Policy paper

Remediation Acceleration Plan

Published 2 December 2024

Applies to England

The problem

There are far too many residential buildings today still with unsafe cladding and the speed with which this is being addressed is far too slow. Affected residents face distress and higher bills while they wait for action. This is unacceptable.

Barriers to making buildings safe at pace include:

• Landlord reluctance – significant numbers of landlords are simply not taking measures to assess and remediate buildings.
• Constrained regulatory capacity – enforcement officers are too stretched; expertise is too scarce when compared with the scale of the challenge in many areas; and the enforcement framework can be cumbersome.
• Social housing providers have varying capabilities and access to funding – some providers are making faster progress than others. Barriers to greater pace include capacity, access to funding, capability and lengthy cost-recovery processes.
• Developer inconsistency and third-party disputes – some developers are making faster progress than others. Barriers to greater pace include disputes between developers and freeholders over access to buildings and scope of works, quality of assessments, insufficient focus or delay to securing necessary regulatory approvals.
• Skilled professionals – the supply chain of skilled professionals able to meet the sector’s demands is delicate. Contractor capacity for remediation work may need attention if rates of remediation increase rapidly.
• Resident experience – the experience of remediation needs to be improved; it can be miserable and makes residents feel unsafe. Insurance costs can be unaffordably high. Residents are not heard loudly enough.

The Remediation Acceleration Plan sets out the government’s ambitious approach to tackle these issues for buildings in England. We recognise that the scale and importance of the challenge is so significant that we expect to publish a further update on this plan in summer 2025 to report on progress and to reflect the second phase of the spending review.

Through this approach we will deliver 3 core objectives:

Objective 1: fix buildings faster

Many of the highest risk buildings are known to us. We must ensure they are remediated at pace, while also taking action to get newly identified buildings fixed more quickly than in the past.

Objective 2: identify all buildings with unsafe cladding

We have a long way to go to be confident that all buildings with unsafe cladding have been identified. We must work urgently to identify all buildings at risk.

Objective 3: support residents

Some residents, including leaseholders, face crippling bills and other difficulties while they wait for remediation to take place. We must better support residents and leaseholders through the remediation process. 

Through this plan we aim that by the end of 2029 all 18m+ (high-rise) buildings with unsafe cladding in a government funded scheme will have been remediated. Furthermore, by the end of 2029, every 11m+ building with unsafe cladding will either have been remediated, have a date for completion, or the landlords will be liable for severe penalties.

We intend to:

• create a legal obligation on landlords to remediate unsafe cladding so that those who should take action, but don’t, face severe penalties
• give regulators – local authorities, fire and rescue authorities, and the Building Safety Regulator – robust new powers to enforce remediation
• crack down on bad actors, by providing funding for regulators so they have the capacity to tackle hundreds of cases a year
• begin accelerating remediation of social housing while working with the sector to announce a long-term strategy in Spring 2025
• encourage and support developers to achieve their stretch target to start or complete remedial works on 80% of the buildings for which they are responsible by July 2026, and on 100% of those buildings by July 2027
• speed up the progress of buildings in government-funded schemes by reducing the time from application to works starting on site
• empower metro mayors to work in partnership with local authorities and regulators to drive remediation in local areas through Local Remediation Acceleration Plans – bringing together expertise, local knowledge and resources to create single area strategies

We will continue to identify 11m+ buildings that could need cladding remediation.

We intend to:

• intensify the government’s current data assessment of over 175,000 building records in the next 6 months and over 540,000 in total
• legislate to create a comprehensive building register
• strengthen expectations on landlords by tightening building assessment requirements

We will make remediation work for residents and ensure they are protected from costs.

This will be achieved by:

• keeping residents informed by driving compliance with the Code of Practice for the Remediation of Residential Buildings
• introducing shared ownership protections, with new guidance allowing leaseholders to sub-let at market rates
• protecting residents during remediation, through the extension of the Waking Watch Replacement Fund to the end of March 2026 which can save leaseholders £172 per calendar month (pcm)
• engagement with the building insurance industry to consider whether, for the duration of the remediation programmes, we might support industry to reduce unaffordably high insurance bills
• further reforms to support residents through the remediation process, including where a freeholder has become insolvent, or where a court-appointed manager is in place for a building

Background

The Grenfell Tower tragedy laid bare the consequences of failures within successive governments and industry, which led to the loss of 72 lives. The Prime Minister has committed to respond to the Grenfell Inquiry report, its findings and recommendations, within 6 months of the report’s publication. We are determined to create a legacy of change so that no other community has to go through the suffering experienced by the Grenfell community. 

The Grenfell tragedy highlighted significant issues within the broader housing stock in England, with many thousands of buildings with unsafe cladding identified. Progress has been made to tackle problems in those buildings most at risk, with remediation having started or completed on 95% of high-rise buildings with the type of cladding in place on Grenfell Tower.

