argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Leaseholders and Cladding — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Housing
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government if he will make a statement on whether leaseholders are expected to pay for the removal of dangerous cladding from their homes.
Robert Henry Halfon (Conservative, Centre-right): I welcome what my hon. Friend is doing, particularly on fairness for leaseholders, but what measures can he take to support Harlow locally to improve the quality of social housing, given the urgent need to ensure that our social housing stock is fit for purpose and we can build an even better Harlow for residents, for the 21st century and beyond?
Leaseholders and Cladding — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Housing
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government if he will make a statement on whether leaseholders are expected to pay for the removal of dangerous cladding from their homes.
Christopher John Pincher (Conservative, Centre-right): My right hon. Friend campaigns for Harlow possibly like no other colleague campaigns for any constituency in the country. He was integral to our work on space standards for upbuilding and ensuring that buildings have light in all habitable rooms. In answer to his question, I point him to our affordable homes programme, under which £12.2 billion will deliver 180,000 affordable new homes in the next five years, and to our reforms to the housing revenue account, which will allow local councils more easily to build social homes if they wish. Harlow may wish to pursue those two endeavours.
Leaseholders and Cladding — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Housing
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government if he will make a statement on whether leaseholders are expected to pay for the removal of dangerous cladding from their homes.
Christopher John Pincher (Conservative, Centre-right): I entirely sympathise with the situation that the hon. Lady’s constituents and those of other right hon. and hon. colleagues face. We are entirely cognisant of the fact that individual legal contracts between owners and leaseholders allow owners to pass on costs to their leaseholders. That is one of the reasons we invited Michael Wade to do the work that he is doing. We will work as fast as we can to ensure that the solutions that we are working through are available to mitigate any costs that leaseholders may fear they have to pay. That is also why we will continue to make public funds available, as we have through the ACM fund and the building safety fund to remediate buildings that are most in need and for which there is no other means of quick and easy remediation.
Leaseholders and Cladding — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Housing
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government if he will make a statement on whether leaseholders are expected to pay for the removal of dangerous cladding from their homes.
Christopher John Pincher (Conservative, Centre-right): I entirely accept the points made by my right hon. Friend. We will continue to work with the insurance sector on the insurance challenges that leaseholders face, with the financial services sector on the challenges with mortgage costs that leaseholders face, and with developers to make sure that remediation takes place swiftly and effectively, so that this problem is resolved.
Leaseholders and Cladding — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Housing
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government if he will make a statement on whether leaseholders are expected to pay for the removal of dangerous cladding from their homes.
Christopher John Pincher (Conservative, Centre-right): I point the right hon. Gentleman to the specific criteria in the building safety fund, which was published earlier this year. As I have said and will say again, we will work with Michael Wade to make sure that there are solutions to what is a very complicated issue. There may be more than one element to the package of solutions to resolve this challenge. I do not want to give a running commentary to the House on the progress of that work, but it is ongoing, and we hope that we can make some further and concrete announcement soon to give succour to the points made by the right hon. Gentleman and reassurance to others in the House.
Leaseholders and Cladding — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Housing
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government if he will make a statement on whether leaseholders are expected to pay for the removal of dangerous cladding from their homes.
Scott Lloyd Benton (Conservative, Centre-right): I welcome the £1 billion the Government have made available through the building safety fund for the removal of unsafe non-ACM cladding. Is my right hon. Friend able to update the House with regard to the number of applications to the fund and how quickly those can be reviewed and processed so that the work can finally be done?
Leaseholders and Cladding — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Housing
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government if he will make a statement on whether leaseholders are expected to pay for the removal of dangerous cladding from their homes.
Christopher John Pincher (Conservative, Centre-right): I entirely understand the concern of the hon. Lady and her constituents. The Government are working hard and at pace to remediate these buildings and resolve the issues that her constituents face. I am very happy to meet her to discuss the specific issues in her constituency, but she can be assured that I have every sympathy with the plight of her constituents. We are working very hard, very quickly to make sure those issues are resolved.
Leaseholders and Cladding — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Housing
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government if he will make a statement on whether leaseholders are expected to pay for the removal of dangerous cladding from their homes.
