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

To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the reports about their tower block safety plan, whether the UK house building industry will be required to pay for remedies to buildings constructed by overseas developers; and if so, why.

The Secretary of State’s statement made clear that no leaseholder living in a building above 11m will ever face any costs for fixing dangerous cladding. We expect industry to make right their historic mistakes by funding and fixing the stock of unsafe buildings they have built over decades.

We are offering industry a window of opportunity, to work with the department through open and transparent talks to agree a settlement that will restore confidence and ensure the industry that caused the problem pays to fix it. Over recent weeks we have held several roundtables with developers and cladding and insulation to make our position clear, and talks are ongoing.

In addition, the residential property developer tax (RPDT) will be charged on the profits of companies carrying out residential property development. The tax is part of a wider plan to bring an end to unsafe cladding, provide reassurance to homeowners and support confidence in the housing market.

The Building Safety Levy will be charged on any residential building that requires building control approval. It is not based on developer location or profit margin. Moreover, if amendments to the Building Safety Bill are enacted, courts will also be given new powers to grant Building Liability Orders to allow developers to be sued where they have used shell companies to manage specific developments and avoid taking responsibility for their actions. The court may choose to apply a Building Liability Order to a developer based overseas if it is an associated company, which would be enforced in the normal manner.