Cladding: 'Get a grip' on crisis, Labour tell ministers

The government needs to "get a grip" on cladding problems which have created "ruinous costs" for homeowners, the Labour leader has said.

Sir Keir Starmer accused ministers of offering "half-baked solutions" and called for a taskforce to be set up.

The 2017 Grenfell Tower fire exposed the dangers of flammable cladding leading to efforts to fix fire safety defects in other buildings.

Ministers say they are providing funding of £1.6bn for renovations.

A government spokesman added: "We all want to see homes made safer, as quickly as possible... we are making good progress on remediating unsafe homes."

On Monday, MPs will debate a Labour motion in the House of Commons on protecting tenants and leaseholders from unsafe cladding.

Ahead of that debate, Sir Keir has called on the government to set up a national cladding taskforce, modelled on a similar body set up in Australia.

Labour says such a taskforce would "drive forward" work on funding the removal of dangerous cladding, pursuing "those responsible for the cladding scandal", protecting residents from costs and ensuring affected residents can sell their properties.

The party argues a new body is needed "after years of delays and ineffective measures" from the government.

Sarah Corker, BBC consumer affairs correspondent

The UK's building safety crisis is escalating.

In the wake of the Grenfell Tower fire in 2017, safety inspections on high-rise buildings have exposed decades of regulatory failure.

It's not just that thousands of blocks are still wrapped in dangerous cladding, but many buildings have other serious problems: missing fire-breaks, defective insulation, flammable timber balconies.

Delays in fixing faults have seen costs for flat owners rocket - increased service charges and insurance costs as well as bills for fire alarms and round-the-clock fire wardens known as waking watch.

The government has allocated £1.6bn to help pay for the removal of dangerous cladding, but a report by MPs estimates it'll cost at least £15bn given the scale of this crisis.

Currently there is no government funding to help leaseholders pay for non-cladding related issues, leaving them facing life-changing bills running into tens of thousands of pounds.

Pressure is growing on the government to do more to protect leaseholders from these costs.

"Millions of people have been sucked into this crisis due to years of dither, delay and half-baked solutions from the government," Sir Keir said.

"For many leaseholders, the dream of home ownership has become a nightmare.

"They feel abandoned, locked down in flammable homes and facing ruinous costs for repair work and interim safety measures."

Following the Grenfell Tower fire - in which 72 people were killed - round-the-clock fire patrols known as "waking watches" were put in place in hundreds of buildings, costing leaseholders tens of thousands of pounds every month.

And other residents have seen insurance costs on buildings with fire safety problems rocket, with flat-owners in one Cheshire development seeing their premiums rise from £34,000 in 2018 to more than £500,000.

Some are paying almost £2,000 a year for building insurance.

The Association of British Insurers says the slow pace of getting buildings fixed means that insurers need to price their policies to accurately reflect the fire risk.

Data released last month shows that cladding removal and repair work has been completed on only 58% of social housing blocks and 30% of private sector buildings.

Fire safety issues such as missing fire breaks and flammable balconies are not covered by the government's Building Safety Fund.

A spokesman for the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government said: "Leaseholders shouldn't have to worry about the unaffordable costs of fixing safety defects in high-rise buildings that they didn't cause - and should be protected from large-scale remediation costs wherever possible.

"The Building Safety Bill is the appropriate legislative mechanism for addressing these issues and will be brought forward in due course."