Cladding Crisis – we call on Government to step up

We know the worry and stress caused to homeowners facing large bills, and unable to sell their properties.

The £4.5bn committed by government to replace non-acm cladding is welcome. It is however entirely insufficient to address the problem.

The fund is also prescriptive on the type of cladding and defects it will pay for. Many homeowners benefiting from funding therefore still face large bills. Only around one third of applications for funding are successful.

The average £2.5m awarded per building is frequently well below the total cost of remediation.

E&J Estates believes that homeowners bought their properties in good faith and should not face costs of this sort.

The root cause is years of lax building regulation by successive governments.

It seems right therefore that government now steps up. We hope that it will increase the scope of the fund, and recover costs by pursuing those responsible for the defects and by introducing a levy on developers.

We understand that Michael Gove, the new housing secretary, has been charged with “sorting out” the cladding crisis.

E&J Estates is fully supportive of that call.