Seven years on from Grenfell, of the 4,834 buildings 11 metres and over in England that have been identified with unsafe cladding, work has been completed on only 1,436. Current estimates suggest that there are between 4,000 and 7,000 buildings in England with unsafe cladding still to be identified. New measures are required to overcome the many barriers holding up progress and this government will do more to address the building safety crisis and keep residents safe.

Figure 1: 2,419 residential buildings (50% of identified buildings) have started or completed remediation on unsafe cladding, of which 1,436 (30% of identified buildings) have completed remediation works.

Total buildings identified: 4,834 (983 are underway, 2,415 are in programme)
Remediation completed: 1,436
Yet to be completed: 3,398

How remediation works

It is the landlord (the party with repairing obligation in relation to a building) who is responsible for ensuring a building’s safety, including that the building has an appropriate assessment made of the fire-safety risks. This is a legal obligation for higher-risk buildings, as set out in the Building Safety Act. A landlord could include but is not restricted to, the freeholder, including where the freehold has been purchased by the majority of the leaseholders through collective enfranchisement, a head lessor, a right to manage company, a resident management company, a named manager and a commonhold association.

Fire risks of cladding and external walls should be assessed using the PAS 9980 guidance, which provides a proportionate approach to risk assessment and means that fire safety measures will be tailored to the building risks. If a life safety risk posed by the external wall system of the building is identified, regulators can serve a statutory notice on the landlord, legally requiring the landlord to remediate the defect. 

Government has made £5.1 billion of funding available through government funded schemes set out in Figure 2 to ensure that there should be no obstacle to action being taken to make buildings safe. Landlords must make an application to the relevant scheme according to the scheme requirements and agree works and a funding package.

For over 1,600 buildings, of which 1,452 have unsafe cladding, the developer associated with relevant construction or refurbishment work has been identified and taken responsibility under the developer remediation contract. In these cases, the developer will fix or pay to fix the building themselves.

In the social housing sector, the landlord may also be the provider of social housing, although this may not necessarily be the case. Social landlords are able to apply for support from government schemes.

There is a route for every residential building 11 metres and over with unsafe cladding to be remediated. But despite these programmes, the pace of remediation is far too slow. While the process drags on, alongside the anxiety of living in a home with unsafe cladding, residents can face significant distress and financial burdens.

Figure 2: Government remediation programmes

Government-funded schemes

	ACM programme	Building Safety Fund	Cladding Safety Scheme
Buildings covered	18m+ with unsafe ACM cladding, prioritised due to higher risk profile	18m+ with unsafe non-ACM cladding, prioritised due to higher risk profile	All future buildings with unsafe cladding, other than those 18m+ in London
Progress	490 (95%) of 514 started on site	518 (64%) of 810 started on site	31 (7%) of 460 started on site, plus 1,716 pre-eligible applications

Other government programmes

	Developer-led remediation	Social Housing remediation
Buildings covered	11m+ with unsafe cladding (and other fire safety defects) originally constructed by 54 larger developers	11m+ with unsafe cladding (and other fire safety defects) - funded by Registered Providers of social housing supplemented with government funding
Progress	718 (49%) of 1,452 with unsafe cladding started on site	1,296 (51%) of 2,539 started on site

This plan outlines the immediate steps that this government will take to address this crisis. We will work with partners including the Building Safety Regulator, the Health and Safety Executive, metro mayors, the Joint Inspection Team, the Regulator of Social Housing, Homes England, local authorities and fire and rescue authorities, to increase the pace of building remediation, while better protecting leaseholders from costs and distress. We intend to announce an update on this plan in summer 2025.

