Item 7 on the agenda is a debate on the Equality, Local Government and Communities Committee report, 'Fire safety in high-rise buildings', and I call on the Chair of the committee to move the motion—John Griffiths.

Motion NDM6917 John Griffiths

To propose that the National Assembly for Wales:

Notes the report of the Equality, Local Government and Communities Committee, 'Fire safety in high-rise buildings', which was laid in the Table Office on 16 November 2018.

Motion moved.

Diolch, Dirprwy Lywydd. I'm pleased to open today's debate on the Equality, Local Government and Communities Committee report on fire safety in private sector high-rise residential buildings. I would like to thank all those who contributed to our inquiry. We can all agree that the safety of the place you call 'home' is one of the most important foundations to a happy and healthy life. Everybody was shocked and horrified by the tragic events at Grenfell Tower in June 2017. Since then, we as a committee have been looking at the safety of high-rise residential buildings in Wales to help prevent such a terrible event happening again.

Initially, we focused on the social housing sector. After taking evidence from the key partners and the Welsh Government, we were reassured that the necessary steps were being taken, but, as we continued to look at fire safety in more detail, it became increasingly clear that, in the private sector, there continued to be concerns—for example, ACM cladding on buildings less than a stone's throw away from the Senedd—and there were wider developments, such as the publication of the Hackitt review. We therefore turned our attention to high-rise residential buildings in the private sector. Our report has been produced to help inform the work of the building safety expert group and the Welsh Government's response to any recommendations by this group. We understand that the group is expected to publish a road map setting out how we in Wales should respond to the recommendations in the Hackitt review. This was expected early this year, and I would appreciate an update from the Minister today on how this work is progressing and when we can expect it to be published.

It is absolutely vital that there is no complacency about issues around building and fire safety. The Grenfell Tower fire and previous fires, such as the fatal fire in Lakanal House, show that these things can and do happen and that it is absolutely vital that lessons are learned and changes are implemented as quickly as possible.

I will now move on to some of the key areas in our report. I am not intending to go through each of our recommendations, but instead will focus on building management, the need to update fire safety legislation and the need for robust building control. Effective building management is critical to ensuring fire safety in high-rise residential buildings. We were reassured by the evidence we took from managing agents. Those who gave evidence to us clearly took their responsibilities seriously and provided us with evidence as to how they ensured the safety of their buildings. But we know we only heard from a section of the market. We are concerned that there may be those managing buildings who may not have the sufficient levels of competence and experience, or may cut corners to reduce costs. We therefore made recommendation 1: this calls for regulation of agents who manage high-rise residential buildings. We appreciated this could be complex and introducing such regulation could take some time. Therefore, in the interim, we suggested looking at whether Rent Smart Wales could take on board this role. I'm pleased that the Government accepted this recommendation. In their response, they detailed the reviews, looking at broader leasehold reform, due to report by the summer. It would be good if the Minister today could give a clear commitment that the implementation of recommendations arising from the reviews will be prioritised so that we can start to see changes taking effect at the earliest opportunity. I acknowledged the Minister's comments that the interim measures we have suggested may not work in practice, but, at this stage, can she provide further details about what steps can be taken in the interim to address our concerns?

I will now move on to issues relating to the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005. We have been calling for it to be revised since we first started looking at this issue in July 2017. It was an area of significant concern then and it continues to be so. As a committee, we feel that more urgency is needed from the Welsh Government. While we appreciate that the Assembly did not have competence over the subject matter of the Order until April 2018, there is now the opportunity to seek to reform or replace it as soon as possible.

In recommendation 3, we call for new legislation to replace the fire safety Order to be introduced in this Assembly term. We also highlighted areas that we feel the new legislation should cover. The Minister agrees with us that the Order needs to be radically reformed or replaced but states that this is a complex issue and time is needed to give consideration to ensure that any new system is effective and joined up. However, it is frustrating to see that this may not happen in the current Assembly. This is about ensuring the regulations that govern the safety of buildings in which people live are fit for purpose, and I continue to hold that the Government should make a clear commitment to deliver on this legislative change by the end of this Assembly as a priority in the legislative programme.

