Lee (Lincoln) (Lab)]

Will my hon. Friend give way briefly?

[Mr Reed]

Yes, but for the last time.

[Karen Lee]

The interim Hackitt report asserted on fire safety:

“Those responsible for high-risk and complex buildings should be held to account to a higher degree.”

Does my hon. Friend agree that after nine months the Conservative Government have shown no willingness to act?

[Mr Reed]

I agree, but I hope that we will hear from the Minister that things have changed.

The BRE makes up to £40,000 per test that it conducts for manufacturers. As it also drafts the guidance, as an organisation it has a financial interest in permitting the use of combustible materials that it then tests. The fire safety tests after Grenfell were carried out by Kingspan, which manufactured part of the materials on Grenfell in the first place. Some individuals from the BRE who drafted the Government’s flawed guidance are now advising Ministers that there is not a problem with the regulations that they drafted. What a surprise! It is even possible to bypass safety tests completely by paying somebody to carry out a desktop study, which does not involve doing any testing whatever. The privatised National House Building Council makes money by signing off flammable cladding that has never been tested, and because flammable materials—combustible materials—are cheaper to make, the industry has a perverse incentive to keep costs down by using combustible cladding.

No other country in the European Union permits a system this lax. Many EU countries do not permit the use of combustible cladding at all. The UK building industry has alerted the Government to materials authorised by the BRE that subsequently failed fire safety tests in other countries. The Government chose to do nothing. The Association of British Insurers, the Royal Institute of British Architects, the Association of Residential Managing Agents and other building industry groups all want flammable cladding banned.

Back in 2013, the coroner investigating the deadly Lakanal House fire in Southwark told the Government to amend fire safety guidance

“with particular regard to the spread of fire over the external envelope of a building”.

She said that BRE Approved Document B, which relates to fire safety, was unclear and needed to be reviewed. However, the Communities Secretary at the time, Eric Pickles, did not do that. Nor have a string of Housing Ministers—every one since then—taken any action, including the Prime Minister’s chief of staff, Gavin Barwell. The current Housing Minister is relatively new in post. He could take a different course. I hope he will, but it is a worrying start that a consultation is under way on further weakening these already weak fire safety regulations by extending the use of desktop studies instead of insisting on rigorous, independent fire safety tests every time.

The industry has repeatedly asked the Government for clear and unequivocal advice on how to deal with the various forms of flammable cladding being found on hundreds of buildings. I wrote to the Secretary of State in January asking for the same on the industry’s behalf. As of today, the Government have given no direction at all on how these cases are to be dealt with.

After Grenfell, the Government said that cladding with a polyethylene core, like that on Citiscape in my constituency, does not comply with the guidance. The Prime Minister repeated that claim, yet I have here a certificate signed by Sir Ken Knight, chair of the Government’s independent expert panel on fire safety and a director of the BRE Trust, that says that it does comply. Quite simply, the Government are all over the place. They do not have a clue what is going on. Every single loophole and error that led to Lakanal House and Grenfell Tower is still in place. This is no one else’s fault and no one else’s moral responsibility except the Government’s.

Thousands of frightened people living in blocks with flammable cladding need to hear from the Minister today that it will be taken down without delay. They do not need any more buck-passing. They cannot afford to spend years in the courts while the cladding remains on their buildings. The Government’s flawed fire safety regime created this mess; the Government must now clear it up. We cannot risk a second Grenfell Tower. The time for the Minister to act is now.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Reed]

I am grateful to everybody who has taken part in today’s debate and provided such powerful testimony from across the country. The Minister seems to be heavily relying on the expert panel that he mentioned, but that panel is chaired by the man who signed off the kind of cladding on Grenfell as safe—I have the document that shows it here, and will give it to the Minister afterwards. I wonder whether he should question a little more, rather than just listen to the advice that he is receiving.

The industry is still very confused about what it needs to do when this kind of cladding is found on buildings. The Department needs to issue clearer advice. Finally, we bailed out the banks when they broke the banking system. Why can we not bail out leaseholders, who are innocent victims of the Government’s failed, flawed fire safety regime?

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered cladding and remedial fire safety work.

Grenfell Tower

Steve Reed Excerpts

Monday 5th February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Dominic Raab]

We are in constant dialogue, so the suggestion that the council has not heard a peep out of the Government is not accurate or responsible. I will chase up the hon. Gentleman’s specific question and ensure that we get a resolution as swiftly as possible. We are having detailed conversations. We often ask further questions of local authorities and they come back with the specifications. We then know how to get the issue resolved properly.

[Mr Steve Reed (Croydon North) (Lab/Co-op)]

I fear that the Minister has been misadvised. Government guidance in paragraph 12.7 of approved document B still permits the use of cladding with a polyethylene core, which industry experts advise is dangerously combustible. It is still being put on buildings today, including on one block in Lewisham, because Ministers have consistently ignored professional advice from the building industry. Hundreds of other buildings across the country are affected, and an average of one fire a month is already being linked to such cladding. When will the Minister issue clear advice on what action should be taken in all circumstances where limited combustibility cladding is in place? When will he order its immediate removal from every residential block where it is present, which includes Citiscape in Croydon?

[Dominic Raab]

The hon. Gentleman is wrong to suggest that we have not taken the expert advice. We have consistently done that and have acted on it, but I am happy to look again at the material he mentioned. I have been involved in relation to the Citiscape case in Croydon and we have made it clear to the freeholder there, just as we have done everywhere else, that there is a moral case for avoiding any unreasonable costs to leaseholders or tenants. The leaseholders and tenants also of course have the option of going to the first-tier tribunal to settle an issue legally, and it would be wrong for Ministers to interfere in that process.

Oral Answers to Questions

Steve Reed Excerpts

Monday 22nd January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

I do not think that that is still the case. However, the hon. Gentleman raises an important point about the need to review the guidance and the regulations themselves. That point was made clear by Dame Judith Hackitt in the interim report that she published last month, the recommendations of which we accepted in full.

[Mr Steve Reed (Croydon North) (Lab/Co-op)]

Citiscape is a residential block in Croydon with the same flammable cladding as Grenfell Tower, and its residents fear that they are living in a deathtrap. The Secretary of State has told them that the responsible person should take action, but the freeholder, the developer, the managing agent and the insurer all deny liability, and the cladding stays in place while legal wrangles go on. There is only one responsible person left, so when will the Secretary of State take action to remove the dangerous cladding, and to keep people and their families safe?

[Sajid Javid]

I am happy to reiterate that the responsible person in such situations is clearly the freeholder. Whatever the legal case might be, the freeholder should take responsibility. My hon. Friend the Minister for Housing has spoken to the chief executive officer of Proxima GR Properties, the company in this case, and is engaged in dialogue to try to see what we can do to ensure that it does the right thing.