argyrotsipi/train-dataset huggingface dataset:
Grenfell Tower Fire Inquiry — House of Commons, 2017-07-12
Topic: Mixed Topics
Karen Elizabeth Lee (Labour, Centre-left): I understand that the Fire Brigades Union has talked a great deal about the cuts in services and about deregulation, and the hon. Gentleman has talked a great deal about sprinklers today. Does he agree that the cuts and what has happened to the fire regulations cannot have failed to have an impact, and that they happened on the Conservatives’ watch? Let me add that I am a bit disappointed to see how many Conservatives are missing from this debate. It is a crucial debate, and Conservative Members should be here.
Grenfell Tower Fire Inquiry — House of Commons, 2017-07-12
Topic: Housing
Clive James Charles Betts (Labour, Centre-left): This is the most appalling tragedy. I am sure that our hearts go out to the friends and families of everyone who lost their lives, to everyone who has been traumatised by this appalling event, and to everyone who has been displaced and is now homeless. The only good that can come out of this is that we learn lessons quickly about what happened and make sure it never happens again On the practicalities, I first want to address the issue of funding to put right the tower blocks up and down the country that are now deemed to be failures and in non-safe situations. I was worried by the conditions that the First Secretary of State put on the funding that might be available. When challenged, he initially said that of course the Government would fund any safety work that the local fire authority deemed necessary, but he then withdrew that statement and said that the Government would fund such work when the local authority could not afford to do it, which is a very important condition. Will the Minister explain precisely what that means, what criteria will lead to Government funding, and if local authorities will be asked to find funding for themselves We must see this in the context of local authority finances as a whole—not merely in relation to the cuts to local authority budgets, but in the light of the fact that this work on social housing will come out of not the general fund, but the housing revenue account. In 2010, funding for social housing was cut by more than any other form of expenditure—by 60%. There is not a penny of Government money in the current spending round for new social housing, decent homes work or any remedial work on social housing. Local authorities have been asked to find the money all by themselves.
Grenfell Tower Fire Inquiry — House of Commons, 2017-07-12
Topic: Housing
Karen Patricia Buck (Labour, Centre-left): Is it my hon. Friend’s understanding that any works at the local level will, in effect, be paid for by tenants out of their rents and by leaseholder contributions? Does he agree that the basic repairs and maintenance budgets for local authority social housing have already been cut by 20% since 2010?
Grenfell Tower Fire Inquiry — House of Commons, 2017-07-12
Topic: Housing
Clive James Charles Betts (Labour, Centre-left): Absolutely—that is precisely the point I was coming on to make. The money will come out of the housing revenue account, which is, of course, funded from rents. In the 2015 Budget, the Government decided that rents would not rise by CPI plus 1%, but would actually fall by 1% per year. It is estimated that that will have a massive effect, with many billions of pounds less—about £40 billion over 30 years—coming into housing revenue accounts. Councils can, of course, borrow money, but the amount is capped by the Government When the Government cap rents and borrowing, where can local authorities go to find the money to show, in the Minister’s terms, that they can afford to do this work? All they can do is to cut other planned expenditure for the maintenance of social housing. Solving one problem will simply lead to other problems unless the Government are prepared to find the money. It is as simple as that, and I hope the Minister will reflect on this very seriously. Local authorities should not have to show either that they will not build a few social houses that they were going to build, or that they will cut maintenance programmes so that they can prove that they can afford to provide extra money for the necessary work on tower blocks. Instead, the Government should say that all the necessary work approved by local fire authorities to make tower blocks safe will be eligible for extra Government money. It is a very simple request, and if the Minister could say yes, he would resolve an awful lot of concerns and difficulties in this debate In a slightly wider context, we simply must start to view social housing differently. There has been a tendency in the past few years to see social housing as poor housing for poor people, and to think that anything will do for the people who live there. I have to tell Ministers that that is somewhat reflected in the pay to stay scheme. Fortunately, the Government have recently made the scheme voluntary for social housing landlords, not compulsory. In other words, there is a view that those who can afford it—slightly better-off tenants—should not be in social housing. I disagree: social housing should be there for those who need it Such thinking is also reflected in the proposal to sell high-value council assets. In other words, there is a view that if council housing is good and decent, it should not be council housing any longer. That is wrong as well. The proposal to fund the right to buy for housing association tenants seems to have been put on the back burner. Again, the Minister could address that by saying that we will have good-quality social housing in the future that will remain as social housing for those who need it.
