The minister for building safety has called for manufacturers of unsafe cladding to “make a contribution” to help leaseholders affected by the scandal.
Lord Greenhalgh today told the Cladding Remediation committee that firms who had “frankly abused” fire safety testing regimes for their products should stump up cash to make buildings safe.
“Frankly a lot of manufacturers have made very healthy profits and frankly they should be making a contribution to what is an enormous cost which at the moment is falling largely on the leaseholder,” he said.
“I think it's time for those cladding manufacturers to make their contribution to funding this.”
The comments came during a select committee meeting to examine the government's progress in helping millions of homeowners trapped in buildings wrapped in dangerous Grenfell-style cladding.
Robert Jenrick unveiled an extra £3.5billion to remove panels from blocks over 18 metres or six storeys tall last month.
But campaigners said they had been betrayed after it was revealed leaseholders in buildings under 18m would be forced to repay loans – at up to £50 a month – to strip the cladding.
The minister told MPs that they expected flammable cladding to have been removed from around 90% of buildings over 18m by the end of the year.
But he admitted the government still doesn't know how many medium sized buildings, between 11m and 18m in height, would need remediation work.
Asked by Rachel Hopkins when all buildings over 11m would be made safe,
Lord Greenhalgh said they did not have “precise assessment”.
Paul Afshar, campaigner for End Our Cladding Scandar (EOCS), said: "The Government have no idea how many homes are affected by the cladding scandal and no plan to help the millions affected.
"Robert Jenrick is asking for leaseholders to stump up to one fifth of their home’s value to pay for cladding*. Yet the country’s largest developers will only pay a tiny percentage of their revenue in the next ten years to sort out the mess they made. It's just not fair.
"We need real action right now. External cladding is just one part of a bigger crisis - the Government has said nothing on money for missing fire breaks, alarms or for cladding in building cavities. Leaseholders are the victims of this crisis and have done nothing wrong to deserve this and are getting no help from the Government."
