Flats and Shared Housing: Fire Risk
Esther McVey Excerpts(4 years, 3 months ago)
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The Minister for Housing (Esther McVey)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Gray.
I thank the hon. Member for Reading East (Matt Rodda) for securing this debate and for speaking so thoughtfully on fire safety last week in the Grenfell Tower public inquiry debate. I am also grateful to all Members who brought key issues before us today and made pertinent points. I thank the hon. Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts), the Chair of the Select Committee. His job is to scrutinise, and he has been present to do exactly that. There is much—if not all—that we agree on, but the question is how we deliver safety to everyone so that when they go to bed of a night time, they know that they are in a safe home and can feel safe and secure.
I hope to get through the points that everyone has made as best I can, but I will also recap briefly some of the key things that we have already done, because people have asked what has been done. The Government have committed to bringing about the biggest changes in building safety regulation in almost 40 years. After the Grenfell Tower tragedy, we took decisive action on the safety risks exposed by that fire. We banned the use of combustible materials in cladding systems on high-rise tower blocks and committed to £600 million of funding to replace aluminium composite materials of the Grenfell style. In the autumn, we committed to adopting in full the recommendations of the Grenfell Tower inquiry phase 1 report and, on 21 January, we published our Government response to that report. However, as more issues arise, the Secretary of State says that we will widen up to address concerns as they are brought forward.
We have established the new regulator, and we are doing that at pace. We are ensuring that the regulator has the information it needs. We are reviewing fire safety guidance and the sprinkler and fire safety measures, going further on combustible materials, which the hon. Member for Sheffield South East spoke about. We are providing clear advice to building owners, setting clear expectations for all residential buildings, for remediation of fire doors—that was raised—ensuring that there is a more comprehensive assessment of building risk, speeding up the remediation of unsafe ACM cladding, reviewing all remediation timescales and ensuring sufficient action. Inaction will not be allowed. We will bring forward the fire safety Bill and the building safety Bill to ensure that the necessary remediation happens. We will also support those who were affected. I agree wholeheartedly that that must be done at pace. The hon. Member for Reading East talked about the enormous scale of the task. What we do has to be thorough and rigorous, but it has to go at pace.
The Government have also accepted the independent Dame Judith Hackitt review of building safety, and we will introduce that legislation. We expect all housing developers not only to deliver good-quality housing, but to deliver it on time and to treat house buyers fairly. We intend to legislate to introduce a requirement for developers of new home buildings to belong to a new homes ombudsman, to protect the interests of home buyers and to hold developers to account when things go wrong. The hon. Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty) raised that point. What are those developers doing, how are we bringing them to account and are they delivering the building—the homes—that people expect?
Mr Betts
The new homes ombudsman is an interesting idea, and we look forward to hearing from the Government about the timetable for that legislation. Will the ombudsman have teeth? If it finds one of those scandalous situations in which developers have built shoddy homes, will individuals be able to get compensation? Will the ombudsman be able to ensure that the compensation is paid?
Esther McVey
The hon. Gentleman is correct. The ombudsman must have teeth so that it can support homeowners and ensure that they get full recompense. It must have teeth so that they will not be needed, and so that people follow the rules, the guidelines and the regulations.
Members have talked about sprinkler system safety. Our consultation on sprinklers and other measures for new build flats is now closed, and we have carefully considered the responses. The Secretary of State has said that he is minded to lower the height threshold from 18 metres to 11 metres. We will set out detailed proposals on that and the plans for other aspects in the full technical review of the fire guidance in February.
In December 2018, the Government banned the use of combustible materials on the external walls of high-rise buildings, and my Department has concluded the review into the effectiveness of the ban. Last week, the Department launched a consultation on the ban, including on lowering the height threshold from 18 to 11 metres. As I said, when things come forward, we have to look afresh, and that is why there has been a wider consultation.
David Linden
I share the frustrations of the hon. Member for Croydon Central (Sarah Jones). The Government seem often to conduct reviews and consultations on issues where action has already been taken in Scotland. Why on earth are we doing more consultations when action has already been taken north of the border? What is the need to consult when we can see what is happening there?
