DESIGNATION OF DEFECTIVE DWELLINGS

HC Deb 21 June 1984 vol 62 cc559-68 9.30 pm

Mr. John Fraser

I beg to move amendment No. 1, in page 1, line 6, leave out 'may' and insert `shall'.

Mr. Deputy Speaker

With this it will be convenient to take the following amendments: No. 2, in page 1, line 10, after 'construction', insert 'or presence of asbestos'.

No. 4, in page 2, line 38, at end insert— '(8) For the avoidance of doubt it is hereby declared that in making a designation under this section the Secretary of State shall have no regard for the date of design or construction of the buildings concerned nor of the materials or methods used in their construction save insofar as these have given rise to the qualifying defect. ' No. 5, in page 2, line 38, at end insert— '(8) For the avoidance of doubt it is hereby declared that in making a designation under this section the Secretary of State shall have no regard for the date of design or construction of the buildings concerned.'.

Mr. Fraser

Amendment No. 1 makes it mandatory for the Minister to take a designation order if he is satisfied that dwellings are defective. I realise that it is unusual to place a mandatory duty on Ministers, and if he assures the House that he will always act on information coming to him to the effect that a group of houses or a class of dwellings is defective, I shall be satisfied. But it is important that the House is assured that the Minister will not pick and choose between groups of dwellings. and that once evidence comes to him that is similar to the evidence on the existing 26 classes of dwellings, he will make an order giving the purchaser appropriate rights to a repurchase or reinstatement grant.

Once the Minister makes a designation, the position will be watched carefully not just by owners but by tenants. Even if only a few people have purchased houses outside the 26 classes already proposed to be designated, and even if no homes are purchased in a class of defective dwellings, the Minister should still be willing to make a designation under clause 1. He should not have regard to when the dwelling was designed or built, which materials were used or the method of construction; the only matter that should be in his mind when he decides whether a class of dwellings is defective is the test in the Bill.

Shelter says: In the future, designation under the Housing Defects Act will give official recognition to the existence of defects in a particular class of buildings. As such it will be an important focus of action by both owners and tenants. It is likely that tenants will wish their homes to be designated, because once they have been designated as defective it will be much easier for the tenants to put pressure on their local authorities for the appropriate steps to be taken to remedy the defects and, in turn, it will be much easier for local authorities, when putting forward plans for their housing investment programmes, to say to the Minister, "You have already designated this class of dwelling as one in which the owners will be assisted by local authorities under the Housing Defects Act, but we can make out a case for having more assistance from the Government under our housing investment programme to provide for the needs of our tenants." It will be a lever that tenants can use on their local authorities, and that the authorities can put on the Government. For that reason, the definition of defective dwellings should be widely drawn to assist their occupants to assert their rights more effectively.

The Minister should also be willing to designate dwellings as defective if they have a problem with asbestos, because that will enable tenants, as opposed to owners, to put pressure on their local authorities. I do not know how many dwellings that are badly affected by asbestos, which is expensive to remedy, have been sold into the private sector, but there may be a few. I expect that a few misguided people will have got them. It is a massive problem for local authority tenants.

Lambeth council has identified 11,000 dwellings that will need major repairs and refurbishment because of the presence of asbestos. It is calculated that in Lambeth the total number will eventually reach about 20,000. The cost of removing asbestos from those dwellings will be approximately £20 million. Lambeth comes in for little criticism, but in case this leads to criticism, I must point out that most of these dwellings were built by the Greater London council, not by Lambeth borough council, and were handed over forcibly under the Government's reorganisation. The opportunity to designate a dwelling because of the presence of asbestos should not be omitted, not only to do justice to the private owner but to give additional weight to the arguments of the tenants.

Mr. Robert Litherland (Manchester, Central)

I have a vested interest in my constituency. The purpose of the Bill is to introduce a statutory scheme of financial assistance to private owners who have found that houses sold to them by public authorities are defective. The Bill will cover houses that are defective because of design or construction and it will affect only about 16,500 dwellings which were built before 1960. I do not know why the Government picked 1960 as the magic year, because most of the defects that have been discovered in Manchester have been in dwellings built since 1960.