Moving on to some of the specifics about the fire safety Order, we heard in July 2017, and continued to hear in autumn of last year, that it was unclear as to whether the front doors to flats, which play an important role in preventing the spread of a fire, came under its remit. This was of particular concern because residents often make modifications to their front door, including replacing them with doors that may not offer any fire protection at all. This clearly could have an impact on not just the residents living in the individual flat but also their neighbours by undermining the integrity of fire safety measures put in place. The Welsh Government were clear that they believed these front doors came under the fire safety Order, but they acknowledged that this had not been tested in the courts. The fire services themselves were unclear and the legal advice we received was that the Order would not cover front doors. So, we were concerned about the significant ambiguity and lack of clarity on this important issue. This was just one of the changes we wanted to see made when the Order is replaced.

Finally, Dirprwy Lywydd, I want to talk about the role of building regulations. One of the most consistent themes that featured throughout this work was the general acceptance that there can be a significant difference between the building as designed on paper and the one that is actually built. This disconnect can happen for a number of reasons, including that unforeseen difficulties and challenges may be faced when turning designs into reality. But of more concern to us was the inspection regime, which seems to be under-resourced, and there seems to be limited powers to monitor what is happening on individual building sites. We heard from one developer how they tried to minimise this disconnect by employing the architect in a quality assurance role throughout construction. But we were unable to identify if this practice was widespread throughout the industry or not, because only one developer gave evidence to us. This was disappointing and meant that we were unable to better understand what developers are doing or not doing. We therefore made recommendation 8, which calls for the Welsh Government to assess the effectiveness of quality assurance throughout the construction stage, and whether best practice should be mandated through regulation. The Government accepted this recommendation but have highlighted that primary responsibility for the safety of a building sits with those involved in its design and construction. We understand and agree with this point that regulation and building control play an important part in ensuring public safety.

Clearly, the Hackitt review has provided a detailed set of recommendations for changes to the building regulation process and system in England, and we look forward to seeing the Welsh Government's response to these recommendations. While we acknowledge that the Minister cannot commit to much at this stage of the expert group's work, we would urge her to ensure that, once the group has made its recommendations, the Government response and implementation is done with real pace and urgency.

As all will agree, Dirprwy Lywydd, this is simply too important an issue to allow it to drift, and I now look forward to Members' contributions.

I do believe that this report's publication is a landmark for everyone concerned to ensure that people living in buildings like Grenfell Tower, but in the private sector, are safe and feel safe, and I do hope that the Minister will continuously update this Assembly on the progress that the Government are making towards implementing the recommendations. I think it was one of the first acts you made in your new responsibilities to reply to the report, and it is broadly positive.

Something that was very clear to me, Deputy Presiding Officer, throughout the evidence sessions was that the current system simply isn't fit for purpose. And it's painful that it took an event like the Grenfell fire for us to realise that, but it does, I think, mean that we have to have a comprehensive and robust approach now to reform in this area. We in the Welsh Conservatives completely agree with the conclusions of this report and support the principles behind its recommendations for such a new and more robust system. We agree with the call for greater clarity and accountability over who is responsible for building safety during the construction, refurbishment and ongoing management of high-rise homes.

Can I also take this opportunity to thank all the witnesses who came in and gave evidence on what was one of the most important committee investigations I've been involved in? We heard evidence, I think, of the highest quality and also a very considerable degree of consistency in what the witnesses told us.

I would like to pick out a few of the recommendations and concentrate on those, and, indeed, the ones I've selected I argued for strongly in the report, and I think all Members were convinced by the evidence that we'd heard on them. I do hope that the Minister will be able to say a few more words in her response to this debate on these particular issues, and indeed several of them have been referred to by the Chair already.

So, recommendation 3 in particular was a real eye-opener for me. I'm very pleased that we have made a stronger recommendation than that contained in the Hackitt review. I don't think many people out there would believe that the fire safety Order does not place any requirements on the competence or qualifications of a person undertaking a fire risk assessment, or indeed on the frequency of those assessments. Recommendation 3 in our report would rectify this, and it seems like an obvious and sensible reform to ensure that buildings are constantly monitored for fire risks.

