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Boris Johnson signals ‘top-to-bottom’ cladding review if elected
Prime minister Boris Johnson has said he wants to look at the problem of fire safety and combustible cladding on high rises “from top to bottom” if re-elected at the general election.
In a radio interview with LBC’s Nick Ferrari, Mr Johnson was asked by a caller, ‘Antonio from Kensington’, whether he would commit to spending the money needed to make tower blocks safe.
Antonio also asked whether Jacob Rees-Mogg would be in the next Conservative cabinet given his suggestion that victims of the Grenfell Tower fire lacked “common sense” by following the orders of the London Fire Brigade to stay in their flats.
Mr Johnson said: “With [aluminium composite material] of the type used in Grenfell, we are working as fast as we can get it off public buildings.”
Challenged by Mr Ferrari that two-and-a-half years was not “fast”, the prime minister suggested the work was being done as rapidly as possible.
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Mr Johnson said: “There are other types of cladding as well that in my view are also inadequate and I want to look at whole thing from top to bottom.”
He said that while exercising planning powers when he was mayor of London he had “never liked it when developers said [they] wanted to put cladding on – and I insisted on brick”.
Mr Johnson had earlier denounced London’s current Labour mayor Sadiq Khan as “Macavity the mystery cat of politics” and this feline reference led Mr Ferrari to ask about Mr Rees-Mogg’s whereabouts given his lack of public visibility since his comments on Grenfell.
“Where’s Moggy?”, the interviewer asked but Mr Johnson repeatedly declined to be drawn on the make-up of a future cabinet.
Social housing landlords this week called on the government to provide clarity on its advice around combustible materials on high-rise buildings, saying residents had been left unable to sell or remortgage their homes due to cladding issues.
Inside Housing is running the End Our Cladding Scandal campaign with the UK Cladding Action Group and the Manchester Cladiators (which represents affected residents), calling for the next government to set up a building safety fund and a taskforce capable of taking control of the remediation programme at a national level – as the current approach of focusing only on aluminium composite material and buildings above 18m is not working.
End Our Cladding Scandal general election campaign: full coverage
The cladding scandal is far from over. Here’s why we need a fresh approach
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Ahead of the general election, Inside Housing revisits our national cladding scandal and sets out what needs to be done to prevent any further tragedies. Peter Apps reports.
The cladding crisis Down Under: what we can learn from the response to Grenfell in Australia
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Five years ago a fire spread up Grenfell-style ACM cladding on a high-rise in Melbourne. This prompted an overhaul of the Australian state of Victoria’s building safety regime. Peter Apps finds out what the UK could learn.
More than 100,000 buildings outside scope of fire safety measures, minutes reveal
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There are more than 100,000 medium-rise homes that fall outside new regulations aimed at making buildings safe in the aftermath of Grenfell, including the ban on combustible cladding, Inside Housing can reveal.
It’s only a matter of time until the next Bolton unless the parties step up to the plate on fire safety
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Inside Housing’s new election campaign calls on the main political parties to commit to taking action to prevent what currently seems like an inevitable further tragedy. It’s time for everyone to step up, writes Martin Hilditch.
Leaseholders fear missing out on £200m cladding fund as bidding deadline approaches
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Leaseholders living in blocks seeking government funding for the removal of Grenfell-style cladding have raised concerns over meeting the deadline for applications, while criticising the lengthy process being run by the government.
Government refusing to test polystyrene panels, despite request from London boroughs
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The government has no further plans to carry out testing of cladding products despite a specific request from London boroughs to test systems comprising polystyrene, a document obtained by Inside Housing has revealed.