Figure 3: Government delivery partners

Building Safety Regulator (BSR)	The BSR in England is part of the Health and Safety Executive (HSE). It was set up under the Building Safety Act 2022 to regulate high risk buildings, raise safety standards of all buildings and help professionals in design, construction, and building control, to improve their competence. BSR sets out rules to protect the design and construction of higher-risk buildings. They help give residents confidence in the safety and standards of their building. BSR has a legal responsibility to consult with residents through the residents panel.
Regulator of Social Housing (RSH)	The RSH regulates registered providers of social housing. RSH takes appropriate action if the outcomes of the standards are not being delivered. Following an expansion of powers, from 1 April 2024, they have begun carrying out regulatory inspections of social landlords. RSH objectives are set out in the Social Housing (Regulation) Act 2023.
Joint Inspection Team (JIT)	The national fire safety JIT is hosted by the Local Government Association, and funded by MHCLG. They are a multidisciplinary team with fire engineers, building control surveyors and environmental health officers and supported by intelligence officers and external legal advisors. The JIT are invited by local authorities and inspects blocks using the Housing Act 2004 and associated powers of the local authority. The JIT provides specialist fire safety advice and assesses the fire hazards and advises local authorities. The objective of the JIT is to give trained council staff greater confidence in their ability to undertake their own inspections and enforcement action.
Fire and Rescue Authorities	Fire and Rescue Authorities enforce the Fire Safety Order and Fire and Rescue Services Act in England and Wales, including undertaking inspections and compliance audits, undertaking prosecutions of those who are in breach of their legislative obligations and responding to emergencies
Homes England	Homes England deliver the Cladding Safety Scheme on behalf of MHCLG, which provides funding to remediate buildings that are above 11m in height across the UK (excluding London) and buildings between 11-18m in London. They are responsible for reaching out to building owners to invite them into the scheme; managing the distribution of funds to buildings who have applied to the CSS; and monitoring and enforcing against buildings that have applied to the funds.
Greater London Authority	The GLA administers the ACM and Building Safety Fund for buildings above 18m in height in London, providing funding for works, managing relationships with building owners and driving projects forwards.
Health and Safety Executive	The HSE is the body within which the Building Safety Regulator operates. They are also the regulator for the Health and Safety at Work regime, which monitors safety on construction sites.
Local Authorities	Local Authorities have regulatory powers and oversight of buildings within their area, deriving from the Housing Act 2004 and other legislation. As part of this they can serve improvement and enforcement notices to impose requirements for a building owner to improve their buildings.

Objective 1: fix buildings faster

While progress has been made to remediate the buildings with the most unsafe cladding, it is unacceptable that so many buildings in need of remediation have yet to be fixed. Seven years after the Grenfell tragedy there are currently as many buildings waiting to begin remediation as have started or completed the process.

We will take action to address the key blockers to increasing the pace of remediation so that buildings can be fixed faster.

Tackling bad actors who fail to get their building fixed

Too many of those responsible for remediating their buildings are failing to do so, despite the availability of funding. In some cases, even buildings which have been accepted into one of the remediation programmes have failed to make progress. There are 32% of buildings we were aware of in 2020 that were eligible for remediation that are still yet to start remediation. This is not acceptable.

In order to get buildings fixed faster, more action will be needed from landlords to get their buildings remediated. This government has been very clear with those responsible for buildings already in funding programmes that they must make swift progress or face action. We have set clear expectations for remediation work to start in high-rise private sector residential buildings with unsafe cladding by the end of 2025 at the latest, and the end of March 2025 for the buildings with the most unsafe cladding. Those not meeting their responsibilities should be on notice. Already, more than 50 local authorities have taken enforcement action involving 483 buildings 11m and over with unsafe cladding. We will do more to force irresponsible landlords to meet their responsibilities and to ensure that there is a sufficiently strong response where they do not.

We propose to legislate to create a clear and legal duty on those responsible for buildings 11m and over to take the necessary steps to fix their buildings within clear timescales. This would be supported by significant financial consequences for inaction and a new criminal offence for those who ultimately fail to remove unsafe cladding. This will be supplemented by further powers for regulators to enforce.

Supporting regulators to hold bad actors to account

When buildings are stuck in the remediation process without justification, enforcement action must be taken to get the process moving. Enforcement is used to ensure landlords meet their responsibilities and get their buildings fixed. Local authorities, fire and rescue authorities, and the Building Safety Regulator have responsibilities to identify and inspect buildings, monitor remediation and take enforcement action. The Regulator of Social Housing undertakes regulation of registered providers of social housing, considering whether providers are delivering the outcomes set out in its regulatory standards, including requirements relating to health and safety under the Safety and Quality Standard.

In order to get buildings fixed faster, we will need to rely on enforcement action to keep buildings moving through the remediation process. But enforcement can be time-consuming and requires significant capacity and legal expertise. As we increase the pace of remediation more resource must be put into enforcement activity to get more buildings fixed faster and we need to ensure that regulators can access appropriate capability to enforce.

We will therefore provide funding to enable local authorities to double enforcement activity. In addition, through support for the national Joint Inspection Team (JIT), we will ensure local authorities continue to have access to expertise they can call on around their most complex and high-risk buildings.

We have been engaging closely with the Building Safety Regulator about them playing a more prominent role in monitoring, enforcement and accelerating the pace of remediation. We will work with the Building Safety Regulator to ensure that they have the capacity to deal with the additional requirements this change in pace will bring.

Alongside this, we will launch a new remediation enforcement support fund for local authorities and fire and rescue authorities. This will enable them to fund access to specific legal advice and support for pursuing those responsible for fixing unsafe buildings.

Through funding we expect to provide key delivery partners with the capability and capacity they require to intensify their enforcement activities against those neglecting their duty to remediate and contribute to getting buildings fixed faster.

