Developers have been warned by the Government that they must pay to fix the cladding crisis.
Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Secretary Michael Gove’s threat to use the legal system to ensure developers meet their responsibilities to leaseholders was a “positive step in the right direction”, the LGA said – but it called for similar action on other fire safety defects in social housing.
Cllr David Renard, the LGA’s Housing Spokesperson, said: “No leaseholder should have to pay the costs of making their homes safe… However, leaseholders are not the only innocent victims of the construction industry’s failure to build safe homes.
“The construction industry must also be made to fix the fire safety defects it has built into blocks owned by councils and housing associations.
“Unless the Government forces the industry to act – or provides taxpayer funding – we are concerned that the costs of fixing social housing blocks will fall on council housing revenue accounts and housing associations.
“This will reduce the funding available to meet the Government’s ambitions for improvements to social housing, net zero, and the provision of new social housing, leaving tenants and those on the waiting list to suffer the consequences of decades of industry failure and poor regulation.
“Like leaseholders, council tenants and those on the waiting list are innocent victims, and the Government needs to help them too.”