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

To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, if he will make an estimate of the average length of time that the First-tier tribunal will take to process an application for (a) a remediation order and (b) a remediation contribution order under the Building Safety Act 2022.

Remediation orders and remediation contribution orders are measures introduced in the Building Safety Act 2022 to ensure that action can be taken against building owners and landlords who are not meeting their responsibilities for remediating historical safety defects in building above 11 metres or five storeys.

As well as those with an interest in the particular building, such as individual or groups of leaseholders, enforcement agencies may apply to the First-tier Tribunal for a remediation order to require a relevant landlord to remedy the relevant defect through a remediation order. They can also apply for a remediation contribution order to require the landlord, developer or associate to make payments to a specified person for the purpose of meeting costs which have been incurred or to be incurred in remedying relevant defects.

We are working closely with the Tribunal to understand how they are dealing with these orders. As only a small number of applications have been made, it is unclear how representative those applications are of the likely caseload as a whole. We are therefore unable to provide an estimate of the time required to process an application.