Buildings: Insulation

(asked on 2nd March 2021) - View Source

Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, if his Department will publish in full the evidential basis for the 18 metre threshold criteria required to apply for Government grants for the removal of dangerous cladding.


Answered by
Christopher Pincher Portrait
Christopher Pincher
This question was answered on 8th March 2021

We are taking decisive action to improve building safety and prioritising unsafe cladding which is a higher risk and can act as a fire accelerant – and is a greater risk in higher rise blocks. Home Office analysis of fire and rescue service statistics shows buildings between 18 and 30 metres are four times as likely to suffer a fire with fatalities or serious casualties than apartment buildings in general.  18 metres is also the height at which building standards become more restrictive in England and presumptions about firefighting tactics change


It is right that we prioritise action on higher rise buildings (over 18 metres) where risk to multiple households is greater when fire spreads. It is therefore the height criterion we have chosen for the Building Safety Fund and the Waking Watch Relief Fund. For the purposes of the Building Safety Fund we are allowing a tolerance of 30cm to this measurement so where there is appropriate evidence that a building measures 17.7 metres or above it will be eligible in regard to its height. This is to allow for measurement error, the potential for ground levels to have varied from the original design and the settlement of the building over time.

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