The Opposition have never been opposed to the sentiments of the Bill. What we have opposed from the very beginning have been its glaring omissions. The Bill will assist a number of private owner-occupiers. These people have had a raw deal and it is right that they should be reimbursed. They are victims of bad design or construction, untried building techniques and poor quality materials. They are the victims of system package deals which have blighted many housing estates, as we have heard tonight, in the Second Reading debate and in Committee.

Council tenants are in an even worse predicament if Manchester is anything to go by. It is estimated that about 1 million houses have been built by different system methods since 1960. The Minister has informed us that not all or even the majority of them suffer from serious defects which are the result of the building system. I do not believe that the Minister had done his homework. My hon. Friend the Member for Islington, South and Finsbury (Mr. Smith) and other hon. Members have given examples of catastrophes experienced by different local authorities.

I know what has happened in the Manchester area. How can the Minister ignore the request that the systems to which we have repeatedly referred should be included? How many times must I tell hon. Members, in the House and in Committee, about the devastation and upheaval caused by Bison Concrete Northern Limited? The Wellington street estate was built 10 years after 1960, the date stipulated in the Bill. Yet 10 years after construction, 1,018 flats that were built by that company are being demolished. Can hon. Members imagine the human suffering caused by living in the midst of the demolition? It is a living nightmare because of vandalism, fires and burglaries. Yet these tenants, through no fault of their own, have to live in deplorable conditions.

The local authorities are not recognised in the Bill. They took the decision to build this type of accommodation on the persuasive arguments of various Governments, who altered housing subsidies to entice high density living, which will now have to be demolished. People will have to be rehoused and new buildings will have to be built, while the local authorities pay off the original loan debt charge. In this case, Manchester city council will be paying it off over the next 50 years, but that is not recognised in the Bill. How can the Minister glibly say that there is no evidence that all or even a majority of these houses suffer from serious defects as a result of how they were built?

My hon. Friend the Member for Islington, South and Finsbury said that an inspection had been made of properties built by Bison. If it was anything like the inspection made in Manchester by consultants who specialise in this type of property, the same problems will have been found. There will be inadequate bearings on bridge supports, stairwells leaning away from the main structure, insecure exterior wall panels, and an estimated cost to put the matter right of £9 million. There is no guarantee that if the council meets that sum, and that if such vast amounts of money are expended, the final result will be satisfactory. So, after spending £5.25 million on the Bison construction Manchester council is now having to spend another £9 million.

Since £5.25 million has been spent, the Minister cannot deny that this deterioration was not caused by lack of maintenance. It is a bit like buying a broken-down car that is irreparable and trying to blame the mechanic when he cannot put it right. The £9 million, or whatever Islington council has to pay, will not put the matter right. These properties deteriorate as one looks at them. Manchester city council received permission from the Department of the Environment to demolish some of these buildings. What are the Government's future proposals to give financial assistance to local authorities in these positions?

Bison is not the only contractor at whom I can point the finger of failure in this type of construction. Another contractor in my constituency, whom I have mentioned before, is Simpson and company. The same structural defects are emerging in a survey in an estate that that company built in the Hulme area of my constituency. New Jerusalems were being built, with Regency suites, terraces, and building contours, and we were shown artists' impression of courting couples walking hand-in-hand over rustic bridges and old people sitting in tree-lined square enjoying the environment. The reality is utter failure. Somebody, somewhere, must be responsible for the misery in these people's lives and the housing conditions that they are having to endure.

The Government are turning a blind eye to the massive housing failures because they are well aware of the gigantic cost of putting them right. The Government are hoping that the problem will go away, but it is becoming more acute with Government cuts in local government spending. That, in turn, affects maintenance, which in turn accelerates the deterioration of these estates and forces demolition, so that the tenants have to be rehoused. The Government will not confirm or deny that there will be a freeze on new house building soon. That will have an effect, if it happens, on the problems of rehousing people who have to be decanted from these defective properties.

That is the mess that the Government are in, and that is why we tell the Government that it is time to stop tinkering with the problem. The Bill does little to combat the disease of system building. That requires major surgery, and major financial support to get these properties sorted out.

