My Lords, as I was saying, the Committee will know that there has been a serious problem aggravating the difficulties that leaseholders have experienced in the post-Grenfell world. This is because insurance companies and mortgage lenders have required these external wall assessments to be made and the dreaded EWS1 forms to be filled in before transactions can proceed. However, not only are the assessments expensive—or they were—but the requirement to provide them implies, or implied, a very cautious view of the needs of fire safety in particular. Worst of all, there has been a crippling shortage of RICS professionals to carry them out.
I argued during the passage of the Fire Safety Bill that this process was over the top, as sometimes happens with professional-based regulation, and increased the numbers of unsaleable properties post Grenfell by hundreds of thousands. I was therefore delighted to hear the Valentine’s Day announcement of the Secretary of State, Michael Gove—in addition to the January comments quoted earlier by my noble friend the Minister —stating that:
“The provisions will protect leaseholders and encourage a more proportionate approach to fixing buildings. Currently, building owners can simply pass all costs on to leaseholders, with no incentive to hold back on unnecessary remediation work that has brought misery to leaseholders. Today’s package, alongside the duties in the wider Bill, will create an environment for tough, proportionate action on critical safety issues while preventing cost inflation and excessive work.”
“Today’s package” sounds good to me. However, I remain a little sceptical, knowing just how bad the gold-plating has been. For example, we were right to
agree earlier on the need to be proportionate about balconies, as the noble Baroness, Lady Fox of Buckley, argued.
The purpose of this probing amendment is to invite my noble friend, who is of course the Minister at the Department for Levelling Up, to update us and agree to undertake a review of the situation in 12 months’ time. The review proposed would focus on the tall buildings that are in scope, but the whole sector would benefit from a review that assesses the position of smaller buildings as well as the interests of the consumer rather than just the surveyor—in this case, the leaseholders and property owners affected. I add that the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of St Albans asked me to say that he supports this amendment but had to be elsewhere. I very much hope that my noble friend will look sympathetically on this request, particularly given the helpful change of approach by the Secretary of State.