Esther McVey
We are doing further consultation because although we have put in place bans and measures, we are now seeing whether they need to be strengthened, and whether the height threshold needs to be reduced. We are going further than we said in the first instance, because further matters have come to light. We are always led by an expert panel, and we always seek the latest advice. As points come forward, we scrutinise the various composite materials and look at what is best.
It has never been the case that simply because a building is below 18 metres, owners are exempt from ensuring the safety of residents. There is a requirement on building owners to ensure that buildings of any height are safe, and we expect all owners to act responsibly. The consolidated advice note also clarifies the actions that building owners should take in relation to fire doors. The Government have welcomed the commitment from members of the Association of Composite Door Manufacturers to work closely with building owners to remediate doors that have failed tests. We will continue to monitor the situation closely.
My hon. Friend the Member for Walsall North (Eddie Hughes) and the hon. Member for Reading East talked about security and safety in buildings, and how other safety measures were being carried out. My hon. Friend talked about people blocking doors to keep them open. For the full safety of the building, we must adhere to the safety rules. It is not just about the safety of the materials used in buildings, but about whether the due safety process is followed.
Last week we published a call for evidence to seek views on the assessment and prioritisation of risks associated with external walls, such as cladding, in existing buildings. For many years, we have relied on crude height limits with binary consequences, yet it is clear that when approaching a building’s risk, height alone does not reflect the complexity of the challenges at hand. As the Secretary of State has made clear, we need a better, more sophisticated system to underpin our approach. Height will remain a significant and material factor, but it will sit alongside a broader range of risk factors. We have therefore commissioned leading experts in the field to develop, as quickly as possible, a sophisticated matrix of risks that will replace the historical system and underpin our approach to future regulatory regimes.
Hon. Members asked what was happening and how quickly it was happening: across all sectors, remediation is complete in 135 buildings; remediation has started in 123 buildings; and there are plans and commitments in place to remediate a further 182 buildings. At the end of December 2019, remediation had started or been completed on 145—91%—of the 159 social sector buildings with unsafe ACM cladding systems, and there are plans in place to remediate the remaining 14 buildings. At the end of December 2019, of the 197 private residential buildings, remediation had finished or started in 54, or 27%. Plans and commitments are in place for 143— 73%—of the other buildings. There are no buildings where plans for remediation remain unclear. We are following closely the speed with which that remediation is taking place and what is happening. Although mitigation safety measures are in place for unsafe ACM cladding where required, we do not underestimate the concerns of residents who live in buildings where remediation has not started. We are therefore appointing a construction expert to review remediation timescales and identify what can be done to increase the pace in the private sector.
We are aware of leaseholders’ concerns about meeting the cost of remediation. The hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green) and others mentioned that. We do not want cost to be a barrier to remediation, so we are considering, with Her Majesty’s Treasury, options to support leaseholders. The Chancellor and the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government will set out further details in due course.
Kate Green
Will the Minister consider looking at what might be done in the area of insurance to broaden access to the insurance cover currently taken out by developers or freeholders, so that leaseholders or their managing agents might be able to make a direct claim under such policies?
Esther McVey
The hon. Member makes a very good point. Those are exactly some of the measures that we are looking at, to make sure that the remediation is done in the best way, while being mindful of leaseholders.
Stephen Doughty
Does the Minister agree that it is inappropriate for companies such as Redrow to offer soft loans to people to deal with things that were not wear and tear but fundamental building defects, in relation not just to cladding but to many other aspects of fire safety? Those people should be allowed to access insurance and opportunities to remediate that do not bear down on them financially. It was not their fault, and they should not have to pay.
Esther McVey
The hon. Member makes a good point. I wonder whether we could have a meeting to talk about some of the things we think should be put in place, so that I can make representations to the Secretary of State and the Chancellor.
I would like to leave some time for the hon. Member for Reading East to make his closing remarks, but first I want to talk about the stringent rules that private landlords must follow. By law, privately rented properties must already be free from the most serious health and safety hazards, which include fire. Landlords must put up smoke detectors on every floor, and they must have gas boilers and installations checked every year. Earlier this month, we laid before the House regulations requiring landlords to carry out safety inspections at least every five years, and to prove that the electrics in their property meet the legal standard. If they do not, the landlord must get the work done to make them safe.
