Parliament's party history for this member: Labour ( – present).
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Building Safety (Remediation of Unsafe Cladding etc) Bill
I very much welcome what my right hon. Friend just announced about those who have found themselves the owner of a flat that they <span id="221" class="column-number" data-column-number="221"></span>did not know was non-qualifying, because of a previous owner. It is clearly unfair that they should be penalised. Will that measure be retrospective? I have a constituent who unknowingly bought a non-qualifying flat and was gobsmacked—traumatised, actually—to discover what had happened to him. He faces potentially huge costs. Will someone who is already in that position benefit from the measure?
Building Safety (Remediation of Unsafe Cladding etc) Bill
I unreservedly welcome the Bill. The story of the cladding crisis arose out of the appalling tragedy at Grenfell on that night over nine years ago, when all those people died in the place they should have felt most safe—their home. They died because of a series of catastrophic failures.
The first and most obvious failure was that cladding was allowed to be put in combinations on the sides of buildings when no one had actually tested what would happen if those combinations caught fire. It is astonishing, when one looks back at it, that architects were able to specify combinations. We now know that when some of those combinations had been put on rigs and set fire to—boom!—they had gone up very quickly.
The second thing—my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington and Bayswater (Joe Powell) spoke so well—is that we are here, over nine years after the event, and we still have not sorted it out. I am much struck by the example that he quoted from Australia; he is right. Many of my constituents have been affected by the cladding scandal. For most of them, it is fair to say, their homes have now been dealt with, but there are still far too many people whose homes have not been. The reaction of the Government at the time was, “Well, it’s not really our responsibility.” They had to be forced by stages, over the years, to do more and more.
There was also a failure to build the blocks in line with the building regulations at the time. It is one thing to look at the cladding—people said, “Oh, I didn’t know that was a problem”—but as it was pulled off buildings, one after another, what did we find? We found that the fire-stopping measures, the firebreaks, were missing—even though that was a requirement of the building regulations at the time. This is a story of a <span id="247" class="column-number" data-column-number="247"></span>load of jerry-built buildings that people lived in for many years, as one Member said, with no idea that they were living in a fire trap. I make that point because, on occasion, I have heard Members in this Chamber lambast Britain as an over-regulated society. I mean, give us a break! This story is a monumental failure of regulation. People died as a result, and many other people’s lives have been put on hold, as we have heard.
I join others in paying tribute to the End Our Cladding Scandal group, Leeds Cladding Scandal, and the many constituents who have raised cases with me and who have worked so hard to try to change the circumstances in which they find themselves. Time and again, people have said to me, as they have to all other hon. Members, “I thought I’d bought the home of my dreams, and I find I’m living in a nightmare that I don’t seem able to get out of.” Many Members have referred to people’s lives being put on hold. That is absolutely true: they cannot get on with things, whether having a family or moving to another part of the country where they have been offered a good job, because they cannot sell their flat. There appears to be no escape. The bills go up, the waking watches are costly, insurance is expensive and service charges go up. I remember the first constituent who told me, “I’ve had to move out of my flat.” I said, “You’ve moved out of your flat?” He said, “Yes, I couldn’t afford the bills, so I moved out of my flat; I’m now renting it, so I can pay the bills that I can’t afford in the flat that I thought was the home of my dreams.”
Each block, particularly the ones that have not yet been remediated, is a very complex story—changing ownership, developers disappearing or going bust, the legal pass the parcel, which was mentioned in a previous speech, and mortgage lenders refusing to lend. The hard truth is that no legislation is going to require a mortgage lender to lend on a property it does not want to lend on. The mortgage lenders therefore have to have confidence.
Building Safety (Remediation of Unsafe Cladding etc) Bill
No, the hon. Gentleman is not; I did not think that he was. That is a fundamental problem. It is about confidence in the system and in the property. Too many of my constituents still worry that they could be landed with bills they simply cannot afford. Someone said to me, “Thirty thousand quid? It might as well be 30 million quid, because I can’t afford thirty thousand.”
I want to raise three specific issues. First, I very much welcome what the Secretary of State said in her opening speech about those who have bought non-qualifying flats. As I was reflecting on the question I put to her about making the measure retrospective, I realised that that probably is not an issue here. The sole owner of a <span id="248" class="column-number" data-column-number="248"></span>flat that was deemed to be non-qualifying will be relieved of the requirement to meet the costs themselves and will be eligible for the support that other leaseholders have.