Grenfell Tower Fire Inquiry — House of Commons, 2017-07-12
Topic: Housing
Andrew Francis Slaughter (Labour, Centre-left): My hon. Friend is making an extraordinarily good case and I hope that the Minister will respond to his points. May I add an additional point? When social affordable housing is used for tenants who have been decanted—in the case of Grenfell or, indeed, of other examples—such housing also needs to be replaced, because otherwise we will again be looking at a net loss of social housing.
Grenfell Tower Fire Inquiry — House of Commons, 2017-07-12
Topic: Housing
Clive James Charles Betts (Labour, Centre-left): My hon. Friend makes an extremely powerful point. Not merely should the Government fund the remedial work on tower blocks but, in the Grenfell case, they should fund the replacement of social housing to make sure people do not lose out There has been a call for an immediate review of the fire regulations, and the Minister could announce today that the Government will get on with that. I hope that whoever is elected as Chair of the Communities and Local Government Committee today will take a lead, with its new elected members, by getting the Select Committee involved, just as we were in relation to regulations for gas and electrical safety in the home Getting Ministers to agree to new regulations has, at times, been a bit like drawing teeth. I draw attention to the Select Committee hearing in 2013 at which Peter Holland, the new chief fire and rescue adviser, and the then Minister were questioned very strongly about the mandatory retrofitting of sprinklers. The then Minister said no to that, and one of the reasons given—it was also given in a Westminster Hall debate—was that we could not have a new regulation unless two old ones were taken off the statute book. What a nonsensical position! Regulations are either necessary or they are not. If regulations are necessary to keep people safe, they should be implemented without having to wait for two others to be cancelled. I hope Ministers will act rapidly, and I am pleased that my local authority in Sheffield has decided to retrofit sprinklers to all its tower blocks in advance of any Government statement Colleagues have made the point that cladding should not be fire-tested in isolation. The insulation, the firestops, the fire doors and all other aspects of tower blocks’ fire safety systems must be tested. Sheffield, working with the fire service, has so far found only one block where the cladding has failed—the Hanover tower block in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield Central (Paul Blomfield). However, the fire service has said that because of everything else that is in place in that block, it still believes its fire systems make it safe for people to live there Sheffield City Council has done very well. It has written to the fire authority and all the tenants. It has held meetings with them and said that if anyone wants to move temporarily because they feel unsafe, they can do so. It has also put a 24-hour fire watch in the block. But in the end, the fire authority believes that the block is safe because of how the cladding works with the insulation, the firestops and everything else. I hope that Ministers will now look at extending the tests beyond cladding to whole fire prevention systems in blocks, and encouraging local authorities to do the same Finally, will the Minister explain why there is to be a taskforce in Kensington and Chelsea and not commissioners? As I said the other day, I believe, as a localist, that commissioners should be used only in extremis, but this is an extreme example of a failure of governance.
Grenfell Tower Fire Inquiry — House of Commons, 2017-07-12
Topic: Mixed Topics
Andrew Francis Slaughter (Labour, Centre-left): The hon. Gentleman’s case might be more convincing if he did not see everything from one particular vantage point. He says that there must be action after the public inquiry, but does he not agree that action should have been taken in the light of what happened at Lakanal House? Can he perhaps explain why Ministers did not make recommendations about retrofitting sprinklers after that, despite what the coroner said in his letter? [Hon. Members: "We did."] No, you did not.
Grenfell Tower Fire Inquiry — House of Commons, 2017-07-12
Topic: Mixed Topics
Louise Margaret Haigh (Labour, Centre-left): When I met Sheffield local authority, it expressed concerns about the safety of not only tower block residents but individuals living in flats above takeaways and other commercial premises, which often share the same staircase, bathroom and kitchen as the commercial premises and often are very overcrowded—for example, with illegal immigrants sharing beds. Does my hon. Friend agree that we need to look into the possibility of having regulations in this area?
Grenfell Tower Fire Inquiry — House of Commons, 2017-07-12
Topic: Housing
Clive Stanley Efford (Labour, Centre-left): I entirely agree. We need to look at that, as in another situation the numbers of people in a block could become an issue—and we do not know that that was not an issue in this instance as well The inquiry must also look at the issue raised by the Chair of the Select Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts), about building control. There are a number of issues about enforcement and making regular checks on the work done when refurbishments take place. Are the fire blocks being put in place between the floors, for instance? The advice to me from a constituent of mine who is an expert and who has been in the media speaking about this case, and about this issue for many years, is that we are very lax about the enforcement of the fire blocks between the floors and around windows, and we need to ensure that there is proper enforcement of this. The inquiry must look into that, too Responsibility for appointing the building control must lie with the local authority. There must be clear lines of responsibility for maintaining these standards, and we must stop local authorities being side-lined over ensuring that safety standards are considered of the utmost importance when these schemes go ahead.