One problem enforcement agencies can face is the difficulty in knowing who is responsible in practice for each building. Whilst identifying the legal owner is generally straightforward, too often the identity of the parent company – sitting behind the legal owner, making the decisions, and benefiting financially – is obscured. There are often layers of corporate ownership above the freehold interest, making it difficult to understand where the real decision making lies.

To tackle this issue, this government proposes to legislate to provide the Secretary of State and regulators with powers to compel entities to disclose their beneficial ownership chains. To improve transparency more broadly for 11m+ buildings, we also intend to introduce requirements around providing information relating to beneficial ownership as part of plans to expand the existing building register.

Action against the worst offenders

We expect regulators to continue to be the primary agencies for delivering local enforcement activities. In support of local activity, this government is also continuing to take direct action against those that fail to fix unsafe homes for leaseholders and residents. Landlords should be in no doubt that we can and will pursue them directly if needs be.

Already, the owners of ten buildings have been forced by action from our Recovery Strategy Unit (RSU) to remediate unsafe buildings within fixed timescales, benefitting around 900 households. Those not meeting their responsibilities should be on notice. Courts are currently considering remediation contribution orders brought by the RSU, seeking to recover up to £72 million of leaseholder and taxpayer funds.

To bolster this work, MHCLG will provide additional funding to the RSU to enable it to target a greater range of actors across the sector, with plans already in train to bring forward the next tranche of targets for legal action. This will increase capacity of the RSU to act, including increasing the number of remediation orders and remediation contribution orders brought forward and to help hundreds more residents.

Ensuring coordination between regulators via local acceleration plans

The Deputy Prime Minister recognises the power of collaborative working at a regional level and the huge value and opportunity partnership working with metro mayors offers if we are to get buildings fixed faster.

This partnership was not previously harnessed by government and thus the opportunity to better coordinate and drive positive outcomes at a local level was missed. Mayors will be supported to play a new crucial role in driving remediation progress by leading local remediation acceleration plans, alongside partners in local government. This government is determined to support and work effectively with mayors, who know their areas best, to deliver for residents. To do this, we will make new burdens funding available to mayors and local authorities for additional activity to accelerate remediation in 2025/26, which will support the implementation of local remediation plans and ensure both have the resource and expertise available to better progress remediation.

Mayors will work in partnership with national and local government to convene regulators and other key partners to prepare local remediation acceleration plans. These plans will outline how collaborative working at a regional and sub-regional level, and with the Ministry, will drive the identification and remediation of buildings with unsafe cladding, including through promoting enforcement action, to hold those landlords delaying remediation to account and get buildings fixed faster.

The Minister for Building Safety will be meeting quarterly with mayors to support them in this work.

To support coordination between regulators, we will also publish new remediation enforcement guidance for regulators to clarify how organisations can work together effectively and best use their powers to hold recalcitrant landlords to account and get unsafe buildings fixed.

Supporting social housing providers to get buildings fixed

2,539 social housing buildings over 11 metres in England have been found to have unsafe cladding. Over 1 in 7 social housing buildings in England have been found to be affected. The 157 registered providers (51 local authorities and 106 housing associations) who own buildings with unsafe cladding are legally responsible for making them safe.

Work to make those buildings safe has been too slow. Remedial works have started or been completed on only half of the buildings with unsafe cladding, and many providers are falling behind their own (too slow) forecast timetable for completing the job. We expect them to get their buildings fixed faster and we will make sure that this happens.

We also recognise that social landlords face the significant challenge of accelerating remediation at the same time as addressing other housing quality issues and increasing supply of new homes. While some social landlords are failing in their duty of care to residents, many face challenges including access to funding, slow cost-recovery from those who built or refurbished the building, limited project management capabilities and supply chain constraints.

We will review options for overcoming all these barriers and announce a long-term strategy in Spring 2025. Ministers held roundtables with the sector and regulators in November 2024 and we will continue to work together to agree a strategy for accelerating remediation and protecting some of the most vulnerable people in our society.

Ahead of implementing this strategy, we will begin to accelerate remediation in the sector. We will make sure that social landlords who are eligible to apply for government remediation funding do so, with a commitment to do the works quickly. We will do this by clarifying the existing rules of government remediation schemes, promoting them, and reaching out to eligible providers who may be in financial difficulty to encourage them to apply. From April 2025, we will also increase funding for social landlords applying for government remediation funding so that remedial works can start sooner.

As part of the joint plan with developers that we published alongside this document, major developers have committed to making every effort to resolve by July 2025 all current negotiations with social landlords over developer contributions towards making remedial works in those social landlords’ buildings. Achieving this would significantly accelerate the start of remedial works in affected buildings.