The hon. Member for Glasgow East (David Linden) mentioned electrical safety inspections and the safety of electrical goods that people buy and plug in at home. He asked whether we could work with the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and other Departments to ensure that such goods are safe. That is a fair point. We do work across Departments, but we need to do that as well as we possibly can. Landlords must ensure that all fire escapes are clear—
Esther McVey
I will, but I was just about to talk about households in multiple occupation—a point that the hon. Gentleman raised.
Esther McVey
As time is running out, I will write to the hon. Gentleman to explain what is meant by a competent inspector.
Enforcement is key. We will hold landlords to account to ensure enforcement. At the end of the day, we must ensure that homes are safe and people can sleep safely at night, knowing that we are mindful of those points.
Oral Answers to Questions
Esther McVey Excerpts(4 years, 3 months ago)
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Lloyd Russell-Moyle (Brighton, Kemptown) (Lab/Co-op)
The Minister for Housing (Esther McVey)
Councils built 26,185 affordable homes between 2010-11 and 2018-19, up from just 2,994 over the previous 13 years under a Labour Administration. We are giving councils the tools to deliver a new generation of council housing. In 2018, we lifted the borrowing caps for councils to deliver 10,000 new homes a year by 2021-22.
Lloyd Russell-Moyle
But last year 6,287 homes for social rent were built and 10,000 were lost due to right to buy and other conversions. That was a loss of 4,000 social rented homes in our country. Is it not time, first, that the Government used net figures rather than these fantasy “built” figures; and, secondly, that we really reviewed right to buy, allowing councils good conditions and restrictions where there are areas of stress and ensuring that the discount carries on rather than just being pocketed by the individual?
Esther McVey
The hon. Gentleman will be pleased to know that we are consulting on right to buy to see what we can do with the sales receipts. Let me say what this Government have done to support councils in building. We increased to £9 billion the size of the affordable homes programme to which councils can apply. We have reintroduced social rents. We have removed the HRA borrowing caps for local authorities and given £2 billion to housing authorities to help with the ability to increase purchases and build by councils. So this Government are doing far more. Under this Government, social housing has gone up by 79,000, but in the previous 13 years under Labour it fell by 420,000.
Scott Mann (North Cornwall) (Con)
There are currently over 20,000 people on the council housing waiting list in Cornwall, yet we are in the ridiculous situation where private pension providers can invest in business development but not in residential development. Will the Secretary of State look at making representations to the Treasury to allow pension providers to invest in social residential housing?
Esther McVey
My hon. Friend makes a very good suggestion. That is exactly what the Secretary of State will be looking at—how we get that investment into the housing structure. Under this Government, council housing waiting lists have come down by nearly half a million.
David Linden (Glasgow East) (SNP)
If the Minister is keen to talk about what is happening elsewhere, she will be interested to know that in the last five years, the SNP Government in Scotland have built 80% more affordable housing per head of population than England and twice as much as Wales. When will the British Government catch on to the fact that the housing crisis will not be solved unless they invest adequately in social rented housing?
Esther McVey
Obviously, this is a devolved matter, but I want to look at what this Government have done. We have delivered many more affordable homes—nearly 460,000. That is what this Government are all about—ensuring that people have the homes they need when they need them. We are looking to extend all types of home. We are tenure-blind, and we are delivering more homes.
David Linden
That is all good and well, but there is no point when the Conservative party manifesto commits to promoting and extending the right to buy—one of Margaret Thatcher’s biggest disasters in terms of policy. In Scotland, we ended the right to buy, protecting existing social rented homes and preventing the sale of 15,500 homes over a decade. Why can the Minister not see and understand that it is totally senseless to build new social housing, only to flog it off afterwards?
Esther McVey
We believe in home ownership. The right to buy has helped 2 million people get on the housing ladder. Since 2010, nearly 600,000 households have been helped to purchase a home through either right to buy or help to buy, and we are ensuring that the money from the right to buy is helping more homes to be built. In fact, we have sold 119,000 homes, which has helped to build 140,000 more homes. That is what we will continue to do—allow people to own their own homes and support all people at every stage of life in every home they need.
Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con)
The Minister is completely right that the housing supply jigsaw has many pieces, so we will continue to pump billions of pounds into housing associations such as Walsall Housing Group in my constituency, which has an innovative partnership with Lovell to build 250 mixed tenure houses on the former Caparo engineering works, a brownfield site. Is that the future?
Esther McVey
It certainly is. My hon. Friend hits the nail on the head, and he has a lot of expertise in this area. As I have said, our party is tenure-blind, and we help people along the steps to ownership, to get the house they need at the time they need it, knowing that most people want to own their own home.
Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)
It is the aspiration of every individual in this country to own their own home, but many local authorities that have built council housing have deliberately set up housing companies to frustrate the right to buy. Will my right hon. Friend look at outlawing that practice, so that people who are tenants in their homes get the right to buy and own their own home?
Esther McVey
We will look closely at anybody who is frustrating people’s dream and desire to own their own home. We will continue with the right to buy. We will look at how those receipts are being used, so that we can maximise the new homes being built. Under Labour, 170 right-to-buy receipts bought one new home. Now, we are getting more homes built through the right to buy, and having sold 119,000 homes, we have built 140,000 more.
Alex Cunningham (Stockton North) (Lab)
The Conservatives’ deep cuts to new council and social housing are part of the reason why homelessness has risen so rapidly over the last 10 years. Every day, hundreds of us see the increasing number of homeless people and their belongings in Westminster station and outside this building, but their plight is the same as that of thousands of others across the country who find themselves trying to find somewhere dry and safe to sleep. Does the Minister accept that, if the Tories had simply continued building social rented homes at the level left by Labour, there would now be 200,000 more social rented homes for those who need them, including those who are homeless on Parliament’s doorstep?
Esther McVey
What we all know is that, for a long period, demand has outstripped supply. That is why this Government are building more homes, with more homes built in the last year than in the last 30 years. We have delivered 1.5 million more homes since 2010, and we will continue to do that. Of course, we have also brought in initiatives for rough sleeping and homeless people. We have to be fully aware of that, and this Conservative Government are doing a lot more to help those people.
Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)
Laura Trott (Sevenoaks) (Con)
The Minister for Housing (Esther McVey)
I welcome my hon. Friend to these Benches. She will be a terrific addition to this place, and I am delighted that she is dedicated to the green belt and supporting her constituents. That is only right, and the Government, too, are committed to that. Planning inspectors are appointed to independently examine plans. Given my quasi-judicial role in the planning system, it would not be appropriate for me to speak on this matter, but I cheer my hon. Friend on in all she does for her constituency.
Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)
The Government’s consultation on closing the loophole that allows second home owners to avoid paying any council tax whatever by pretending to be a small business ended 12 months ago. Will the Government take action to protect communities in south lakes and elsewhere, or have they decided not to bother?
Esther McVey
We will absolutely help communities like the hon. Member’s. The Government have removed the requirement to offer council tax discounts on second homes amounting to 75% of the full rate. He is quite right: the consultation closes on 16 January, and then we will make decisions on it. If he would like to discuss his suggestions with me, I will gladly meet him.
Ruth Edwards (Rushcliffe) (Con)
Claire Coutinho (East Surrey) (Con)
Esther McVey
I welcome another hon. Friend to these Benches. She is quite right: we have to ensure that we have the right infrastructure. We pledged in the manifesto to ensure that infrastructure first, as set out in the Queen’s Speech. We have the £5.5 billion housing infrastructure fund, but we will introduce a bigger, single housing infrastructure fund to provide the infra- structure that she rightly wants for her constituency and that other Members want for theirs.
Hilary Benn (Leeds Central) (Lab)
Further to the Secretary of State’s answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Meg Hillier), may I suggest—given that the only difference in the crisis facing many of our constituents is that they have problems with high pressure laminate or other forms of external cladding, as opposed to aluminium composite material—that it would be sensible to extend the coverage of the fund that the Government have established for the private sector to cover those blocks? Otherwise, the residents will face a very bleak future.