Building Safety Fund

(asked on 12th March 2021) - View Source

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

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what assessment his Department has made of the adequacy of the average time taken to approve applications to the Building Safety Fund.


Answered by
Christopher Pincher Portrait
Christopher Pincher
This question was answered on 22nd March 2021

The rate at which applications to the Building Safety Fund are advanced will be dependent on the readiness of building owners to provide the required information. Following registration, MHCLG contacts building owners or the responsible person to ask for supporting evidence for their technical eligibility for the fund. This will include evidence of the height of the building and materials that are in place.

It is disappointing that almost 900 building owners – who are responsible for making sure their buildings are safe – have been unable to provide any of this basic information. We have engaged with registrants and industry bodies to understand the challenges they have in meeting our deadlines and criteria requirements. To address their concerns we have extended the deadlines for the fund to the end of June 2021, giving building owners more time to submit full applications but still reflecting the importance of these critical safety works.

As of 5 March 2021, 978 decisions on the Building Safety Fund have been made on the basis of sufficient supporting information received. Of these, 624 registered buildings are proceeding with an application for full funding and 354 have been shown to be ineligible. An additional 349 registrations have been withdrawn by applicants. So far, the total amount allocated from the Building Safety Fund is £226.8 million. Further details can be found on the Building Safety Fund Registrations Statistics at: www.gov.uk/guidance/remediation-of-non-acm-buildings#building-safety-fund-registration-statistics.

We are also providing expert construction consultation support to actively engage with those planning and undertaking remediation work under the Building Safety Fund to increase the pace of remediation. We expect all buildings with an existing application to be started on site by September 2021.

Reticulating Splines