In the committee, we believe that the lack of basic requirements set out in legislation was a clear gap, and was not in line with other comparable works such as gas safety checks, for instance, so I'm pleased that the Government does accept this recommendation in principle, although I note what the Welsh Government has said on the timescale and complexity of this work, and the Chair has referred to this. I hope the Minister in her response will outline how she plans to take this forward and to what timescale she imagines it will be carried out. It is, I think, one of the more practical changes that we can get in place quickly, I hope, and I'm confident that it would make a substantial difference to the fire safety of high-rise buildings. I do share the aspiration of the Chair that we could see legislation within this Assembly, and I can assure you that you'd get full co-operation from the Welsh Conservative Party—and, I'm sure, all parties represented in this Chamber—if you do set that as an ambition for this Assembly.

Deputy Presiding Officer, in the build-up to the recent publication of the Welsh Conservatives' housing strategy, I had several discussions with the construction industry with regard to the lack of upskilling opportunities in Wales so that older workers can modernise their methods, and I believe this is an issue throughout the UK, not just in Wales. This is something I think the Minister also mentioned in her response to recommendation 8, regarding the quality assurance of building works. I would be interested to see if the Minister would be willing to expand in her response, perhaps in writing or directly today, to highlight the conversations officials are having with UK Government and the industry to get these training opportunities in place.

I am disappointed that recommendation 6 has only been accepted in principle. I think the joint competent authority model was consistently backed in evidence. The model looks at the whole life cycle of a building and involves local authorities, building control, fire and rescue and the Health and Safety Executive to oversee the management of safety, and I think the key movement there was to look at buildings in their whole life cycle. 

So, I would appreciate a full response, if possible, at least of the direction of travel the Minister will now be going in, the speed she'll carry out the recommendations, and then also further information on the ones that have only been accepted in principle. I think this will go a long way to ensure that those who live in high-rise buildings can have a secure home and have the security and peace of mind that they deserve. Thank you very much.

I'm pleased to be able to contribute to this debate, although much of the credit for this work must go to my colleague Bethan Sayed, who worked tirelessly to ensure that this issue was placed further up the agenda, where it deserves to be.

It's now just over 18 months since the tragedy of Grenfell fire demonstrated just how vulnerable some high-rise residential units are, and also the extent to which basic standards of health and safety just don't seem to apply to people who are on low incomes, especially those who belong to minority groups. I found it shocking, for example, that there is still no statutory regulation for people wishing to manage high-rise residential buildings. I also found it shocking that, during our evidence sessions, we heard that in France and Germany there are materials that are specifically prohibited in high-rise buildings, and that isn't the case here. Perhaps it's because France and Germany have political systems that are less likely to give preference to profit over people. We had a small example of this a decade ago, of course, where a modest proposal by the current Deputy Presiding Officer for sprinklers to be installed in homes was met with an unbelievable level of hysteria from the industry. Now, our report makes a number of recommendations about fire safety that would start to address that imbalance, and, frankly, they need to be implemented with urgency. So, I'm pleased that all but one of these recommendations have been accepted by the Welsh Government. I'm not entirely sure that they had much choice, given the consequences of not implementing these recommendations. But even once all of those recommendations are implemented, there still remains a wider piece of work that must be done to raise safety levels throughout the private housing sector. Too often in the past, these high-rise buildings have been places where people with low incomes have dwelled but not lived. They've had to put up with poor conditions and underinvestment in services to support their communities and absent landlords. Is it any wonder, then, that we found so many issues urgently needing addressing? And isn't it a shame that it's taken this tragedy to give us the opportunity to take a proper look at this? 

