“Section 119 of the Building Safety Act 2022 is amended by the insertion after subsection (4) of the following —

‘(5) The Secretary of State may, by regulations, amend subsection (2) so as to bring additional descriptions of lease within the definition of “qualifying lease”.’” —

This new clause would give the Secretary of State the power to bring “non qualifying” leaseholders within the scope of the protections of the Building Safety Act 2022.

Brought up, and read the First time.

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

With this it will be convenient to discuss new clause 28—Meaning of “relevant building” for the purposes of the remediation of building defects—

“Section 117 of the Building Safety Act 2022 is amended by the insertion after subsection (6) of the following—

‘(7) The Secretary of State may, by regulations, amend subsection (2) so as to bring additional descriptions of building within the definition of “relevant building”.’”

This new clause would give the Secretary of State the power to bring buildings which are under 11m in height or have fewer than four storeys within the scope of the protections of the Building Safety Act 2022.

New clauses 27 and 28 concern building safety. The building safety crisis exists within the context of leasehold property and has been rendered more acute by the iniquities on which the leasehold system rests, yet the solutions to the specific problems faced by leaseholders in unsafe buildings are different from the general failings of the leasehold tenure that the Bill has sought to address in a limited number of areas. However, while the provisions in parts 1, 2 and 3 of the Bill are not answers to the problems of dangerous cladding and non-cladding defects, the relationship between the building safety crisis and residential leasehold properties makes the Bill the ideal vehicle for implementing a number of those solutions.

As the Committee will know, the building safety crisis is far from over. It has been almost seven years since the horrific fire at Grenfell Tower that claimed the lives of 72 innocent men, women and children, yet the Minister will know that there remain many thousands of unsafe buildings across the country that still require remediation.

The Minister may also know that last night in my constituency the London fire brigade had to attend with 125 firefighters and 25 fire engines—three with the tall turntables—to put out a fire at King Edward Court. More than 100 people were evacuated from the building—safely, I am pleased to add—but the cladding on that building was similar to that at Grenfell. Here we are, seven years on from Grenfell, and three and a half years since the survey of that building took place in which it was reported that the cladding was of that combustible type, and still the Building Safety Act 2022 has not been able to ensure that, between the manager and the developer, those residents remain safe.

I am very glad that the residents were evacuated safely, but my hon. Friend highlights a problem that will apply to many other buildings across the country. The pace of remediation is far too slow. We often talk about remediation works as if they were just a practical issue—“When will it start and when will I be updated?”—but for so many residents there remains a very real risk to their health, their safety and in many cases their life. That is why we need to grip the crisis and ensure that it is addressed. No one disputes the fact that some progress has been made over recent years in addressing the building safety crisis, or the fact that the Minister has personally devoted considerable time and attention to the issue, but it really is a damning indictment of the Government’s record that nearly seven years on, the crisis remains unresolved for the vast majority of blameless leaseholders whose lives remain blighted by it.

It has been the Labour party’s consistent position that all blameless leaseholders should be protected from the costs of fixing historic cladding and non-cladding defects and associated secondary costs, irrespective of circumstances. That is why we sought to reduce leaseholder non-cladding remediation contributions to zero during the passage of the Building Safety Act 2022; it is why we opposed the Government’s decision to arbitrarily divide blameless leaseholders into those who qualify for protections under that Act and those who do not; and it is why we have always taken issue with the imposition of a crude and arbitrary height threshold that not only fails to adequately reflect the complexity of fire risk, but remains an entirely unsound basis for determining which leaseholders in unsafe buildings can and cannot access state support to cover the costs of remediation, should they need it.

Our firmly held belief that all affected leaseholders should be fully protected from the costs of remediation is a principled one. The building safety crisis is the product of pernicious industry practice and state regulatory failure. Affected leaseholders played no part whatever in causing it, and none of them should have to pay to resolve a scandal of which they are the victim. It is manifestly unjust that a minority of them remain trapped in their homes physically, mentally and financially, having been all but abandoned by their Government. If hon. Members doubt the impact that non-qualifying status is having on leaseholders so designated, I recommend spending just a few minutes on the “End Our Cladding Scandal” website and listening to some of the testimonies.

We also take our view for practical reasons, because we know that the decision to exclude a minority of leaseholders from protections under the Building Safety Act and to prohibit a limited number of unsafe low-rise buildings from accessing central Government grant funding will almost certainly ensure in many cases that remediation simply does not take place.

