Another four publicly owned buildings have been stripped of potentially deadly flammable cladding, as the government finalises the details of its concessional loan scheme to help private building owners remove the material.
The dangerous cladding has now been removed from Palmerston Primary, Building 4 at Canberra Hospital, Building 12 at Canberra Hospital and a Housing ACT site.
There are five more government-owned buildings to be rectified, with work on track to be completed by the end of the year. The government does not release the locations of sites before the work is completed out of safety concerns.
Meanwhile, ACT Sustainable Building and Construction Minister Rebecca Vassarotti said the government would announce the details for the second stage of its concessional loan scheme for affected private buildings in the coming weeks.
"We continue to support eligible owners corporations to identify potentially combustible cladding with our testing and assessment rebate scheme of the private buildings cladding scheme, which closes on July 21, 2022," Ms Vassarotti said.
"The ACT government is assisting eligible owners corporations by paying 50 per cent of the costs of testing and assessing their buildings' cladding."
That scheme has so far approved 37 applications out of 54 that had been made. Six applications were deemed ineligible, while nine applications are still being assessed, the government said in a statement, while two applications were withdrawn by the applicants.
The second stage of the scheme will provide fixed-interest loans up to $15 million with a repayment period of 10 years and no penalty for repaying early to eligible owners' corporations to help cover the cost of removing and replacing flammable cladding.
"Testing and assessing private building's cladding is an important step in understanding the potential risk posed by combustible cladding, so I encourage owners corporations to apply, which will help them make an informed decision about how to reduce that risk," Ms Vassarotti said.
"To apply for the upcoming concessional loan, a testing and assessment report will be required, so I strongly encourage owners corporations to take advantage of the testing and assessment rebate while it's still available."
Ms Vassarotti said the government was in the final stages of a procurement process for the concessional loan component of the scheme.
The ACT government in August 2020 committed to a taxpayer-funded loan scheme to help apartment owners determine whether their buildings used flammable cladding.
The ACT government's COVID-19 economic recovery package allocated $21.4 million to two cladding rectification schemes over three financial years.
The ACT government revealed in February 2021 there were 23 public buildings in the ACT which would need to have the potentially dangerous cladding removed. It has repeatedly insisted none of the buildings were at immediate risk and were safe to occupy.
Previously rectified sites include public schools, the National Convention Centre, public housing sites and the Tuggeranong Child and Family Centre.
Fire can spread quickly up a building if the flammable aluminium composite cladding panels, which can have highly combustible cores, are used.
The cladding issue was highlighted five years ago after the Grenfell Tower disaster in London, where cladding accelerated the fire which killed 72.
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