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Residents facing a cladding removal bill of £2m have called on the government to extend its guidance to dangerous systems which do not have exactly the same materials as used on Grenfell.
Leaseholders living at the 246-home NV Buildings in Salford have told Inside Housing that government guidance has had no impact on their situation and they still face costs tens of thousands pounds to make their building safe.
This is because the cladding system on their building is not aluminium composite material (ACM) - as used on Grenfell.
Two weeks ago housing secretary James Brokenshire told parliament that the government would provide financial support to local authorities to remove ACM cladding from buildings and force building owners to cover the costs.
Peter Brown, who is a resident and nominee director of the NV Building’s management company, told Inside Housing: “This new legislation is limited to buildings with ACM cladding – the type involved in the Grenfell Tower tragedy.
“However other cladding systems have been identified as a fire hazard but, unbelievably, so far there has been no attempt by the government to evaluate the severity or size of the danger from other types of combustible cladding.”
He called on the government to extend the guidance to other non-ACM buildings deemed unsafe and where leaseholders are facing huge costs.
In response, the government said it would review relevant guidance to ensure leaseholders in buildings such as this are protected.
The NV Building’s cladding system contains an EPS (expanded polystyrene insulation) the leaseholders say has been deemed a fire hazard by the Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue Service and needs removal.
The government has focused on ACM cladding since the Grenfell Tower fire and latest figures from the government has found that a total of 441 blocks over 18m are clad with ACM, with remediation work having started on 100 buildings.
Analysis recently carried out by insulation manufacturer Rockwool estimated that a total of 1,678 buildings were high-risk and contained combustible materials on their facades.
The scheme was developed by Countryside Properties in 2005. The firm Carillion, which went into liquidation earlier this year, was the original contractor enlisted to build of the block.
A spokesman for Countryside said the building complied with all fire and building regulations and had all relevant approvals when it was built 15 years ago.
He added: “While we are of course sympathetic to the concerns raised by residents at NV Buildings, it is the responsibility of the freeholder to ensure that the building complies with prevailing fire and building regulations on an ongoing basis.”
Mr Brown also criticised the government’s guidance for focusing on recovering money from building owners rather than the developers.
He said while the move by the government was a positive step, it did not address the fact that it was developers that built the buildings.
Listen to a podcast on the cladding crisis in private buildings:
“The government keeps going on about building owners, but building owners are just in most cases financial institutions that have bought the freehold, in most cases they don’t even know what it looks like,” he said.
Residents at the NV Buildings are under a tripartite lease which means residents are not only liable for the re-cladding costs but also must manage the remediation work.
Housing secretary James Brokenshire said: “Unsafe cladding systems which do not comply with building regulations should be replaced and I expect leaseholders to be protected from the costs of such work. I am concerned that many are not.
“I have asked the government’s Independent Expert Advisory Panel to review their existing advice to inform updated guidance.”
In the days following the Grenfell Tower fire on 14 June 2017, Inside Housing launched the Never Again campaign to call for immediate action to implement the learning from the Lakanal House fire, and a commitment to act – without delay – on learning from the Grenfell Tower tragedy as it becomes available.
One year on, we have extended the campaign asks in the light of information that has emerged since.
Here are our updated asks:
GOVERNMENT
LOCAL GOVERNMENT
LANDLORDS