I just wanted to add one or two comments to what's already been said by the Chair and other Members. Over the recess, I visited the site of the Grenfell Tower, and I think it remains a very devastating landmark to the disgrace that most of these residents have not yet been allocated a proper home, despite the fact that Kensington and Chelsea is one of the richest boroughs in Britain and they seem to be too busy making development deals with people who want to build million-pound homes. If the UK Government wasn't so busy with Brexit, they should have instructed Kensington and Chelsea to rehouse these people compulsorily.

Anyway, I want to emphasise this lack of clarity about the front doors of flats because, as the Chair's already outlined, we've had lots of conflicting evidence, and absolute—. We know, anecdotally, from all of us having visited properties, that loads of people change their front doors and nobody has any oversight over whether they are fire-resistant, and, obviously, that puts other people, as well as themselves, at risk. So, that is something where it would be very useful if the Government could take prompt action on. 

I think there's also the point about the need to use the architect as the quality assurer, because the construction of buildings is such a complicated business these days, and unless you are on-site reasonably frequently, you simply have no idea whether the work is being done to the standards as specified in the contract. And once the first fix is completed, it is absolutely impossible to see whether a building is fire-safe or whether it's a fire hazard. And we had very good evidence from the fire service, who specifically spoke about a particular building where they'd had reason to have to pull apart what was behind the panels to find that it absolutely was a fire hazard. So, how many other high-rise buildings are in a similar state? We have to—. It is the role of Government to ensure that the regulations are adhered to and that people can reasonably assume that, if they are going to be living in a high-rise building, it is going to meet the regulations to enable them to escape in the event of a fire. 

Thank you. Can I now call the Minister for Housing and Local Government, Julie James?

Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer. First, my thanks to the committee for its very careful consideration of what is clearly a critical but also very complex subject. Following the tragic fire at Grenfell Tower, which a number of Members have referred to, and the myriad issues that have surfaced since, the Welsh Government has also been very deeply engaged in these matters. Our involvement has been at both a policy and a practical level. Throughout, our prime consideration has been that people living in high-rise residential buildings, whether in the private or social sectors, must be as safe as they and we should be entitled to expect, as has been referred to by a large number of Members, most latterly Jenny Rathbone. 

The report, to which I responded earlier this month—and, as David Melding said, was one of the first things I did when I took over this portfolio—is a very welcome addition to the body of knowledge that is developing as we take the steps to make sure that we can ensure that people are safe when they live in a high-rise building, right down to actually what a high-rise building is and what the height that constitutes the particular issue is. I've had quite a few discussions in the short time I've been in portfolio, and I know that my predecessor, Rebecca Evans, had a number of discussions before about whether it is in fact the height or the make-up or whatever of the building that matters, and the escape routes and the class of occupants and all those sorts of things. As Dame Judith Hackitt indicated in her report, 'Building a Safer Future', an effective and coherent system is the key to that assurance. Dame Judith's report was commissioned by the UK Government but we absolutely recognise the picture it paints. What we're doing now is to consider whether and how the recommendations are right in a Welsh context. It's essential, therefore, that our decisions and any legislative changes we bring forward in due course and the system they underpin add up to something real and coherent, something that makes a real difference to people's lives and to their well-being, as every Member who's contributed has said. That means improving design in construction processes, clarifying responsibilities, ensuring compliance both during a build and post occupation, and the ongoing safety of high-rise buildings in Wales, and it also means a strong enforcement regime wherever necessary. 

I will just address very briefly the issue about the front doors—only to say there is an ongoing issue with that. I'm very aware of it. I've already had some discussions on that, and the expert group is also aware of it. There are some issues around insurance and so on that are also complex that I know the committee picked up. So, we are very much aware of that. I don't have an answer to it at the moment, but we're very aware of it and it's part of what we're looking at. 

I did meet the ministerial expert group last week for the first time. That group brings together a range of expertise, including developers, building control bodies, architects, social landlords, fire safety professionals, the Health and Safety Executive and various sector representatives. They've heard from both UK and Scottish Government representatives, the Building Research Establishment and technical experts, and as a consequence of the group's expert input we are on track to produce what we call a road map, which will give shape and coherence to our approaches to the problems that Dame Judith's report described. So, they've had their penultimate meeting, which is the one that I attended just to meet them, and then they'll have their last meeting very shortly. So, we'll have the road map very shortly after that—certainly by the end of the summer term, but I'm hoping by what the Government calls 'spring'; let's hope that's May—as soon as possible. They're very committed people. They put a lot of personal time in over the Christmas recess to produce the interim stuff that they were dealing with at their penultimate meeting. So, I'm confident that we will have that at pace.

