- Residents raise cladding concerns in meeting with Council
- Councillors take issues to registered providers
New data compiled by the Labour Party estimates that 5290 residents in Barnet are affected by cladding issues, with a minimum 38 buildings affected.
There have been 37 Building Safety Fund registrations for potentially dangerous non ACM cladding in Barnet, with between 6-10 buldings identified with ACM cladding systems that are unlikely to meet building regulations and between 1-5 buildings with ACM cladding systems that are yet to be remediated.
A group of residents affected by cladding problems have now met with the Council to go through their concerns, and councillors have taken these concerns to registered providers where relevant. Barnet’s Labour councillors repeatedly pushed for these meetings on behalf of residents.
Issues & proposals raised include:
– How do we ensure all the residents in affected buildings have been contacted? Many residents only seem to find out about cladding and related problems when they come to sell, or when a developer is planning changes to the building
– How do we ensure residents going through this have wider connection and support?
– Can the Council help bring Aviva, freeholders and developers to meet with residents on Zoom to get better communication going, and generally improve communications with all affected residents?
– Can the Council act as an information hub, fielding Q and As on legislation and support going forward?
– Mental health support should be bespoke, funded and offered by developers.
– This needs to be the start of a proper dialogue with and support for residents.
– Can the Council put in place measures to ensure that developers that have used unsafe cladding in the past are checked for suitability to build in Barnet if any development of theirs is subject to unresolved cladding issues?
– Urging housing associations to find means to not pass all the extra costs onto leaseholders where there is no Government funding.
– Ensuring all registered providers press to obtain grant funding from the Government whenever possible.
Barnet Labour Group Deputy Leader and Housing & Growth Spokesperson, Cllr Ross Houston said: “I would like to thank the local resident cladding group representatives for their fortitude and for the amazing campaigning work they have done on this issue.
“We support them in their ongoing campaign to push the Government to not pass the cost of fixing the cladding scandal onto leaseholders.
“It’s good that the Council have finally met with the residents and we would like to see that continue on a regular basis until all the cladding problems are resolved. The Council needs to be responsive and proactively engage with and support local residents.”
Cllr Anne Clarke, Childs Hill councillor and Labour’s candidate for Barnet & Camden said: “It’s good to see Barnet taking an interest. The cladding and building safety scandal is impacting the lives of so many of our residents. It’s not just unsafe cladding and dodgy materials, the cost of remedial repair is financially ruinous for many. These residents can’t sell and move away from the problems as they can’t get mortgages, services charges are often enormous and increasing. Ultimately, the Government needs to ensure that these buildings are safe and that leaseholders don’t foot the bill.”
Ends.
Notes:
- The data for Barnet can be found in the following Government documents:
- The number of people affected has been calculated as follows:
Minimum number of buildings affected X national average of 58 (ave households per building) X 2.4 (ave household size)
- The minimum number of buildings affected has been calculated as follows:
Building Safety Fund registrations + ACM yet to be remediated (min value)