9.45 pm

My hon. Friend the Member for Norwood (Mr. Fraser) mentioned asbestos. That problem is reaching serious proportions on the estate that I have already mentioned. I do not want to over-dramatise the situation but priority must be given to the problem caused by the recent use of asbestos in public buildings. Inspection teams consisting of councillors and officers have had to be set up to determine financial priorities after the asbestos content of building materials has been analysed. Decisions on financing from the HIP allocations have already been taken and special allocations have been put on one side to deal with the asbestos problem. About £750,000 has been put on one side by the city council from the 1984–85 allocation. That will not go far, because one estate has about 500 houses which were built wih asbestos roof sheeting, and the replacement cost is estimated at about £500,000. Any damage to such asbestos sheeting means that the whole roof must be reinstated with another material because once asbestos is damaged it is dangerous. Large estates in Manchester and in my constituency are now affected to some extent by the use of asbestos.

It will be costly to replace asbestos that has been used for wall cladding, for example, on the deck access estates such as Wellington street and Hulme. It is all right for the Minister to say that that cost can be spread over several years, but the tenants want the repairs made now. Where asbestos has been used on exterior walls, rainwater pipes, gutters and so on, it can be removed with minimum effect on the tenant. However, if, as in the mid-1960s and early 1970s, asbestos has been used for lining such things as heater cupboards or outlet grills, the dangers are greater. Local authorities may then have to decant tenants, at an enormous financial cost.

Such materials were once acceptable but are now found to be not only defective but dangerous. They have been used to build houses since the time stipulated in the Bill. The problem will not go away. I do not want to over-dramatise, but in my area this is an emotive issue. The money must be found to meet this great expense. We are asking the Government to recognise the problem and stop tinkering about with it. This is only the tip of the iceberg. They should make money available for defective property that is no fault of the tenant or local authority.

Mr. Chris Smith

I rise briefly to add my pleas to those of my hon. Friends the Members for Norwood (Mr. Fraser) and for Manchester, Central (Mr. Litherland) on the issue of asbestos which is outlined in amendment No. 2.

Asbestos was widely used, particularly in the construction of council flat estates in the 1950 and 1960s. It is now widely recognised that asbestos, especially soft asbestos and especially where it is either damaged or able to be damaged, is dangerous to health. The Minister of State, Department of Employment admitted as much to the House last autumn. The fears of tenants and those who have purchased flats on estates where asbestos has been used are great. There are fears about the effect of asbestos dust on their health, and especially on the health of their children, as children are more susceptible to damage from asbestos than are adults.

I raised this issue under the Adjournment debate procedure some four weeks ago with regard to existing council tenants, and drew attention to the Bemerton estate in King's Cross which suffers particularly from this problem. It is an estate of 600 flats in my constituency. This very night tenants of the Bemerton estate are speaking at the housing committee meeting in the borough of Islington about the problems they face, and are seeking urgent assistance from the borough to remove all dangerous asbestos from the estate. When I raised the matter, the Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, who sadly is absent from the Chamber, expressed sympathy with the plight of the tenants and of the local authority, but offered no practical assistance to help the local authority. I believe that this is a failure by the Government to make available resources that are needed, and to recognise the problem.

Because of that failure by Government to help local authority tenants, I support the amendment, which will provide some assistance at least to the small number of people who may have purchased such properties. A number of those who have applied to purchase or who have purchased, properties on the Bemerton estate is small, but the problem is as acute for them as it is for tenants who are left wondering whether the local authority will have sufficient money to deal with their problems. Any person faced with the danger of asbestos and the possibility of damage to his health or that of his children is surely as justified to be concerned about the condition of his dwelling as a person living in a dwelling which, by the nature of its structure, gives rise to problems.

I therefore hope that the Government will accept, or show signs of being prepared to consider accepting, that the potential danger of asbestos is just as damaging co the welfare, health, safety and comfort of tenants and owners in properties, whether purchased or not, as the possibility of faults in the original construction.

As we now know, the inclusion of asbestos was a design fault in the first place. I hope that the Government will accept this not just for the relatively small number of people who will be directly affected, but because it would demonstrate to thousands of people who will not be directly affected or assisted by the Bill, yet who face the same problem as tenants on estates in which asbestos is used, that the Government have recognised the problem, and will take it seriously when considering resource allocation to local authorities facing such problems. I hope that the Government will give some consideration to those thousands of people in the country who deserve a better hearing from the Government than they have hitherto had.

