Written evidence submitted by Jessica Bishay [BSB 134]
I am a leaseholder, living in E14 and am writing to express my distress with the Building Safety Bill and the cladding scandal which is directly affecting myself and many others.
I, like millions of others affected by this, am saddened and disgusted by the disregard towards leaseholders in the process of the draft Building Safety Bill. I have spent months and months feeling anxious, depressed, and unable to plan my future. It makes me feel physically sick to think that such a gross injustice can occur in such a public and nonchalant manner.
I have watched and listened to MPs, including Chris Pincher, standing in Parliament discussing actions to be taken and expressing that leaseholders shouldn't have to pay to remove unsafe cladding, yet when the new Draft Building Safety Bill emerged it stated, "we are committed to making sure that leaseholders won’t pay unaffordable costs for historic repairs to their buildings." Ministers are proposing that tenants might have to pay a, “building safety charge” if required by the landlord, which include fire safety works. Stating that anything up to and within the region of £80,000 or more to be ‘reasonable’ is simply absurd. I am a Teacher in my third year working in Newham and do not have £80,000 in savings, nor should I have to cover the costs of pre-historic building errors. The average UK salary is around £30,000. According to the Parliament website, as of April 2019 the basic starting salary for an MP was £79,468. Since then, they have received a pay rise which has increased.
When we purchased the property, we did so thinking that we were making the best decision of our life, feeling safe, and completely unaware of these building flaws.
The leaseholder must NOT cover costs for freeholders' mistakes and building safety failures. If the freeholder is unable to pay, the Government has to step in and do the right thing by providing further funding. The funding provided is not enough and it is evident that it is not enough. What sickens many is that the Government has prioritised funding and projects to build brand new buildings in 2020 whilst totally neglecting those who are still stuck in unsafe buildings three years on with little to no action. All this amidst a global pandemic. Our block in E14 affects 559 flats, all covered in ACM-cladding (the same as Grenfell). No physical works have commenced yet, but we do know that our freeholder has applied for the funding. We also know that this funding is not enough and future cladding bills will fall upon the leaseholders.
Thousands of innocent homeowners are receiving bills demanding huge figures to replace unsafe cladding on their homes. The lack of help, urgency, and protection towards leaseholders is simply unacceptable. The government funds created are simply not enough and are not inclusive. Some freeholders refuse to cooperate, and others have even failed to provide up to date financial accounts for the last couple of years. Leaseholders pay their taxes, soaring service charges, building reserve funds, electricity and gas bills, and now are being asked to pay for architectural errors which came to light three years ago due to the tragic Grenfell disaster costing 72 lives. We are not talking about repairing a window or two, which of course, should fall on the leaseholder. We are talking about gross building safety failures signed off by the architects and freeholders at the time of construction and accepted by the Government. To pass costs onto innocent leaseholders is despicable and very few will be able to afford this.
The EWS1 form is providing a huge range of life-threatening issues. We remain trapped in our homes, unable to move, sell or rent because quite rightly, people do not want to live in a home whose value is £0, and which is unsafe. We have worked very hard to purchase these homes in good faith. To punish us for doing so after investigative work carried out by specialists is one of the greatest injustices that I have heard of. This cannot continue.
Nick Ferrari asked Robert Jenricks all of these questions in a recent LBC interview, and he was unable to provide clear and accurate answers, highlighting just how out of touch our Housing Minister is. This is a scandal and a crisis which cannot be ignored. Freeholders own the building, leaseholders do not.