Christopher John Pincher (Conservative, Centre-right): Something like 97% of buildings with ACM cladding in the social sector have been remediated or have remediation under way. Of course, we continue to work on the remediation of non-ACM cladding, and we will work with local authorities to make sure that that is done as swiftly as possible. Another Member previously asked me if I would encourage housing associations to work more swiftly to remediate their properties—I think it was my right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers)—and I said to her that, yes, we will. I say to my hon. Friend: yes, we will work harder with social housing operators to make sure that their properties are remediated.
Leaseholders and Cladding — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Other
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government if he will make a statement on whether leaseholders are expected to pay for the removal of dangerous cladding from their homes.
Christopher John Pincher (Conservative, Centre-right): My hon. Friend encourages me to facilitate a meeting with Lord Greenhalgh, and I am happy to try to assist him in that regard. Regardless of the rather byzantine practices in the other place, I trust that we can make that happen for him My hon. Friend asks whether we have sympathy with the amendment sent down to us from the House of Lords. I understand what the amendment is trying to achieve. I believe it is defective, but of course we will look at it from the point of view that another Chamber in this Parliament has sent us an important amendment, and we will give it appropriate consideration.
Leaseholders and Cladding — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Housing
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government if he will make a statement on whether leaseholders are expected to pay for the removal of dangerous cladding from their homes.
Christopher John Pincher (Conservative, Centre-right): I pay tribute to the hon. Lady. I know she campaigns hard for her constituents, and we have had many exchanges across the Chamber about the concerns that her constituents have raised with her. We entirely agree that it is not right that leaseholders who have done the right thing—who have invested in a property or have chosen a place to call home—should find themselves burdened by costs for which they are not responsible. That is why we are working with the financial services sector—Michael Wade is working on this—to try to make sure that any costs respecting historical defects of buildings are obviated. She will understand when I say that the taxpayer should not be held responsible for an open-ended cheque. We have already spent over £1.5 billion of public money to ameliorate those buildings most in need of it. The fundamental responsibility must lie with developers, but I entirely understand the point of view that the hon. Lady has raised on behalf of her constituents. Leaseholders who have done the right thing should not fall liable to unfair costs.
Leaseholders and Cladding — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Housing
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government if he will make a statement on whether leaseholders are expected to pay for the removal of dangerous cladding from their homes.
David Mervyn Johnston (Conservative, Centre-right): On behalf of my constituents who are affected by and anxious about this situation, can I add my voice to the cause that leaseholders should not have to pay for these charges? They have done nothing wrong. Can my right hon. Friend assure me that he will push lenders not to require the EWS1 form if it is not really needed, and also push the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, which is training 2,000 other assessors, to deploy those in the areas of the country that most need them? If they are too thinly spread across the country, it will not do enough to reduce the delays.
Leaseholders and Cladding — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Domestic Commerce
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government if he will make a statement on whether leaseholders are expected to pay for the removal of dangerous cladding from their homes.
Christopher John Pincher (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his thoughtful contribution. Yes, we will continue to work with the lending sector to ensure that the EWS1 form is fully and properly understood and is not misused, or that its use does not bleed across in a way that is inappropriate. We will of course roll out the 2,000 assessors as quickly as we possibly can. I will take on board his point and consider how those assessors can be best and most effectively deployed.
Leaseholders and Cladding — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Housing
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government if he will make a statement on whether leaseholders are expected to pay for the removal of dangerous cladding from their homes.
Christopher John Pincher (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman. The question he puts is a fair one, and the way in which he puts the issues he raised was entirely reasonable and fair. We will bring forward proposals as quickly as we can, to ensure that costs to leaseholders are mitigated. He will understand that this is a complicated issue that tracks back over political generations. To unpick that challenge, and to ensure that remediation is done effectively, that liability falls where it should, that the taxpayer is not subjected to unfunded commitment and that leaseholders have the right thing done by them is a challenge, but one that we are rising to and one for which we will bring forward proposals as quickly as we can.
