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

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what assessment he made of the potential merits of his policy to provide funding to remove cladding from buildings over 18m and loans to leaseholders living in buildings with cladding under 18m.

Instead of facing sudden cladding bills of tens of thousands of pounds, leaseholders will need to pay either nothing, or up to £50 per month towards fixing the problem. This helps gives lenders certainty both that the cladding will be remediated, and of the total potential financial implications for a leaseholder and their property.

This announcement is therefore an important step towards restoring confidence in the housing market. It provides certainty for lenders where unsafe cladding is present and complements the wider work we have underway to continue to develop a proportionate risk-based regulatory environment on fire safety.

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.