Grenfell Tower Fire Inquiry — House of Commons, 2017-07-12
Topic: Housing
Clive Stanley Efford (Labour, Centre-left): Yes, an incident such as this one shows that there must be a basic knowledge of fire safety regulations, and there are many other issues that building control has to cover, so of course there must be a minimum qualification requirement The current position on sprinklers makes no sense. New blocks built to new building standards over 30 metres high are required to have a sprinkler system installed. However, older buildings built to an older standard of building control are not required to retrofit. That is completely and utterly illogical. The Government—outside of the inquiry and everything else—must fund the retrofitting of sprinklers in those blocks of flats where that has been recommended by fire safety officers. There can be no equivocating on that. This fire shows that that is essential, and the Government should just accept that we cannot hold back on it any longer We are told that there was a plan to put fireproof cladding on to Grenfell Tower but that it was £2 per square metre more expensive than the cheaper version that was actually put on. If that is correct, the inquiry will obviously have something to say about it. There are some questions here. As I have said, this cheaper type of cladding was already on other blocks where similar fires had taken place. Why was it allowed to be used on this block? Is it true that the contractors who were erecting the cladding raised concerns about whether they should be putting that cladding on that block at that height? If it is true, action must obviously be taken against the people who made that decision.
Grenfell Tower Fire Inquiry — House of Commons, 2017-07-12
Topic: Housing
Clive Stanley Efford (Labour, Centre-left): I will not, because I am taking up some time and I want to sit down. I have had the nod from the Deputy Speaker, and if I do not sit down quite soon, I will not get called again My final question for the Minister is about the Building Regulations Advisory Committee. We were told that, in the light of the Lakanal report, that committee would meet to oversee fire regulations, but that meeting did not take place. The Minister said that that work would be completed by the end of this year, but the committee has not yet met. We need to hear from the Minister why, in the light of the report on Lakanal, that committee did not meet to review the fire regulations. In my opinion, this shows that the Government were asleep on the job. I hope that we will learn the lessons from this, once and for all, when the inquiry reports. Lakanal should have shown us the steps we needed to take to prevent this. Fires that have happened in other countries since Lakanal have pointed the way to the action that we should have taken. We have to learn the lessons once and for all to ensure that this type of tragedy never happens again.
Grenfell Tower Fire Inquiry — House of Commons, 2017-07-12
Topic: Housing
James McMahon (Labour, Centre-left): I know that the hon. Gentleman is just about to finish his speech but, notwithstanding all his points about personal responsibility, and not painting fire doors or propping them open with fire extinguishers, people must be forgiven for leaving their windows open on a hot summer’s night only for flames to engulf their flats from the outside in.
Grenfell Tower Fire Inquiry — House of Commons, 2017-07-12
Topic: Mixed Topics
Ruth Margaret Cadbury (Labour, Centre-left): It is a great pleasure to have sat through the whole of this debate and listened to the excellent maiden speeches of my hon. Friends the Members for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel), for Croydon Central (Sarah Jones), for Barnsley East (Stephanie Peacock), for Lewisham West and Penge (Ellie Reeves) and for Leigh (Jo Platt)—I hope I have got them all. This has been an excellent debate, with very many important points raised and questions asked of Ministers on issues that the Government must address. I will not take up Members’ time by repeating many of them The Grenfell fire was an appalling and, very likely, preventable tragedy, exacerbated by what seemed to me, as somebody with a bit of experience of this, the frankly dysfunctional response from Kensington and Chelsea Council in the hours, days and weeks following that terrible fire—and even now. I share all Members’ concerns for the families of those who lost their lives, and those who lost their homes. I share the concerns of the emergency and frontline service workers who have had to deal with the trauma. I hope that there will be adequate long-term post-trauma support for them all, of the kind that the Government put in place immediately after the 7/7 bombings; somebody I know well is benefiting now from the support he received immediately after that.
Grenfell Tower Fire Inquiry — House of Commons, 2017-07-12
Topic: Mixed Topics
Clive James Charles Betts (Labour, Centre-left): I raised that issue in the debate. I asked the Secretary of State in a written question to set out the criteria against which applications for additional funding will be assessed. The answer I got was "that it will not be possible to answer this question within the usual time period." That is a rather empty answer, is it not, to a very pressing problem?
Grenfell Tower Fire Inquiry — House of Commons, 2017-07-12
Topic: Housing
Karen Patricia Buck (Labour, Centre-left): For clarity, will the Minister confirm that half or more of all the high-rise towers identified at the earlier point in this discussion have not submitted materials to be tested? That is the clear implication of what he was saying.