Leaseholders and Cladding — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Housing
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government if he will make a statement on whether leaseholders are expected to pay for the removal of dangerous cladding from their homes.
Robert James MacGillivray Neill (Conservative, Centre-right): The Minister may well have seen on Sunday on the television my constituent Ritu Saha talking not for the first time about the agony that she and her neighbours in Northpoint in Bromley are going through, for all the reasons that have just been set out by the right hon. Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn) and many others Of course there are complications in sorting out liability and dealing with some of the technical issues of remediation. I entirely accept that, and the work being done, but will the Minister recognise that the moral point is not complicated? At the end of the day, leaseholders who have done nothing to create this situation and who relied in good faith on a regulation that ultimately Government—of whatever description—own should not be out of pocket for whatever reason. If that takes more money, will he at least give the commitment that where it is a failure of regulation and no fault of the leaseholder, they will not ultimately have to pick up the tab?
Leaseholders and Cladding — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Housing
Questions: To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government if he will make a statement on whether leaseholders are expected to pay for the removal of dangerous cladding from their homes.
Christopher John Pincher (Conservative, Centre-right): I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I have heard the testimony of Ritu Saha and others in his constituency. I understand the point that he makes. I hope that in answering him quickly, he will not in any way think that I am diminishing that point, because it has also been made by colleagues across the House. We will work at pace to ensure that leaseholders who through no fault of their own find themselves in this terrible situation are not subjected to unfair costs. Costs ought to fall in the first instance to the developers and owners—and their warranty providers—who built the properties. The Government have set aside funds in this financial year to support those buildings that require immediate remediation and where there is no other means of so doing. We will continue to keep the situation under review, but we will work with the sector to ensure that remediation is done by those where responsibility lies.
Private International Law (Implementation of Agreements) Bill [Lords] — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Mixed Topics
Jonathan Simon Djanogly (Conservative, Centre-right): As things stand, is it the Minister’s intention that there will be only one five-year period—that in five years’ time the Government will drop it? Or is his current intention that it will be extended if other things come up?
Private International Law (Implementation of Agreements) Bill [Lords] — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Mixed Topics
Jonathan Simon Djanogly (Conservative, Centre-right): The ongoing disputes over the Bill have not related to the content of private international law treaties, but rather to parliamentary scrutiny of orders made pursuant to PIL treaties and scrutiny of the PIL treaties themselves. As far as the order-making powers are concerned, we have ended up today with a welcome compromise, eked out in the other place following a significant defeat and general kickback from basically everyone for the initial proposals for a Henry VIII clause. To that end, there were counterproposals to limit the scope for orders to specific treaties, for reports to be laid before auditors and to a stated timetable and for a super-affirmative procedure. Although none of those proposals has been accepted, others have been. I welcome the concessions offered today by the Minister, who I have to say has now listened, in terms of the exclusion of some level of criminal offences punishable by prison, the introduction of a five-year sunset clause, albeit a renewable one, and a prior duty to consult on orders, although only with such persons as the Secretary of State thinks appropriate. That is, frankly, as far as we are going to get on this and I shall support what is offered. However, I wish to make two related wider points First, while Government suggest that the PIL treaties are non-contentious, the sweeping scope and initially non-restricted life of order powers clearly represent a significant increase in the power of the Executive. It is also an attack on the constitutional principle that international agreements should only change domestic law if they are instituted by Act of Parliament. Here we need context, because if one looks at the range of current Government Bills, one sees time and again power being removed from this place to the Executive. That was recently described by one journalist as this Government’s Maoist tendency It may be that recent staff changes at Number 10 are going to reverse that tendency. The Government should keep in mind that the Executive will not always be a Conservative one, and messing with our finely tuned unwritten constitution may not be to the Conservatives’ advantage in the long run My final point concerns what has been persistently avoided in the Bill, which is the urgent need to reform the Constitutional Reform and Governance Act 2010 provisions for scrutinising proposed international treaties. Frankly, I have not been able to understand Ministers’ feet dragging on this issue. As things stand, it looks like CRaG reforms are more likely to come in piecemeal via the Trade Bill and the Agriculture Bill. In my view, that sectoral hotch-potch should be managed by the Justice team, to cover all international treaties. I suggest that Ministers apply their many talents to that task.
