Asked by: Lord Young of Cookham (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what recent assessment they have made of the progress of the Building Safety Fund.
Answered by Lord Greenhalgh
The Secretary of State for Levelling Up made clear in his building safety statement on 10 January 2022 that the Government is focused on making sure the Building Safety Fund is more risk driven and delivered more quickly to protect leaseholders. The monthly Building Safety Fund statistics on gov.uk at: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/remediation-of-non-acm-buildings#building-safety-fund-registrations-private-sector-and-social-sector show the progress that is being made with the Fund. Over £1 billion of funding has been allocated and over a thousand buildings are proceeding with a full application to the Building Safety Fund. This means that owners of over 80 thousand homes within high-rise blocks are covered by Building Safety Fund applications and leaseholders and residents can be assured the fire risks caused by the unsafe cladding will be addressed at no cost to them.
Asked by: Lord Young of Cookham (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the statement on building safety by the Secretary of State for the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities on 10 January (HC Deb col 288), whether leaseholders who are buy-to-let landlords will be covered by the "protection for leaseholders" referred to.
Answered by Lord Greenhalgh
As set out in our statement to Parliament on Building Safety on 10 January 2022, building owners and industry should make buildings safe without passing on costs to leaseholders, and leaseholders living in their own medium rise buildings should not pay a penny to remediate historic cladding defects that are no fault of their own. We have clarified that we have no intention of excluding leaseholders who have moved out and sublet from the protections that will be in place (including those in shared ownership) for buildings below 18 metres in England. We will explore whether this support should extend to other leaseholders, such as buy-to-let landlords.
Asked by: Lord Young of Cookham (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask Her Majesty's Government when they will publish their Levelling Up White Paper.
Answered by Lord Greenhalgh
Levelling up is a transformative agenda and the Department’s priority is to produce a White Paper which matches our ambition, building on existing action we are already taking across Government and setting out a new policy regime that will drive change for years to come.
Work is progressing well and we plan to publish the White Paper soon.
Asked by: Lord Young of Cookham (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have to publish their review of the Vagrancy Act 1824.
Answered by Lord Greenhalgh
The Government is clear that no one should be criminalised simply for having nowhere to live and the time has come to reconsider the Vagrancy Act.
Work is ongoing to look at this complex issue and it is important that we look carefully at all options.
We will update on our findings in due course.
Asked by: Lord Young of Cookham (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have to suspend repossession of leasehold properties until potentially dangerous cladding in such properties has been replaced.
Answered by Lord Greenhalgh
The Government has announced a globally unprecedented investment in building safety and hundreds of thousands of leaseholders will be protected from the cost of replacing unsafe cladding on their homes.
On 10 February the Government announced it will provide an additional £3.5 billion grant funding for removal of unsafe cladding on buildings over 18 metres, which brings the total investment in building safety to an unprecedented £5 billion.
Lower-rise buildings between 11 and 18 metres, with a lower risk to safety, will gain new protection from the costs of cladding removal through a generous new financing scheme. As part of this financing scheme, no leaseholder will pay more than £50 per month towards the cost of cladding remediation.
This builds on steps already taken to support leaseholders, including £1.6 billion of funding to remediate unsafe cladding, the £30 million waking watch fund to help end excessive costs and new legislation in the Building Safety Bill which will ensure homes are made and kept safer in future.
The schemes will be launched in due course, and we will publish more details on how these will work as soon as we are in a position to do so.
The Government has worked with the lending industry and the regulators to prevent both homeowners and landlords from facing unaffordable bills or repossession if they can’t work, or if their tenants can’t pay rent due to the impact of coronavirus.
Mortgage holidays have been extended, with applications open to 31 March 2021. Borrowers that have been impacted by coronavirus and have not yet had a mortgage payment holiday will be entitled to a six-month holiday, and those that have already started a mortgage payment holiday will be able to top up to six months without this being recorded on their credit file. Current FCA guidance states all mortgage holidays must end by 31 July, so while no one can have more than a six-month deferral, any consumer applying now for their first payment holiday will not be able to take the full six months. Information on mortgage payment holidays is set out on the FCA website: https://www.fca.org.uk/news/press-releases/fca-confirms-support-mortgage-borrowers-impacted-coronavirus
The FCA has been clear that for borrowers who have taken six months’ holiday and continue to face ongoing financial difficulties, firms should continue to provide support through tailored forbearance options. This could include granting new mortgage payment holidays. Mortgage customers in this situation should speak to their lender to discuss their options.
