The government’s plan to fix all unsafe high-rises in government-funded schemes by the end of 2029 “lacks ambition”, parliament’s spending watchdog has concluded.
A Public Accounts Committee (PAC) report said the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government’s Remediation Acceleration Plan fails to address the impact of non–cladding defects on progress with cladding remediation.
The cross-party committee warned that the scheme, launched by housing secretary Angela Rayner last December, won’t make product manufacturers contribute to the cost of remediating their dangerous cladding products.
“Eight years on from Grenfell, we are concerned that MHCLG still does not know how many buildings have dangerous cladding, how much it will cost to address, or how long it will take,” said PAC in its report, published today.
MHCLG estimates that 9,000-12,000 buildings need remediation at a cost of between £12.6bn and £22.4bn, estimates that PAC says are “very broad”.
“MHCLG asserts that it is working to narrow the range, but promised six–monthly updates have not materialised,” the report added. “This level of uncertainty means that MHCLG cannot know if it is on track to achieve value for money for residents and the taxpayer.”
PAS 9980 concerns
The committee said that PAS 9980, a code of practice endorsed by MHCLG used for fire risk appraisals of external wall construction and cladding on existing blocks of flats, “leaves too much open to interpretation and is resulting in disagreements over the extent of remediation required”.
The National Fire Chiefs Council (NFCC) warned PAC about the limited availability of qualified professionals to carry out fire safety risk assessments and shared its members’ concerns about PAS 9980 assessments not meeting the intended standard.
NFCC and the campaigning group End Our Cladding Scandal also shared concerns about the inconsistent quality of fire risk appraisals and assessors reaching different conclusions about what kind of remediation work was required.
According to the MPs, NFCC said that some PAS 9980 assessments “were unjustifiably supporting” the retention of combustible materials.
Impact on housing delivery
PAC also raised concerns about the impact of building safety remediation on the government’s target to build 1.5 million new homes in the current parliament.
“We are not convinced that MHCLG is taking the potential impact of its remediation plans on wider housebuilding targets seriously enough,” it said.
Housing associations in London are reporting a 90% drop in social housing starts in the past year and the impact of the Building Safety Levy on developers could further impact the affordable housing supply, according to the report.
To address these challenges, the committee has put forward a series of recommendations, including asking MHCLG to set out by July this year what action it is taking to help ensure there is sufficient capacity across the remediation system and how it is assuring its progress.
It also asks MHCLG to bring forward to the end of 2025 detailed proposals as to how construction manufacturers should be required to pay a share of the fire safety remediation costs and when the government will respond to the Morrell/Day product testing review.