The second issue relates to blocks below 11 metres. I echo the point made by the hon. Member for Bristol Central (Carla Denyer). There is a development in Leeds called the Chandlers; some of the blocks are over 11 metres and some are below 11 metres. Applications have been made to the new fund that was opened—from memory, the closing day was 17 August. There will be lots of applications, and we do not know who will be successful and who will not. I seek clarity from the Minister. As I understand it, under the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005, a “responsible person” is required to carry out fire risk assessments on all buildings and put in place measures to address fire risks they identify. A House of Commons Library briefing note states:
“Since 2022, this risk assessment duty has included assessing the structure and external walls of the building, including cladding”.
Although the Government generally argue that most buildings under 11 metres do not present a risk, what is the situation in cases where there is a risk in those buildings? For example, a PAS 9980 assessment was done for the Chandlers. The residents were first told that the blocks under 11 metres were a high risk; they were then told that those blocks were a medium risk. But hey—a medium risk is still a risk. Would you want to live in a block that has a medium risk of catching fire, putting your life at risk? I have read the Bill and the explanatory memorandum on this point quite hurriedly, and it appears that these particular powers apply to buildings of over 11 metres. However, since the Government have said, “We are prepared to provide funding for buildings under 11 metres,” can the Minister tell me whether any of the powers in the legislation as it is currently drafted apply to blocks of under 11 metres and the people responsible for them? If not, if such a block has got a PAS 9980 assessment that says, “This is a risk”, then why, logically, would we not extend these powers to ensure the remediation of blocks under 11 metres?
Finally, I join my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton Itchen (Darren Paffey) in making a plea about people who really, really, really need to move. Could the Government think creatively about developers buying back flats or, as was said a moment ago, the local authority purchasing them? We want more social housing, and each one would be one more unit. I wonder whether we could see what might be done to help people who really needed to move—for example, if someone’s mother were extremely ill and they needed to move in order to look after her.
Having said that, our constituents who still live in unsafe flats have waited far too long to have them made safe, and I look forward to the Bill making very speedy passage through both Houses.
Does the hon. Gentleman accept that the reason the Loughgall inquest began, and was then terminated by the previous Government’s legislation, is that the Attorney General in the last Conservative Government, who is also the Advocate General for Northern Ireland, decided, having considered all the papers, that it should be held? Is he telling the Committee that he disagrees with the decision of the right hon. and learned Member for Kenilworth and Southam (Sir Jeremy Wright)?
I thank my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the way in which he has handled these two days of Committee consideration with such skill, grace and understanding. The fact that the temperature and the temper of the debate over the past two days have been markedly different from that which we experienced previously is, as I said at the beginning of my speech yesterday, a sign that the Government have listened, and that point has been recognised. I join the Secretary of State in thanking the civil servants in the Northern Ireland Office and other Government Departments for all the work that they have done on the Bill. They are as fine a group of civil servants as I have had the privilege to work with.
I mentioned yesterday my first visit to WAVE, when Sandra Peake, that wonderful human being, sat me down and said, “Hilary, one of the things that you need to understand is how intimate the violence was in Northern Ireland.” The story that we have just heard from my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State—indeed, the stories we have heard from so many right hon. and hon. Members over the past two days, and over the past 28 years—is proof of that. But today is a chance to <span id="1078" class="column-number" data-column-number="1078"></span>recognise that this issue can now finally move on. I have said to the House many times that if dealing with legacy was easy, we would have done so a long time ago. It isn’t. It is really, really difficult; it is really, really hard.
The last group of people I want to thank are all right hon. and hon. Members across the House for the contributions they have made, because responsibility falls on all of us to get this right in the interests of the people who sent us here to represent them.
Let me begin by congratulating my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State on the amendments that he has tabled. Notwithstanding what we have just heard, I think that they show beyond doubt that the Government have listened to the points made by many Members, veterans and others. They have been carefully thought out. They <span id="814" class="column-number" data-column-number="814"></span>are balanced, reasonable and fair. They maintain the principle that everyone is equal before the law. Amendment 47, tabled by Opposition Members, would not ensure that, because it singles out one group for special treatment. The Government amendments recognise the special circumstances in which all those who served with such distinction in Operation Banner found themselves, and in my view, those amendments will enable the House to send the Bill to the other place with confidence.
The Bill, and the amendments, are needed for two principal reasons: first, because of the manifest failings of the Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Act 2023; and secondly because we need a system that can command confidence and provide help for all those people who are still searching for answers after all these years. That is what this is about—how their loved ones died, and at whose hands. I say “all those people”, because if I have a cause for regret, it is that it strikes me, when I reflect on the debate on the Bill in the House over the last year and a bit, that much of it has focused on just some of the people who were involved. Veterans are hugely important—many of them were killed, and many of their families are looking for answers on how and at whose hands their loved ones died—but if we are honest, we must recognise that we have failed collectively, as a House, to reflect the hurt, pain and suffering of the vast majority of families who lost loved ones during the troubles, and that is what I want to focus on in my brief remarks.