Grenfell Tower Fire Inquiry — House of Commons, 2017-07-12
Topic: Other
Jenny Chapman (Labour, Centre-left): On a point of order, Mr Speaker. The House is aware that the repeal Bill is to be published tomorrow morning. Disconcertingly, the Labour party has received reports that the press is to be briefed on its contents this evening. Mr Speaker, have you received any notice from the Government that a Minister intends to come to this House at the earliest opportunity to make a statement as to the contents of the Bill? If not, could you please advise me on how we might be able to bring the contents of the Bill to the attention of the House before 21 July?
Homelessness — House of Commons, 2017-07-17
Topic: Housing
Margaret Olivia Hillier (Labour, Centre-left): The Secretary of State talked about homelessness as though it is people living on the street; in my constituency, the council is spending £35 million a year on people living in hostels and temporary accommodation, and there are many other hidden households who are living with another family because they cannot afford a roof over their head. The Secretary of State talks about his ambitious plans, but they do not help people here and now; what is he doing now to make sure that people in Hackney South and Shoreditch, across London and the country can get a roof over their head that is affordable?
Homelessness — House of Commons, 2017-07-17
Topic: Housing
Barry John Sheerman (Labour, Centre-left): Surely the Secretary of State must give some hope of a vision that this Government actually believe in something. And if he believes in one thing, it must be sorting out the social housing market by building homes for people at affordable rents—and good quality ones, too.
Grenfell Tower Fire: Advice to Landlords — House of Commons, 2017-07-17
Topic: Housing
Michael Joseph Patrick Kane (Labour, Centre-left): The Residential Landlords Association, which is based in my constituency, has raised concerns about the complex and sometimes contradictory guidance being given to private landlords by various bodies, including the Government, on fire safety. What plans does the Secretary of State have to address this matter?
Grenfell Tower Fire: Advice to Landlords — House of Commons, 2017-07-17
Topic: Housing
Questions: I am concerned that a survey of social landlords carried out by HouseMark has found that they had little confidence that they would be able to take enforcement action under the Housing Act 2004 to ensure that leaseholders complied with fire safety regulations, including through fitting fire doors, which is obviously essential, given what the Secretary of State has just said about keeping all tenants safe. Will he respond to the request from Nottingham City Council, which is seeking additional powers to enable this to happen?
Harriet Ruth Harman (Labour, Centre-left): Could the Secretary of State be more specific about the financial help that he is going to make available to councils with tower blocks, such as Southwark, which has 174? He has talked about the legal duties of councils to keep their tenants safe, and of course that is very important, but they also have a legal duty to have a balanced budget. Since the Conservatives came into government in 2010, Southwark Council’s budget has nearly halved. Fire improvements such as the installation of sprinklers should not happen at the expense of other improvements that tenants are waiting for; nor should the expense be placed on leaseholders. Will the Secretary of State come up with the £100 million that Southwark needs?
Grenfell Tower Fire: Advice to Landlords — House of Commons, 2017-07-17
Topic: Housing
Questions: I am concerned that a survey of social landlords carried out by HouseMark has found that they had little confidence that they would be able to take enforcement action under the Housing Act 2004 to ensure that leaseholders complied with fire safety regulations, including through fitting fire doors, which is obviously essential, given what the Secretary of State has just said about keeping all tenants safe. Will he respond to the request from Nottingham City Council, which is seeking additional powers to enable this to happen?
Anthony Joseph Lloyd (Labour, Centre-left): In the five weeks since the Grenfell Tower tragedy, both private and social landlords have met with an array of bewildering and sometimes contradictory advice. They look to the Department for Communities and Local Government both for technical advice about acceptable specification and for real advice about what the Department will pay for. When is the Secretary of State going to make it clear to those responsible for tower blocks what is the right thing to do and how they will pay for the necessary improvements?
Housebuilding — House of Commons, 2017-07-17
Topic: Housing
Questions: Numbers matter, but so does the quality of new homes. I am sure that the Secretary of State will have seen some of the terrible stories in the national press, and I have seen some awful examples recently in my constituency. Why is it that someone can buy goods in a shop and have powers of redress, but if someone spends a fortune on a new home, they can sometimes struggle for months, if not years, to get what they paid for?
Benjamin Peter James Bradshaw (Labour, Centre-left): Will the Secretary of State congratulate Exeter’s Labour council on building more council homes and housing association homes in the last 10 years than all the surrounding Conservative districts put together? What more can he do to encourage those rural councils to provide more homes in their market towns and villages, instead of plonking their developments on the edge of cities such as Exeter in unsustainable urban sprawl?