The Regulator of Social Housing (RSH) has identified social landlords whose performance on fire safety is of particular concern, and is holding them to account for delivering the outcomes set out in the strengthened consumer standards that came into effect in April 2024. Ministers met RSH, the Building Safety Regulator and the Housing Ombudsman Service in November 2024 and asked regulators to work together to intensify action against social landlords who fail to get on with the job.

Making sure that developers fix buildings they developed or refurbished

We expect the industry which caused and profited from unsafe homes to contribute its fair share towards making those homes safe. But developer-led remediation is in some cases moving too slowly. People living in around 30% of the buildings for which developers are responsible do not yet know whether their homes are safe and whether remedial works are required, with actual works starting in fewer than half of buildings known to be unsafe.

Barriers to developer-led remediation include disputes between developers and freeholders over access to the building and/or scope of works, access to competent and independent assessors and delays to securing the necessary regulatory approvals. Government will work with developers and other parties to overcome those issues.

We welcome the commitment made by 54 responsible developers who signed a contract with government to remediate, fix or pay to fix over 1,600 buildings at a cost to themselves of around £3.3 billion. Both the government and responsible developers recognise that action must be taken to accelerate progress to find and fix all unsafe buildings.

The Deputy Prime Minister convened 14 major developers on 11 November 2024 and agreed a plan to achieve this. We are publishing this joint plan today. At least 29 developers (accounting for over 95% of the buildings that developers need to remediate) have already endorsed the commitments in the joint plan, and we expect more developers to commit to do so over coming weeks. The list of developers that have signed up can be found on GOV.UK. 

The joint plan includes 35 commitments by developers and government across 6 areas:

• improving resident experience of remedial works
• accelerating work to find all unsafe buildings requiring remedial works
• improving quality of assessments used to determine whether a building requires remedial works
• accelerating work to fix buildings
• accelerating resolution of cost-recovery negotiations between developers and social housing providers
• establishing a developer-government working group to unblock remaining barriers to remediation

The joint plan also includes for the first time ambitious public targets for developers to:

• finish assessing all their buildings by the end of July 2025
• start or complete remedial works on 80% of their buildings by the end of July 2026
• start or complete remedial works on all their buildings by the end of July 2027
• resolve all current cost-recovery negotiations with social housing providers by the end of July 2025

We are grateful to the developers who have already committed to those stretch targets. We expect other developers to follow suit. The stretch targets for developers have informed the wider stretch targets set out elsewhere in this plan.

We will report on the progress developers are making against the stretch targets in our quarterly reports. Government will make sure that our reporting fairly represents cases where a developer has demonstrated to MHCLG’s satisfaction that the developer has taken reasonable steps to accelerate remediation, and a stretch target has been missed due to factors genuinely outside the developer’s control.

The joint plan includes a commitment by developers to put resident need at the heart of remedial works by adopting and adhering to the Code of Practice for the remediation of residential buildings and making sure that their sub-contractors adhere to the Code.

Developers also commit to making sure that residents and leaseholders receive timely information packs about remedial works to their building and letters of comfort to help them to insure or sell their homes.

The government recognises that progress on some buildings can be delayed due to reasons outside a developer’s control. We will play our part by helping developers who are doing the right thing to overcome such barriers. This will include:

• publishing guidance to help with buildings where a dispute with a third party is delaying remediation
• working with regulators to intensify enforcement action against any third parties who unreasonably block remediation and make sure that landlords who unreasonably block remedial works could face serious consequences – those measures are covered elsewhere in this plan
• supporting work by developers to draft template license access agreements

 While developers have begun to assess and remediate buildings, some have not done enough to prioritise this vital work. This is unacceptable. We are taking formal performance action against several developers and will not hesitate to take legal action against developers who fail to comply with their contractual obligations. We will continue to publish quarterly data showing the progress which each developer is making. 

Streamlining delivery

While we are pushing others to meet their obligations, we also want to ensure that we are driving pace through our existing funding schemes. The Cladding Safety Scheme (CSS) was launched in 2023 to help fund work to address unsafe cladding for buildings between 11-18 metres, as well as those over 18 metres outside London.

The scheme uses digital technology to move applications through the funding stages smoothly and quickly. Applicants are also required to show that they are keeping residents informed throughout the process and we are seeing evidence of an improved resident experience of remediation.

All buildings starting remediation outside London are now part of the newer programme and we will seek opportunities to exploit the benefits of the CSS further.

Ensuring capacity and value through the supply chain

As the pace of remediation increases, we also need to ensure the remediation supply chain has the necessary capacity and capability. Some companies working within remediation say they face uncertainty around how much remediation work there will be in the future; how much it will cost to complete and whether the people they are employing have the right skills for the job. This means that some suppliers are unwilling to invest and build capacity. These conclusions have been tested and reinforced through wider industry engagement.