Some conversations and stories that we hear as Members of Parliament never leave us. Some remain with us and are imprinted on our very soul. I can think of many that I have had in Northern Ireland, including the first time I went to WAVE, a wonderful organisation that supports so many people affected by the troubles. I had a meeting in Newry with Alan Black, the sole survivor of the Kingsmill massacre, which was found by an inquest—I shall return to this point—to have been carried out by the IRA; Eugene Reavey, whose three brothers were shot on the same day by the Ulster Volunteer Force and all died; and Michael O’Hare, whose 12-year-old sister Majella was shot and killed by a soldier while on her way to mass.
I remember standing in the bleakness of Bragan bog, to which reference was made earlier, with Columba McVeigh’s family as the search teams continued patiently to scrape, bit by bit, the surface of the black and grey earth, trying to find his last resting place. He was 19 years of age when he was kidnapped and murdered by the IRA. I remember the family of Private Tony Harrison, who was shot dead by the IRA on his fiancée’s sofa in her home in Belfast, and so many others. I am not alone; many Members of this House have heard such stories. Too many times, I have heard people say that somebody came from the police and said, “Don’t worry; we will leave no stone unturned to find out what happened,” but they never heard another word.
I think all of us understand that, at the height of the troubles, the number of killings was so great, and the circumstances in which investigation would need to have been carried out were so challenging—indeed, in some places, downright dangerous—that it was difficult for that work to be done. That is why it is so important that we now have a mechanism that allows such work to <span id="815" class="column-number" data-column-number="815"></span>be completed, and in which all families in Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom can have confidence.
I have criticised the 2023 Act many times in exchanges. Much of it failed to command support from any of the political parties in Northern Ireland, or from victims and survivors. We should not forget that the legacy commission, which the Act established, has the power to undertake criminal investigations as well as fact finding. People listening to debates that we have had about this Bill might think that it introduces a new thing called criminal investigation, but it does not; that was provided for in the Act. However, the Act did establish the legacy commission.
When the report on the murder of Rory O’Kelly came out, I think it proved what the commission is there to do. For me, most important of all was the reaction of his family. Even though they could not name who was responsible for the killing, his daughter said that when they heard the details of what happened, it moved the family into
“a space of serenity and light, all anger taken away.”
It has always been the case that the success or failure of the commission rests in the hands of the families who go to it, and on the judgment that they pass when the commission comes back with answers, in so far as it is possible to find them.
I would say this about inquests, which we will debate in detail tomorrow. I have heard some people make the criticism that they achieve nothing. I disagree profoundly, even though the inquests will now come to an end. Eight had started—and in my view, it was profoundly wrong to cut off an inquest that a family had seen begin—and the Solicitor General will deal with the remaining ones. I was puzzled when I became the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, because I had grown up thinking that, if there is a suspicious death, there is an inquest, but I found that there were many cases in which there had been no inquest at all for over 20, 30, 40 or 50 years. We only have to look at the impact on the family of the recent Springhill inquest, its findings and the apology that the former Prime Minister made from the Dispatch Box to see what it meant to the family, who had been waiting for 54 years to hear that their loved ones who had been killed, including children, had presented no threat to anyone.
The hon. Member—my hon. Friend, if I might call him that—makes a very powerful point. Every family deserves, in so far as it is possible, to find <span id="816" class="column-number" data-column-number="816"></span>an answer to how and at whose hands their loved ones died. We are debating all these amendments in order to create a means of finding those answers—a means that people can have confidence in; that was the point on which the previous legislation failed.
<strong> </strong>I want to finish, because many Members wish to speak.
This is unquestionably the unfinished business of the Good Friday agreement. Those who signed that extraordinary document knew that this issue had to be dealt with, and knew that it could not be done at the time. However, it is 12 years since the Stormont House agreement, and people think, “Right, we might be moving forward now.” Everyone is getting older, and sadly people are dying. The trauma is being passed from generation to generation. Is the legislation perfect? Of course it is not, but if we wait for the perfect, we will never do this. Now is the time to take forward this legislation, so that the families who still wait patiently for answers, after all these years, finally have the chance to find them.
My right hon. Friend was clearly faced with a very difficult decision, but I think he took the right decision in the light of the advice he was given by the Chief Constable, which he has reported to the House, and I thank him for it. Given the enormous progress that Northern Ireland has made since the signing of the Good Friday agreement, who would want to go back? What does he think is now required to restore confidence in an independent process for determining parades?