Developers who fail to remove flammable cladding on all buildings over 18 metres tall by 2029 could face jail, a minister has said.
The dangerous Grenfell-style material will be fixed on all high-rises on Government schemes within the next five years, the building safety minister Alex Norris pledged on Monday.
Asked whether developers and building managers could face jail if they do not meet the new deadlines, Mr Norris told LBC: “There could be criminal sanctions.”
He added: “If there are people responsible for buildings and those buildings are dangerous, then there are significant sanctions that they face.
“It should never get to that stage. There is no excuse. There are very good government backed schemes that the taxpayer has stepped up and put money into multiple billions of pounds, £5.1 billion worth of funding available.
“They need to get in one of those schemes.”
The Remediation Acceleration Plan will set out that by the end of 2029, all buildings over 18 metres tall – defined as high-rise – with unsafe cladding that are on a Government scheme will have been remediated.
Every building over 11 metres tall with unsafe cladding will have been remediated, have a date for completion or landlords will be liable for penalties by the same date.
The Deputy Prime Minister has described the plans as “decisive action”, but campaigners have labelled them as “extremely disappointing” proposals that will “only make a horribly complicated process worse”.
The Remediation Acceleration Plan comes alongside proposals drawn up with housing developers on how they can speed up work to fix buildings for which they are responsible.
Ms Rayner said the “pace of remediation has been far too slow for far too long”, more than seven years after the Grenfell Tower fire killed 72 people.
The inquiry into the 2017 fire found that victims, bereaved and survivors were “badly failed”.
The west London tower block was covered in combustible products because of the “systematic dishonesty” of firms that made and sold the cladding and insulation, inquiry chairman Sir Martin Moore-Bick said in September’s report.
End Our Cladding Scandal, a group representing leaseholders impacted by unsafe buildings, said that they are “still far from a comprehensive solution” on building safety.
“Labour’s Remediation Acceleration Plan is extremely disappointing,” the group said in a statement.
“These proposals will only make ahorribly complicated process worse with further layers of bureaucracy.
“The Government may be patting itself on the back by announcing a target date for all high-rise buildings in government-funded schemes to have been remediated; however, the Building Safety Fund first opened for registrations in June 2020, so a target date of nine years from then is underwhelming.”