In response to these challenges, we will publish pipeline data from our major remediation programmes. This will help generate confidence for contractors and encourage investment in skills, resource and training. We will continue to engage with industry leaders and through industry surveys and engagement to monitor capacity and identify capacity issues and blockers.

We will continue to work with the Construction Leadership Council (CLC) to develop modular training for cladders, designed to increase the number of skilled cladders and improve quality. We expect that this new training regime will be ready to roll out in early 2025.

We also signpost the possibility for industry to utilise the inclusion of ‘cladders’ on the Home Office’s Immigration Salary List to acquire visas for cladding resource to support remediation activity, where needed. These initiatives are expected to boost capacity in the remediation market but may also benefit other government programmes.

To ensure that funding achieves the best value for money, remediation project costs have been benchmarked based on those projects that have already gone through the system. These costs will now be published as part of regular data sets to provide greater insight into anticipated project costs for projects moving into remediation and to support in negotiations throughout the supply chain.

These measures will help establish an acceptable cost for construction products that will keep the price of remediation predictable and ensure that those remediating buildings do not run into unforeseen obstacles to progress due to underestimation of the funds required.

Taking action against construction product manufacturers

The Grenfell Inquiry phase 2 report exposed the dishonest and misleading practices of cladding and insulation manufacturers involved in the Grenfell refurbishment. The Inquiry uncovered a culture in the construction sector that put profit and speed above safety, and construction product manufacturers who demonstrated dishonest and unscrupulous behaviour and provided inaccurate and misleading information about their products. These behaviours contributed to the Grenfell tragedy.

The Grenfell community have waited 7 long years, and we completely understand their need for justice. We will fully support Met Police and the CPS in their work. We also recognise that we must take action to hold the manufacturers responsible for the ‘horrific failings’ described by the Inquiry to account, both now and to prevent future bad actors. 

The government has already taken steps to prevent manufacturers supplying non-compliant construction products. The National Regulator for Construction Products, established in 2021, has prohibited the supply of non-compliant insulation products manufactured by Kingspan and Unilin, prevented the supply of non-compliant plywood, and taken action on other construction products, by establishing a pro-active surveillance regime. Additionally, powers through the Building Safety Act allow building owners to pursue manufacturers for contributions to remediation costs.

We know we need to go further. The Prime Minister made a clear commitment to write to all companies found to be part of the failings as the first step to stopping them being awarded government contracts. The Cabinet Office has written to organisations named in the inquiry who will hold different levels of responsibility. Government will be publishing guidance to support the first set of decisions early next year, to stop the most egregious companies being awarded government contracts. To avoid this, companies identified will be required to demonstrate cooperation, corporate renewal and compensation.

We also need to introduce sufficient deterrents in the future to ensure manufacturers know they will be held to account, with proportionate consequence. We have committed to system wide reform of the construction products regulatory regime and will consult on measures to introduce sufficiently robust sanctions, penalties and liabilities against manufacturers as part of this.

Objective 2: identify all buildings with unsafe cladding

Landlords are responsible for assessing fire risks in their buildings but too many are falling short. It’s estimated that there are between 4,000 and 7,000 buildings 11m and over with unsafe cladding in England that haven’t been identified. While buildings above 18m in height are now required to register with the Building Safety Regulator as part of the higher-risk building regime, 11-18m buildings – which are not classed as higher-risk buildings for the purposes of regulation are not. Consequently, whilst 11-18m buildings are in scope of our remediation funds, there is a gap in our understanding in relation to how many of these buildings need to be remediated. This ongoing uncertainty means that many residents are left unsure about the safety of their homes and the timeline for getting them fixed.

We propose closing this information gap and providing greater certainty to residents, by legislating to require the registration of 11-18m residential buildings. Once this process is complete we will, for the first time, have a complete register of relevant buildings (i.e. residential buildings above 11m) making the task of identifying, assessing and fixing those that require it, much faster and more straightforward.

This measure would be in line with recommendations from the National Audit Office report on the remediation portfolio, and would help to provide a backstop for when we could expect all buildings to be reported.

We also want to drive action from those responsible to assess their buildings. We plan to tighten the rules around building assessments, creating more opportunities to identify buildings with unsafe cladding while ensuring residents are safe, by having up-to-date assessments.

With these measures in place we expect to identify all 11m+ buildings in need of remediation. We propose to legislate to ensure the strongest possible penalties for those that do not comply. In the immediate term, however, we must also do more to identify buildings with unsafe cladding.

Since July, the Department has identified hundreds of further 11m+ residential buildings in need of remediation. However, we need to speed up our efforts.