I also wanted to give more of a feel for where we are now. We're working alongside partners in local government and the third sector to identify the number and particulars of all tall residential buildings in Wales. That proved a much more difficult task than you'd expect, particularly in the private sector, but we do now have much stronger and more reliable data. We've shared the information via the Welsh Local Government Association to ensure that we're in a more robust position in terms of the information that is held and built on. Just anecdotally, Deputy Presiding Officer, I'm told that, in the end, we had to just send people out to have a look to see where tall things were because there was actually no register. So, that's a piece of information we now have. 

But that information, of course, only takes you so far. Three tall buildings in the social sector and 12 in the private sector were found to be clad in aluminium composite material, or ACM, the particular cladding that caused the difficulty in the rapid spread of fire at Grenfell Tower. The Welsh Government has worked closely and effectively with building owners and developers to ensure that responsible decisions have been taken. As it stands, work has either been completed on, or is in train to remove and replace the cladding on all but two of those buildings. In the case of the outstanding two, large-scale tests have been recommended on the exact nature of the cladding and its performance and the developer has committed to complying with any subsequent recommendations and is keeping us appraised of process. So, we're very pleased that that is ongoing at some pace. 

In the discussions with my predecessor, Rebecca Evans, developers and owners signalled that they would do the right thing by the residents. We made abundantly clear that the Welsh Government did not want to see the cost of that work passed on to residents. I'm pleased to see that residents are not being asked to bear the cost of removing and replacing ACM. That's obviously the right decision, which we welcome, and will doubtless come as a relief to people who bought or live in those particular buildings. 

In terms of new or future buildings, we've consulted on banning combustible materials altogether. My officials are currently analysing the responses and undertaking the necessary impact assessment work on the consultation that's come back. Whilst a ban is intended to add further protection, obviously I understand that builders and insurers are already taking practical steps to ensure new buildings are not developed using combustible cladding, but there obviously is a massive retrofit issue as well.

There are, of course, as many people have said, complicated issues that go far beyond the ACM cladding issue. Officials continue to work closely with counterparts in local government and the fire and rescue services to take on a casework approach to buildings about which other concerns have been identified. Bringing together key players is one area from which we continue to learn, and, like the committee's report, that experience will understand and develop sound systems to enhance their safety.

In responding to the ELGC committee report I've been keen to accept recommendations wherever possible and to ensure that these are factored into the work of the expert group. Dame Judith was very clear about the need for a coherent, rather than a cherry-picking, approach to implementing a whole-system change, and we are very keen to do that, because we know that, at the moment, there are a set of regulations and obviously the problem is that there are gaps, and then some things fall into those gaps, so that whole-system, coherent approach is essential so that those gaps are eradicated. The expert group completely get that. They've confirmed that the current system is, in their view, fragmented, complex and ineffective. We will be overhauling it. We must do that if we are to keep people safe from the sorts of fires that we saw at Grenfell, or indeed any kind of fire.

In terms of the time, I think it's best—. We have to get this legislation right, so we don't want to do something at pace that we then miss one of the gaps. So, we want to get the right combination of taking enough time to ensure that we have covered off a coherent, system approach and the pace necessary. So, I want to be able to say that we can do it within this Assembly term—we certainly would love to—but I think it's very important to get the system right, so to make sure that we have covered off all other gaps that exist in the current legislation and we've explored all the possibilities. So, I'm not going to commit to that other than to say I share the ambition, but whether or not we'll be able to do that, I don't know. But it is very important, and I make no apology, that we get the practical application right and then enshrine that in the legislation. We want to have all the appropriate consultations with key players, of course, including the views and voices of residents. We want to be clear, as I said, about the nature of the buildings in scope. Height alone is not necessarily the only issue. There are other risks posed to different groups. So, it's clear, isn't it, that a nursing home, for example, at only two storeys will have particular difficulties and might need particular fire protections that an ordinary residential domestic building might not need and so on. So, there are obviously more complex issues than simply height, although height continues to play an issue.

