On Wednesday 11 September, a debate on building safety and resilience took place in the House of Commons.
Rushanara Ali MP, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities, and Local Government opened the session by referencing the release of the Grenfell Tower Inquiry Phase 2 report the previous week, saying:
“The report shines a light on a terrible culture in the industry in the years leading up to the tragedy—a culture of putting profit before people, and a culture in which safety took a back seat. It reveals a building safety system that was fundamentally broken
“The consequences of these failures are still with us today; there are too many buildings with unsafe cladding and the pace of remediation has been too slow.”
MP for Kensington and Bayswater, Joe Powell was one of several members to raise the issue of the slow pace of remediating fire safety issues, as well as that of the number of current buildings where concerns are only now being uncovered. He noted that there are still “tens of thousands of people up and down the country who are still going to bed in buildings that are unsafe.
He continued, saying, “In my constituency—quite incredibly, given the history of Grenfell—we have one of those buildings that is not yet on the Department’s list. It underwent a fire inspection just a few months ago and flammable rendering was found.”
Replying to these issues, Ali said, “We will ensure that dangerous buildings are found and dealt with. The money is there. The speed must increase. We are not leaving this task just to regulators; the Government must do more, and this Government will do so.”
Amongst the wide-ranging debate that covered many topics, the impact of fire safety concerns on the cost of insurance was raised by a number of MPs, including former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn who said, “In many cases, residents are paying the price in very high insurance premiums, as she rightly acknowledged. Could those residents who have suffered a great deal of stress and cost over the past few years expect some form of compensation for their losses, because of the failure of Government and the industry to undertake the proper remedial works?”.
Ali responded saying that the government would take action to protect those impacted by high insurance costs and enter dialogue to “ensure that there are not high insurance premiums.”
Speaking for the Opposition, Shadow Minister David Simmonds raised concerns over proposed reforms to the planning system, issues over different occupancy types in the same building, and the increased use of modern methods of construction to improve building efficiency and that this drive “has created a risk of a loss of focus on safety”. He made it clear that the Opposition “share the Government’s determination to ensure that everybody in our country is able to feel safe in their home, and that risks, whether they are known or might emerge from the continuing research into this field, are properly addressed.”
One of the recommendations in the Grenfell Tower Inquiry Phase 2 report was for the Phase 1 report recommendation regarding Person Emergency Evacuation Plans (PEEPs) to be given further consideration. During the debate, the minister confirmed that the Home Office, “will bring forward proposals this autumn for residential personal emergency evacuation plans” and that work on this is underway through “funding social housing providers to deliver residential PEEPs for their renters.” She also confirmed that Government will engage with representative groups as these plans are developed and plan “to lay regulations as soon as possible, with a view to the proposals coming into force in 2025-26."
This approach to progressing recommendations from the Grenfell Tower Inquiry Phase 2 report was confirmed by Ali, who explained that the government “will consider all the recommendations in detail, and we will respond within six months. As part of that work, we will listen to and engage with the bereaved, survivors and residents in the immediate community. We will update Parliament annually on progress against every commitment we make.”
The parliamentary debate covered many topics concerning building safety and a full transcript of it can be found here.