Mr. Ancram

The hon. Member for Norwood (Mr. Fraser) asked for assurances. He should know that since we have introduced the legislation and taken the initiative we need no encouragement to pursue the course of action suggested in the amendment. When it is necessary to use the power to assist owners we shall. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will withdraw amendment No. 1.

The hon. Member for Norwood and the hon. Member for Manchester, Central (Mr. Litherland) referred to dates. I suspect that in their minds was the date placed on houses using load-bearing PRC components. I am sure that the hon. Member for Norwood appreciates that nothing in the Bill prevents the Secretary of State from designating a class of buildings by reference to such matters. Reference to the date when a building was designed or constructed will not always be arbitrary. I shall explain why it has arisen in one case. A type of building might be conveniently described by reference to the date of its design or construction, particularly when one firm designed or constructed several variations of the same type and only one variation was defective by reason of design or construction.

When PRC load-bearing component houses were involved, our designation was limited to the category constructed before 1960 because only they were shown to be defective as a class nationally. The 1960 date marks a change in the physical characteristics of PRC dwellings. Only those designed before 1960 have been shown to be defective as a class. If there were evidence that other classes of building met the criteria in clause 1 on a national basis the Secretary of State would examine the evidence and decide whether he should exercise his power to give assistance to owners, bearing in mind the other uses of his powers. The date of design or construction and the materials or methods used are likely to be relevant only in so far as they are typical of various classes of dwelling which have been, or may need to be, examined for the purposes of establishing whether they should come within the assistance scheme. In the light of my comments, I hope that the hon. Member will not press the amendment.

The Minister for Housing and Construction and myself are worried about asbestos. We do and shall continue to take it seriously. The amendment on that subject is unnecessary because clause 1(1) gives the Secretary of State power to designate as a class any buildings consisting of or including one or more dwellings if it appears to him that the buildings in the proposed class are defective by reason of their design or construction and, secondly, that general knowledge of the relationship between the proposed class of buildings and the defect of design or construction has led to a substantial reduction in the value of some or all of the dwellings. The amendment is unnecessary since, when a building is defective because of its design or construction through the use of asbestos, the terms of clause 1(1) already suffice. After that assurance, I hope that the hon. Gentleman will not press the amendment.

Mr. Terry Davis (Birmingham, Hodge Hill)

Do the Government intend to designate Smith houses so that they benefit under the Bill?

Mr. Ancram

The Government have not yet made a decision, and it would be premature for me to make a statement about it now.

When asbestos fits the criteria in the Bill, designation will follow.

It being Ten o'clock, the debate stood adjourned.

Ordered, That, at this day's sitting, the Housing Defects Bill may be proceeded with, though opposed, until any hour.—[Mr. Major.]

Question again proposed, That the amendment be made.

Mr. Terry Davis (Birmingham, Hodge Hill)

s: I must express my disappointment, and that of my constituents, at the news that the Government still have not made up their mind whether to designate Smith houses as one of the groups that will qualify for the national scheme. It is more than a year since the Government, under pressure from both sides of the House, accepted the need for an investigation into Smith houses. The problem affects many people in my constituency and elsewhere in the city of Birmingham. There was all-party agreement when the Government announced at Easter 1983 that there would be an investigation by the BRE into a number of systems, and that Smith houses should be added to the list.

We were disappointed that the report on Smith houses came out a few weeks after the report on the other types of system-built houses. Yet that is almost six months ago. The Government have had sufficient time to reach a decision. On Second Reading, the Minister dodged the question. When he was pressed about Smith houses he told us—two months ago—that he was still considering whether Smith houses should be included in the mandatory scheme. He said that he expected to reach a decision following his visit to Birmingham in May. A month has passed since that visit, but we are still waiting for the Minister to make up his mind.

