Getting the cladding sorted SUSAN BRIGHT 10 NOVEMBER

Getting the cladding sorted SUSAN BRIGHT. 10 NOVEMBER 2018

Numbers and Remediation: Residential Buildings No of buildings with ACM cladding unlikely to meet Building regs* Social sector managed by local authorities and housing assocations 157 291 private sector 201 residential 28 hotels 62 student accommodation 9 publicly owned Hospitals and schools 30 Cladding status still to be confirmed * MHCLG, Building Safety Programme: Monthly Data Release

Numbers and Remediation: Residential Buildings No of buildings with ACM cladding unlikely to meet Building regs* Social sector managed by local authorities and housing assocations 157 Progress 22 finished (14%) 98 started (62%) 33 plan in place 4 plans being developed * MHCLG, Building Safety Programme: Monthly Data Release

Numbers and Remediation: Residential Buildings No of buildings with ACM cladding unlikely to meet Building regs* Private sector 291 Progress 17 finished 21 started 92 plan in place 40 plans being developed 121: unclear * MHCLG, Building Safety Programme: Monthly Data Release

* MHCLG, Building Safety Programme: Monthly Data Release

Who will fix (pay for) the problem? So far…. NHBC: NCQ (Greenwich), New Festival Quarter (Poplar) (fewer than a dozen; Inside Housing 6/11/18); Freeholder (Legal and General, Hounslow) The developer eg Bellway (NFQ; Prospect Place, Cardiff); Barratt (Citiscape).

Who can be made to pay? NHBC, insurers: 10 year time limit; needs to be breach of Building Regs Leaseholders: Tribunal decisions - Citiscape (but Barrats agreed to stump up); Green. Quarter Developer? Contract/tort/Defective Premises Act: privity problems; limitation periods (6 years). Bad PR? The state of Victoria, Australia: long-term, lowinterest loan whereby cladding rectification agreements (CRA) will help owners and owners corporations meet the rectification costs

Who can make sure that the problem is fixed? Local Council responsibility: can bring action if there is a housing ‘hazard’ under the Housing Act 2004? Safe with fire watch Fire Brigade: powers under the Regulatory Reform Fire Safety Order 2005? Power only to issue Prohibition order or interim measures? Safe with fire watch? Other insurers (following NHBC)? National government: using ‘policy pressure’?

Using Human Rights arguments to compel action/claim damages? Positive obligation to undertake preventive operational measures to protect an individual whose life is imminently at real risk Challenge 1: only ‘state actors’ are subject to positive obligation (not developers etc) Challenge 2: mainly used post event to claim damages: can it be used to compel action? Challenge 3: is there sufficient awareness of problem/likelihood of harm to trigger obligation? Cases show heightened awareness or risk in specific location