A mortgage holiday is not the right solution for everyone, and a prolonged payment deferral may not be in a consumer’s best interest - it is important to remember that whilst someone takes a payment holiday, they will still owe the amount they don’t pay during the deferral period, and interest will continue to accrue. Where consumers can afford to re-start mortgage payments, it is in their best interest to do so.
Asked by: Lord Young of Cookham (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the consultation paper by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government Raising Accessibility standards for New Homes, published on 8 September 2020, when they plan to publish a response; and what plans they have to align the mandatory baseline for accessibility standards for new homes with the accessible and adaptable standard.
Answered by Lord Greenhalgh
Evidence gathered by the consultation on raising accessibility standards for new homes will help government consider whether to mandate a higher baseline accessibility standard or to reconsider the way existing optional standards are used. We are currently analysing responses and will publish a government response in due course.
Asked by: Lord Young of Cookham (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have to reduce the reliance on interim measures such as waking watch and evacuation management plans by residents of high-rise buildings awaiting remediation for building safety defects.
Answered by Lord Greenhalgh
The most effective way to make buildings with unsafe cladding safe and eliminate the need for interim measures and associated costs is to have the unsafe cladding removed as quickly as possible. That is why we are prioritising £1.6 billion public subsidy on remediation of unsafe cladding. However, we recognise residents’ concerns about the cost of waking watch measures and the lack of transparency of these costs. That is why we have collected and published information on waking watch costs. This will enable those that have commissioned it to make comparisons and challenge providers on unreasonable costs. The data is available at: www.gov.uk/government/publications/building-safety-programme-waking-watch-costs
The Government also welcomes the National Fire Chiefs Council update to its guidance on Simultaneous Evacuation published in October (available at: www.nationalfirechiefs.org.uk/Simultaneous-evacuation-guidance). We have asked the Fire Protection Board to advise Fire and Rescue Services on how best to operationalise the revised guidance including looking into other measures such as installing building-wide fire alarm systems to reduce the dependency on waking watches wherever possible.
Asked by: Lord Young of Cookham (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether the letter sent by the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government to Manchester City Council in August on planned 'smoke-free' pavement licences was agreed in advance with the Department of Health and Social Care.
Answered by Lord Greenhalgh
The national smoke-free seating condition in the Business and Planning Act was agreed with the Department of Health and Social Care, as was the associated guidance. Ministerial correspondence is not generally cleared across Government.
Asked by: Lord Young of Cookham (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have to provide a package of financial support to enable tenants to pay off arrears accrued due to the COVID-19 pandemic in order (1) to prevent the risk of evictions when the ban comes to an end, and (2) to support smaller landlords.
Answered by Lord Greenhalgh
The Government has established an unprecedented package of support to protect tenants and landlords throughout the Covid-19 pandemic, with support for businesses to pay staff salaries and strengthening the welfare safety-net with a nearly £9.3billion boost to the welfare system. This includes an extra £1billion to increase Local Housing Allowance (LHA) rates so that they cover the lowest 30% of market rents. These measures are supporting both landlords and tenants by enabling renters to continue paying their rent.
For those renters who require additional support, there is an existing £180 million of Government funding for Discretionary Housing Payments made available this year, an increase of £40 million from last year and which is for councils to distribute to support renters with housing costs.
We will continue to monitor the situation closely throughout the Autumn and Winter.
Asked by: Lord Young of Cookham (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the enactment of the Business and Planning Act 2020, how many local authorities have opted to make pavement licences subject to a smoke-free condition.
Answered by Lord Greenhalgh
The new pavement licence provisions provide vital support for businesses, particularly in the hard-hit hospitality sector, helping with their economic recovery following the impact of Covid-19 restrictions. Under the pavement licence provisions in the Business and Planning Act 2020 all pavement licences are subject to a national condition which requires provision for non-smoking seating. The Government will work with the Local Government Association to assess the uptake of the pavement licence provisions and the conditions that apply as part of this.