Residents were told recently they would have to pay £31,300 per flat to fund cladding removal and replacement. The building is owned by Proxima GR Properties, which stated it is ‘not its responsibility’ to pay for the removal and replacement of cladding that failed the government’s fire safety tests undertaken after the Grenfell Tower fire.
The £2m bill works out at £31,300 per flat, and the company ‘denied responsibility’ in paying towards the work, stating that the recladding will only take place ‘once full funds are in place’. Last October, residents received letters saying that they would have to pay £5,000 to £6,000 per flat to replace the cladding.
Six months ago the government told the company to remove the cladding, while Sajid Javid, the housing, communities and local government secretary, said that the landlord ‘was responsible for ensuring resident’s safety’. Proxima ‘insisted that it is not obliged to cover the costs’, warning leaseholders that the bill ‘will increase if they delay payment’.
Residents responded that the amount ‘was more than they earned in a year and that they feared for their safety’, with a group releasing a statement in which they said they had been ‘left terrified by what could happen in the event of a fire’. The site has fire wardens patrolling ‘constantly’ at a cost of around £4,000 per week, another cost the company is ‘planning to pass on to leaseholders’.
The last development had been that removal will not begin ‘until £2m in costs are paid, either by residents or the government’. FirstPort, which manages the development, stated that the total bill is over £132,000. It had originally estimated cladding removal would cost under £500,000 before increasing it to £2m, with work not set to begin until September ‘at the earliest’ due to the revision.
The Guardian has now reported leaseholders will have to pay as ‘they, rather than the management company, were obliged to cover the costs’. Leaseholders had argued replacing cladding ‘should not be added to their service charge’ because this was ‘not a matter of disrepair’ as it ‘remains as designed and constructed’ and did not fall under ‘periodical expenditure’.
Tribunal chairman Angus Andrew ruled leaseholders should pay because ‘if the manager is obliged to do work […] the tenants are obliged to contribute to the cost although they remain entitled to dispute the reasonableness of the cost’. He did suggest however that residents ‘may have claims against other parties involved’, noting that the cladding manufacturer could be included ‘if warranties were given as to its suitability’.
Barratt Homes, which built the block in 2001, could also have claims made against it ‘if they were negligent as to the selection and installation of the cladding’. Leaseholders can also mount legal challenges against Croydon ‘if there were errors in [the] certification process’, Mr Andrew referring to the fact that many buildings were signed off by council building inspectors as compliant with regulations.
He also said leaseholders could challenge the government ‘if the building regulations were not fit for purpose’, but no claims could ‘reasonably commence’ until the public inquiry into Grenfell was completed. As such, tenants could ‘find themselves mired in litigation for many years, during which time their flats would be effectively unsaleable’.
A First Port spokesperson commented: ‘We brought this case before the tribunal not in conflict with residents, but to receive an independent judgment on the most appropriate way to ensure their safety in the long term. As the property manager, we will continue to support everyone at Citiscape and work to minimise the costs of recladding, while putting residents’ safety first at all times.
‘We will continue to work with all parties to provide further assistance to residents, but we must begin these essential safety works.’
Steve Reed, MP for Croydon North, added: ‘The tribunal’s decision is the first time a judicial body has opened the door to a legal challenge to the government over the flawed fire safety rules that allowed flammable cladding to go up on Grenfell and hundreds of other blocks across the country.
‘The government has consistently claimed the flammable cladding on Grenfell did not comply with the rules, but last week we saw a certificate authorising a similar material that was signed by the government’s chief advisor on the fire safety of buildings. It is crystal clear the government was responsible for allowing this cladding to go up so the government must accept responsibility for taking it down.’