Private International Law (Implementation of Agreements) Bill [Lords] — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Mixed Topics
John Michael Howell (Conservative, Centre-right): Let me first declare an interest as an associate of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators I thought for a moment that I was going to welcome the agreement that there clearly is between my hon. Friend the Member for Huntingdon (Mr Djanogly) and me, but, given his last comments, I am not sure any more—I need to think about them. However, I think we are on the same sort of page at the moment I, too, welcome these Lords amendments and point out that they are a very good compromise between this House and the other place. I also welcome what the Minister has said in bringing them forward. In taking away the criminality, having a sunset clause and bringing in a consultation, they have done a tremendous amount to bridge the gap that there previously was during our discussions on this Bill. But in fundamental essence, the Bill remains the same in what it can do, and I am glad that it does I made the point on Report as to why that was important. I am not going to repeat the entire speech that I made then—I probably could not get away with that—but I stressed the need for agility and flexibility, and I put that in the context of the Singapore mediation convention. There is a great necessity to get the Singapore mediation convention into working order and on the statute book. The reason for that is twofold First, it fundamentally does no harm whatsoever—in fact, it does a tremendous amount of good for the small businesses that are choosing mediation as a means of settling their disputes. Secondly, it ends the farce we have at the moment with the system that is in place whereby if one has a mediation, one then has to agree an arbitration, however short that may be, in order to take advantage of the New York convention. That is a nonsense that we do not want to continue with. We must implement the Singapore mediation convention, which allows the results of a mediation to be recognised in the countries that have signed up to this The Minister was kind enough to say that I am a great champion of the Singapore mediation convention, and he is quite right, because I have seen that it does a tremendous amount of good for this country. It is also because, as the hon. Member for Stockton North (Alex Cunningham) said, a tremendous amount of alternative dispute resolution takes place in this country. We are world leaders in this, but we will not remain so for very long unless we sign up to the Singapore mediation convention and get stuck into what the rest of the world is getting involved in. All I can do is recommend to the Minister that he gets on with introducing the statutory instrument to get the Singapore mediation convention up and running in this country. To repeat what I said on Third Reading, I am very happy to serve on the SI Committee that introduces the Singapore mediation convention and to see a great dream come true.
Exiting the European Union — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Other
Eleanor Fulton Laing (Conservative, Centre-right): Order, just before the shadow Minister responds to the intervention, she said herself that she will now be turning to the substance of the matter before us. As much as it is always interesting to consider the history and choir practice of the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant)—
Exiting the European Union — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Other
Eleanor Fulton Laing (Conservative, Centre-right): I think that is just as well. That which refers to his singing specifically of "Hark the Herald Angels Sing" is interesting, but not relevant. I am quite sure that the shadow Minister will come to the relevant points before us.
Exiting the European Union — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Other
John Alan Redwood (Conservative, Centre-right): I have declared my business interests in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. May I reassure the Opposition that I wanted to make a few comments in this debate, and I submitted a request to participate on my own initiative? I have not received any message from the Whips, either before or during these debates, that I should not make a few remarks. With the permission of the House, I will exercise that democratic right I understand that there is a parliamentary game going on and that the Opposition want to extend this debate because there are some other things that they do not want to discuss, but that is a matter for them. Oppositions are quite entitled to use what time is available for their own purposes.
Exiting the European Union — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Other
Eleanor Fulton Laing (Conservative, Centre-right): Order. As the hon. Gentleman said, the point he has just made goes very wide, and very much wider than the particular statutory instrument before us. So I am sure that the hon. Member for Kilmarnock and Loudoun will stick very strictly to the terms of the SI, which he has done very well so far in his long speech.
Exiting the European Union — House of Commons, 2020-11-24
Topic: Other
Eleanor Fulton Laing (Conservative, Centre-right): I have been informed that the Member who is No. 5 on the call list has withdrawn from the debate, as have the Members who are Nos. 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18 and 19. We therefore come directly to the Minister.