Homes England are investigating over 540,000 building records, generated from Ordnance Survey data, to identify buildings that may have unsafe cladding. By April 2025 we will have assessed the highest risk buildings, close to 200,000 records. Landlords will be contacted and given support to get their building assessed and join the appropriate scheme. To date, over 20,000 records have been assessed and over 1,000 freeholders have been contacted to confirm whether their building has been assessed and the outcome of that assessment. This information will also be shared with local authorities and regulators alongside metro mayors as part of local remediation acceleration plans. Once buildings of concern are identified, regulators like local authorities and fire and rescue authorities will have a key role to play in the next steps needed to ensure all buildings can progress towards remediation where needed. 

The government recognises that leaseholders may feel powerless to try and force action where they are concerned around whether their building has been assessed, or whether the freeholder has applied for support to remediate. It is important for regulators to ensure individuals have facilities to raise safety concerns with them. In parallel, the government has developed a ‘Tell Us’ tool, so that leaseholders can make Homes England aware of any concerns. Homes England will check with the relevant party for the building and require positive proof that the building has been assessed, ultimately referring a building to regulators for enforcement as necessary. If a building is investigated, leaseholders will be kept informed.

Objective 3: support residents

We have been clear, as a government, that much more needs to be done to better protect blameless residents from the impacts of the failures of others. Residents continue to be confronted by significant difficulties in the remediation process, with many facing painful unforeseen costs, uncertainties around when their buildings will be fixed and concerns for their safety in the process. We will mitigate the burdens residents face and ensure they are supported through the remediation process.

Putting residents’ needs at the heart of remediation

Remediation planning and works can be extremely stressful for residents. It is vital that they are kept informed throughout the process, that they have a meaningful say in remediation, wherever possible, and that contractors working on site consider how to minimise the disruption residents face.

Guidance on how to do this already exists in the Code of Practice for the Remediation of Residential Buildings. Government schemes will ensure adherence to the Code of Practice. We will strengthen the obligation to ensure that those responsible for remediation inform, consider, and take reasonable steps to mitigate the impact on residents. We will challenge those responsible to evidence their compliance where residents are not receiving the support they deserve.

The joint plan we have agreed with developers to accelerate remediation includes developers committing to ensuring that the Code of Practice will be an integral part of their remediation plans. We expect social housing providers to follow suit and will encourage them to do so. 

It is also important that the information shared on GOV.UK is presented to residents in an accessible, clear and easy to understand manner. We will, in future, ensure communication with residents is written in plain English.

Government will also engage directly with residents in affected buildings on a rolling basis throughout the country, giving them the opportunity to communicate their experience of the remediation process that will inform future decision making and flag issues that we can address.

Keeping residents safe during remediation

There continue to be risks that result from the process of remediation of buildings. In light of this, HSE will continue its ongoing programme of sample inspections of cladding remediation projects. This programme has resulted in enforcement action, including prosecution in the past. We should be clear that the duty to protect the safety of workers, residents and others lies firmly on those undertaking the remediation work, including the client. HSE has long-standing guidance that helps them to understand what they need to do. Government will work with the HSE to see how that advice and guidance on health and safety during the remediation phase can be provided to clients, developers and the supply chain as part of the funding process and to provide signposting to relevant health and safety standards.

Furthermore, landlords must continue to exercise their duties to keep buildings safe during the remediation process. The law requires building owners to update their Fire Risk Assessment when there are material changes to the building, such as construction works, and any appropriate mitigations should be put in place and residents informed. We will make sure building owners are playing their part in keeping residents safe.

Further measures to support leaseholders through the remediation process

We are looking to introduce further measures to support and protect leaseholders in buildings requiring work and who find themselves in challenging situations. This includes when a court has appointed a manager to take on the duties of the landlord. We propose to amend the Landlord and Tenant Act 1987 to make clear that this manager can also be responsible for building safety duties. This will ensure that remediation funds can be provided to a court appointed manager, and they are able to progress remediation. 

Further measures are being devised to help leaseholders in other difficult circumstances. This includes making sure that leaseholders in buildings that have escheated (where the freehold has been destroyed – for example, due to liquidation of the freeholder) have a clear route to managing their building to ensure its safety and to applying for government cladding remediation funds. It also includes notifying regulators when landlords of 11m+ buildings go into voluntary insolvencies, liquidation or disclaim/go into escheat so they are able to support leaseholders.

Protecting leaseholders from costs

Protecting residents from extreme building insurance costs

Buildings insurance premiums remain unacceptably high for many leaseholders in buildings with fire safety issues, who have been paying too much for too long. Average premiums for buildings with identified flammable cladding increased 187% from 2016-2021, compared to 94% for buildings without such issues, and some individuals now face annual bills of over £3,000. In addition to needing to find thousands of pounds to meet premiums, these bills can make it difficult for people to sell their properties.