While the delay continues, people in the city of Birmingham who have bought their houses from the local authority are in a state of great uncertainty. They do not know what will happen. They suffer from all sorts of defects in their houses. I know of people with failing eyesight who suffer the problem of wavy floors. The Environmental Health Department says that it is waiting for the bill. Other people are tied to Birmingham because, having bought their houses, they cannot sell them. They may wish to move because of the high rate of unemployment or they have retired and wish to move nearer to their families—perhaps married children living in other parts of the country.

While the Government procrastinate, a kind of feudalism is being introduced in Birmingham—it is 20th century feudalism. If the Minister wants to intervene I shall be happy to give way. I hope that he will say that, in view of my remarks, he has decided to make Smith houses the 29th group.

Mr. Gow

I visited Birmingham on 25 May and I saw a number of Smith houses. The problem is complex because we must decide whether the defects in the houses are common to the Smith type as a class or whether there is a local problem.

Two options are available under the Bill. First, there is the designation by my right hon. Friend under clause 1 and, secondly, there can be a local designation if a house is not designated by my right hon. Friend. I assure the hon. Gentleman that my right hon. Friend will announce his decision about the Smith houses at the earliest opportunity. The issue is complex and I shall be glad to have a further word with the hon. Gentleman later.

Mr. Davis

I shall be delighted to have further words with the Minister either in the House or behind the Chair. I hope that an early decision means before the Summer Recess, which is still about six weeks away. I do not understand why it is taking such a long time to reach a decision.

It is more than a year since representations were made by an all-party delegation to the Minister's predecessor. It is more than six months since we received the report from the BRE. It is more than a month since the Minister visited Birmingham. I do not know how often he visits Birmingham, but he is very welcome there. I shall be happy to show him the defects in the Smith houses in my constituency if he needs any convincing of the seriousness of the problem.

We look forward to an early decision. If the Minister does not reach a decision before the Summer Recess, he will hear something about that in the Adjournment debates.

While we want an early decision, we hope that it will mean Smith houses being included in the national scheme. I appreciate the effect of clause 10 and the possibility of a local scheme, but that is not satisfactory to hon. Members who represent Birmingham constituencies, for it would still depend on money from the housing investment programme.

We have had recent experience of the Government cutting the housing investment programme for the city of Birmingham, and that has had a tremendous effect on improvement grants and on urban renewal in the city. We would not be happy, therefore, if Smith houses were added to the burdens on the city council of Birmingham. We want Smith houses to be regarded as a national, not a local, problem.

Mr. John Fraser

The purpose of the amendment was to elucidate the use of clause 1, and we have had sufficient assurances about designation if buildings have asbestos in them, about the materials used in construction and about the way in which the Minister will work on the criteria which come to him in making orders.

I wish, in making a final comment about asbestos, to illustrate the theme of equity between people in the private and public sectors. Under the Bill, a person who finds his home hard to sell—that is really what it amounts to—because there is a possible defect, or even because of the reputation of the building, will, under the circumstances, have the right to sell that dwelling back to the local authority and to move elsewhere.

Many dwellings which are let have problems with asbestos. Those dwellings have no less of a bad reputation than the dwellings which may have an apprehended defect because of the use of PRC reinforcement. On the one hand, therefore, we have homes that are hard to sell but in respect of which there is a remedy. On the other, local authorities have homes which are hard to let because of their reputation and defects.

In my constituency there is the new Loughborough estate, built by the GLC and handed over to Lambeth borough council. There, the problem of decanting tenants to clear the premises of asbestos is an absolute nightmare because the local authority does not have enough money to undertake a quick programme; it must try to dovetail the removal of asbestos from the Loughborough estate with many other requirements, such as the re-proofing of other buildings. It is therefore a slow process because of insufficient money.

It is even more difficult to manage the estate because of the reputation of the dwellings being hard to let, and I am sure that that experience is reflected by many hon. Members in their constituencies. There are also the problems of squatting and dwellings left vacant for long periods because people do not want to move into them.

I plead with the Minister to try to treat both sectors with equal care. If he has the courage to designate dwellings in the private sector as being defective because there is asbestos in them, he will give a boost to local authorities and tenants if he can get their rented dwellings, dealt with more rapidly.

However, I believe that the Minister has given sufficient assurances about the use of clause 1 to justify my begging to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.