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

To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what steps he is taking to help ensure that affected homeowners are not charged unaffordable remedial costs for historic fire safety defects.

Building owners and developers should make buildings safe to live in and it should not fall to leaseholders to pay the price when they have failed to do so. The Government is focused on protecting leaseholders, who bought their flats in good faith, and now face unaffordable costs.

The Government is investing an unprecedented £5.1 billion to fund the cost of replacing unsafe cladding for leaseholders in residential buildings 18 metres and over in England. This will make homes safer and support those who, through no fault of their own, have been unable to sell their property. Fire risk is lower in buildings under 18 metres and costly remediation work is usually not needed.