The industry-led Fire Safety Reinsurance Facility has somewhat improved capacity in this market, but the market alone is unlikely to tackle the very high premiums some leaseholders are paying. The government will therefore work with insurers to consider whether, for the duration of remediation programmes, government might support the industry to reduce fire related liabilities in order to reduce the high insurance bills leaseholders are facing.

Large insurance bills for leaseholders can be exacerbated by opaque and excessive hidden commissions often shared between brokers, freeholders and property managing agents. These commissions have particularly risen for leaseholders in buildings with fire safety issues.

In February 2024, 14 brokers signed a commitment to cap their commissions to 15%, stop commission-sharing and share policy information when requested.

Legislation is already in place to provide for the transparency of these and related charges and we will act quickly to provide homeowners with greater rights, powers, and protections over their homes. To this end, the government is, today, publishing a consultation document on how we can ensure that leaseholders are only charged a fair and transparent permitted insurance fee for work done in managing arranging insurance on their behalf.

Ensuring residents can reclaim unfounded costs

Leaseholders should never pay for costs connected to cladding remediation and this government is outraged that some leaseholders have been forced to pay such costs.

We want to provide assurance that residents and leaseholders can recoup costs that they have already paid in connection with remediation. To do this, we have made amendments to the Building Safety Act (under the Leasehold Freehold Reform Act) to clarify that residents can request to recover costs from landlords that they should not have paid in the first place. This includes for interim measures meant to keep residents safe during remediation works, such as waking watches or simultaneous evacuation alarms; the cost of expert reports; and costs of alternative accommodation if residents were moved from their homes on building safety grounds.

More widely, we will also be looking to make sure that funds recovered through Remediation Contribution Orders for future payments are used for the purposes intended in the Order and are kept safe should the party holding those funds become insolvent.

We also intend to tighten existing enforcement routes with clear sanctions, further protecting leaseholders from having to live in unsafe buildings and face exorbitant remediation costs passed down via the service charge. We propose introducing stronger protections for residents should they be forced to leave their homes due to concerns over building safety.

It is also essential that residents are not prevented from taking action to help themselves cover additional costs. Some residents in shared ownership contracts have rightly felt trapped by social housing landlords who have enforced contracts which prevent them from sub-letting at market rates. From 1 November 2024, the government has made changes to the relevant guidance to clarify that shared owners living in buildings with remediation issues can charge a market rent, when sub-letting, to help them to meet costs until the remediation process is completed. The government reserves the right to take action against social housing landlords who fail to respond positively to this change of guidance.

Ensuring residents are protected from costs of interim measures

We know that inefficient waking watch measures are still being used too often and in too many cases, costs continue to be passed onto leaseholders. To assure residents that we will help to end the need for waking watches swiftly we are extending the Waking Watch Replacement Fund until the end of March 2026 and will confirm long-term plans at the next stage of the spending review. The fund has already provided alarms in 346 high risk buildings. We estimate the fund has saved affected leaseholders on average £172pcm and it has played a role in preventing residents being evacuated from their homes.

Ensure those responsible pay

We must also ensure the taxpayer is protected from industry’s costly mistakes. We are implementing measures to ensure that those responsible for the building safety crisis pay to put it right.

Building Safety Levy

The Building Safety Levy will raise funds to pay to remediate building safety defects. It is one of the ways government will help to protect leaseholders from the costs of remediating building safety defects. Currently the levy will top up the £5.1 billion of tax-payers money already allocated by HM Treasury to pay for remediation. It aims to raise around £3.4 billion over at least 10 years.

The levy will be charged on all new residential buildings in England (subject to exemptions) which require building control approval. We intend that the levy will come into effect in Autumn 2025. That means that applications for building control after the date the regulations come into force will be liable for the levy charge.

Local authorities will act as the collecting authority on behalf of central government as they are the local guardians of the building control process and have tax collection expertise. Revenue, excluding operational local authority costs, will be returned to central government.

The levy design will minimise its impacts on housing supply while still raising the required revenue within a reasonable timeframe.

Developer debt collection programme

The largest building developers in the country have agreed to repay the taxpayer where government funds were used to remediate life-critical fire safety defects in the buildings they developed.

This programme aims to recover up to £700 million. The initial focus will be on billing where buildings have reached completion, and we plan to send out the first invoices before the new year.

Next steps

This plan is the first step in increasing the pace of remediation and better protecting residents. It sets out a clear path to improving the situation for those living with the uncertainty of remediation and moving people out of the process altogether.

Many of these commitments will require changes to the law. We will bring forward legislation to deliver these reforms as soon as parliamentary time allows. In addition, funding will be deployed to drive forward the pace of remediation. Finally, further collaboration will be undertaken with regulators, partners and those living in remediation so that we can make all buildings with unsafe cladding in England safe from the risk of fire.

We will provide an update in summer 2025 assessing progress and outlining further necessary steps.