In tabling new clauses 27 and 28, we seek once again to press the Government to reconsider their decision to exclude certain categories of leaseholders and buildings from the protections that have been afforded to others. New clause 27 would give the Secretary of State the power to bring non-qualifying leases within the scope of the protections of the Building Safety Act 2022; new clause 28 would do the same in relation to non-qualifying buildings. I have no doubt that I will be disappointed by the Minister, given the Government’s intransigence on the matter. Nevertheless, I urge him, as I have urged his predecessors on countless occasions, to think again and consider accepting our new clauses.

New clauses 27 and 28 also provide me with the opportunity to raise a number of specific problems that arise from the Building Safety Act and that this Bill could potentially rectify. Some of those problems were unforeseen; many others are the entirely predictable result of the manner in which and the pace at which the Building Safety Bill, which was already a complex and technical Bill when it completed its Commons stages, was overhauled in the other place to reflect the Government’s belated change of approach.

We know that the Government are considering using the Leasehold and Freehold Reform Bill to address a number of outstanding building safety problems. The background briefing notes accompanying last year’s King’s Speech explicitly signalled the Government’s intention to use the Bill to build on the 2022 Act and to ensure that freeholders and developers are unable to escape their liabilities to fund building remediation work and that leaseholders are protected by extending the measures in the 2022 Act to

“ensure it operates as intended.”

As we approach the conclusion of the Bill’s Committee stage in this place, the Government have not tabled any building safety-related amendments to achieve those objectives. On Second Reading, in response to an intervention from me, the Minister made it clear that he was

“looking at what may be possible.”—[Official Report, 11 December 2023; Vol. 742, c. 712.]

Even accounting for the Christmas break, he has had many weeks to do so. I would therefore be grateful if the Minister set out for the Committee the Government’s current thinking on how we might use the Bill to better protect blameless leaseholders who are struggling with the inability or unwillingness of their freeholder or original developer to progress remediation works, or are still waiting for such works to commence.

In addition, I would appreciate it if the Minister provided me with answers to the following questions. First, will the Government amend the Bill to make it clear that leaseholder protections under schedule 8 to the Building Safety Act apply irrespective of when service charge demands were issued, and thereby prevent the Court of Appeal from potentially overturning the November 2023 ruling of the upper tribunal to that effect?

Secondly, will the Government amend the Bill to protect qualifying leaseholders in buildings classed as leaseholder-owned and excluded from schedule 8 protections simply because a company owns the freehold and a director of the company personally has a lease or leases of a flat or flats in the building? For us, that was a hypothetical problem; in recent cases that I have seen, it has become a reality. We think that it needs to be addressed.

Thirdly, will the Government amend the Bill to finally address the detrimental impact on property valuation and mortgage lending resulting from the fact that non-qualifying leases are designated as such in perpetuity, irrespective of whether a building has been fully remediated?

Fourthly, given the extent to which the Bill seeks to encourage leaseholders to acquire their freehold, will the Government amend it to protect leaseholders in enfranchised buildings from the impact of building safety defects? The call for evidence on that subject closed on 14 November 2022, and unless I am mistaken we have heard nothing since then.

Fifthly and finally, if the Government persist in refusing to review the definitions of a qualifying lease and qualifying building in part 5 of the Building Safety Act, will the Minister at least consider amending the Bill to ensure that freeholders and managing agents acting on their behalf must agree reasonable prepayment plans and a permitted maximum annual sum, to provide a measure of protection for non-qualifying leaseholders who are horrifically exposed by their current liability for payment of costs within what are often extremely short timelines? Will the Minister also consider protecting non-qualifying leaseholders from litigation costs relating to building safety?

I look forward to the Minister’s response to those questions and to the more fundamental issues raised by new clauses 27 and 28.

I am grateful to the hon. Members for Greenwich and Woolwich and for Brent North for the new clause and the contributions to the debate. I put on record how sorry I was to hear about Petworth Court, on which I was briefed overnight. It must have been a real challenge, and very scary for the residents of the property. I hope that we can move that on as quickly as we can. I am grateful for the efforts of London Fire Brigade and others, which ensured that no one came to any harm. It is a salutary reminder of the importance of the work that has been outlined by the hon. Members, which we all support.

The hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich asked me a number of detailed questions. We have had many exchanges on these issues in the past, so he will appreciate that this is a sensitive and detailed area, and one that we need to get right. The Building Safety Act 2022 made huge steps forward, and there have been many steps forward in the practical reality of building remediation. I want to ensure that we deal with those questions in turn and in the depth that they deserve. We will have different views on some of those questions. Take, for example, the perpetuity issue. Without going into detail, my answer is that all the buildings have pathways to remediation, so long as they choose one or, in extremis, an actor in the system forces them to take one, and that once the remediation has happened the perpetuity point should become moot and fall away. However, it is better that I write to the hon. Gentleman and the Committee on all those points in due course.

Putting those important matters aside, we come to the question of whether the Secretary of State should have specific powers to amend the definition of “qualifying”. This gets to the point of where the Secretary of State’s powers should lie, which is obviously a contested matter. It is one on which the Government have a clear view, which we have articulated, notwithstanding the challenges that that brings to some people who are impacted by it. That is better dealt with in primary legislation, rather than through the Secretary of State making changes or having the ability to make regular changes. On that basis, we will resist the new clause.

Let me turn to new clause 28 on buildings under 11 metres, in the name of the hon. Members for Greenwich and Woolwich and for Weaver Vale. I have taken a particular interest in buildings that are under 11 metres, and I and the hon. Gentlemen have had interactions on the issue in the past. There are specific issues about a small set of buildings that are under 11 metres. The previous Minister, my right hon. Friend Stuart Andrew, and I have made repeated commitments from the Dispatch Box, from as far back as 2022, to look into each and every one of those buildings, and we have done so. A number of them have been raised with us, and we are working through them and getting to the end of the processes.

I encourage any hon. Members with examples—and I see occasional repetitions in parliamentary questions—to raise them with the Department, as I know members of the Committee have, and we will see what we can do to move those cases on or get clarity that no works are required. With almost all under-11 metre buildings, when we get to the end of the discussion there are no works required under the PAS 9980 assessment. That is positive. There is a clear reality that buildings under 11 metres are less likely to be impacted by this issue, and we will resist the new clause on that basis.

As a result of the fire, as I said to the hon. Member for Brent North, it is important that we make progress. Significant progress has been made, and I am grateful to the hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich for his recognition of that. Every month, we see more buildings complete and more buildings starting the process. Where freeholders are willing to make their buildings safe, we have mechanisms and processes in place, both centrally and locally, to make sure that is happening; and I continue to see lots of progress. It will take time, but we are cognisant of the importance of moving fast, and we have certainly sped up over recent months.

I thank the Minister for his response. I will pass over his criticisms of the technical flaws of the new clauses. Their intent is very clear; we can debate whether primary or secondary legislation is the best means of achieving it. I think there is a point of disagreement on qualifying and non-qualifying leaseholders. On a point of principle, we think that the distinction is arbitrary and we should get rid of it. From the evidence I have seen across the country, we should also undoubtedly get rid of it on a practical basis. I do not have responsibility for building safety directly any more—my hon. Friend the Member for Weaver Vale does—but I continue to hear of cases where buildings with a significant proportion of non-qualifying leaseholders see remediation works stalled or held up entirely.

I have always conceded that buildings under 11 metres are small in number and that there is not a systemic issue, but because of the drafting of the Building Safety Act, there remains a problem about liability. In those cases where the Government certify that the buildings are unsafe and require remediation—as the Minister knows, I have a case in my constituency—the stage that we have got to, after many years, is that the Government ask the original developer to put them right. We do not know what lies behind that request or whether there is any enforcement of it, so we are at the same point that we were at many years ago.

We come back to the question, “What is the need for the distinction?” I would argue that if under-11 metre buildings are that small in number, that is all the more reason for opening them up to access for Government grants should they require that—where the developer will not remediate them voluntarily. But that is beside the point.

I thank the Minister for his willingness to provide me detailed answers to all five of the non-specific questions—that is very welcome—but on the point of principle raised by new clauses 27 and 28, there is a clear difference of opinion. I think it is worth us putting on record, again, our strong feelings about that, so I will push both new clauses to a vote.

Question put, That the clause be read a Second time.

The Committee divided: Ayes 5, Noes 10.

Question accordingly negatived.