My Lords, as it is not customary for anyone on these Benches to speak on their behalf, I just add thanks on my own behalf, which I hope will be shared by colleagues, to the Minister, particularly for his appreciation of the contribution made from these Benches. Of course, I send my best wishes to the noble Baroness, Lady Scott of Bybrook. Her courtesy throughout has been outstanding and her tenacity to be admired, and I add my best wishes for her restoration to good health as soon as possible. I add my thanks to the Bill team, even if we did not agree on quite a number of points, and to our clerks. I particularly thank the noble Earl’s colleague, the noble Lord, Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay, for the way in which he responded to the question of building preservation notices, to the CLA, of which I am a member, and Historic Houses for their valuable input on that.
On the other matter of interest to me, namely building safety remediation, I am of course sorry that I could not persuade the Government or your Lordships to support a different way forward, but I owe a tremendous debt of gratitude to people outside—they know who they are and I will not mention them by name, but they have dedicated their time free and without any benefit to themselves to assist me with their comments and their critique. I also thank the many other experts, and professional and trade bodies, who were willing to share their thoughts with me.
I particularly express thanks to Amanda Walker, a leaseholder, for her courage in coming forward with her story, and the hundreds of other leaseholders who wrote to me with theirs. I thank Jake Fisher for his online petition, which gained 50,000 signatures in 25 days. My focus throughout has been on them and getting fair treatment for affected leaseholders generally, even if my approach has not always been fully understood or appreciated. I do not intend to give up trying.
Finally, I am most grateful for the support across the House for the general principle sitting behind the fact that we all, I think, believe that leaseholders should not pay for construction defects for which they are blameless. There is clearly a lot more work to be done, but I am enormously grateful for the general acceptance across the House of that principle.