So, as I said, I expect to receive that in the early spring. We'll be giving thorough consideration to their recommendations, and I am clear that there will be no delay between their report and our response that isn't necessary to just make sure that we've got, to use the colloquialism, our ducks in a row.

I'm very happy to accept David Melding's recommendation that I keep Members fully informed via the committee and, Deputy Presiding Officer, via the floor of the Senedd. My officials will develop a programme plan and timeline as we consult and implement short, medium and long-term proposals to demonstrate our commitment.

I'm very clear about the importance of this work in ensuring we get it right. My portfolio includes housing, planning and responsibility for fire policy, so I'm committed to using the breadth of the portfolio to oversee and implement the wide-ranging agenda, bringing together the various components to ensure that the system in Wales is clear and effective and enhances safety in the right way. In that regard, I reiterate my welcome for the ELGC committee report and its part in informing the key decisions and actions we take, and, as I said, I will of course continue to update Assembly Members on the progress that we make. Diolch yn fawr.

Can I now call on John Griffiths as Chair of the committee to reply to the debate?

Diolch yn fawr, Dirprwy Lywydd. I thank Members for their contributions, Dirprwy Lywydd, and the committee members for their focus and commitment to this work. As everybody who has spoken today has stated, it's very obviously extremely important that we understand as best we can the issues around fire safety in high-rise in general, in private high-rise in Wales, identify necessary action and take that action as quickly as possible. I'm very grateful for the understanding of the importance of these issues, the focus that committee members have given, the seriousness with which they've approached the work, and the evidence that we've received, again reflecting the gravity of these matters.

As Leanne Wood said, obviously, it's a terrible thing that it took a tragedy such as Grenfell Tower to really bring to the fore the issues that we face and the need for the work that's now taking place and the action that has happened and will follow. We really need to get to grips with these issues and do all we can to make sure that such terrible tragedies do not happen again. That's why I think, as the Minister said—rightly said—it is very, very important that we get it right. But, obviously, the committee is also is also of the view—and I know the Minister is as well—that, yes, we need to get it right, but we need to get it right as quickly as possible, and that's the spirit in which we must move forward. In that respect, it's good to hear of the commitment from the expert group, as the Minister has shared with us, and the acceptance that there is a need to get that road map published as quickly as possible.

I'm very grateful for the assurances that the Minister has given in response to what David Melding said about the need to keep us all updated as regularly as possible, because there is a lot of work going on. There is a lot of work going on at a UK level, a lot of work jointly between Welsh Government and the UK Government, and a lot of work here in Wales. So, you know, there is a lot to update on, and, again, it's extremely important that we keep abreast of those developments, and that they are shared and that we understand what is happening and when it's going to happen. Again, I think it was very good to hear David Melding talking about the co-operation that he rightly reassures the Minister would be in evidence right across the political parties here were legislation to be brought forward and to be brought forward in this Assembly term. I think we heard what the Minister said on that subject. But, if it is possible, then I'm sure it's important for the Minister to know that there would be that spirit of co-operation from the other parties that would ease the passage of that legislation through the Assembly and help provide reassurance to the Government that some of the difficulties involved might be overcome with that spirit of co-operation.

So, in short, then, Dirprwy Lywydd, these are matters that the committee will return to. We have done that now over a period of years with our early work on the social housing issues, in terms of high-rise in Wales, and now with this subsequent report on high-rise private residential blocks. We will continue to return to these matters, and I look forward to working with the Minister, knowing that she's made this an early priority in her current role, and will continue to do so.     

Thank you very much. The proposal is to note the committee's report. Does any Member object? No. Therefore, the motion is agreed in accordance with Standing Order 12.36.

Motion agreed in accordance with Standing Order 12.36.