Meeting of the Parliament 14 May 2024
The Scottish Government’s stated ambition for the bill is to accelerate the progress of the cladding remediation programme. In closing the debate, I reiterate the support of the Scottish Greens for the bill as a milestone towards finally resolving Scotland’s cladding crisis after years of immense hardship for too many home owners.
Let us remember how we got here, although we have heard about this to an extent already. The Grenfell tower tragedy in June 2017 claimed the lives of 72 people when a fire broke out in a flat in the 24-storey residential building in west London. The building had recently had a cladding system installed that comprised combustible foam insulation boards attached to the outside of the concrete structure. Those were protected from the weather by aluminium composite material—ACM—panels, the core of which was highly combustible.
In the seven years that have passed since, little meaningful progress has been made to remediate affected buildings in Scotland. The high-rise inventory has identified 780 high-rise buildings in Scotland, which contain 46,616 flats. Thirty-six buildings are clad in ACM, 23 of which are clad in the highest-risk category 3 panels. Despite that, it is worth noting that the scale of fire risk in Scottish homes is low. Jim McGonigal of the Institution of Fire Engineers set that out, stating that
“Fewer than 1 per cent of fires spread beyond the flat of fire origin; since Scotland took responsibility for the fire stats, there have been no fatalities beyond the flat of fire origin; and, in the past 10 years, there has been a 57 per cent reduction in the number of fires in flats above six storeys.”—[Official Report, Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee, 30 January 2024; c 11.]
Although the risk of fire might be relatively low, the issue of cladding has consumed people’s lives, causing long-term worry and stress about the safety of their homes, and it is having a financial impact on owners, who are unable to sell or remortgage their properties. The skills shortage of qualified fire safety professionals, which I mentioned earlier, looms as a potential bottleneck, and creative solutions such as establishing a fire engineering degree programme in Scotland should be seriously explored. We cannot allow this crucial endeavour to be hamstrung by the lack of trained personnel.
Perhaps most critically, as colleagues have mentioned, open and transparent communication with impacted residents and owners must become a top priority as we implement the legislation. The years of limited engagement and information blackouts are simply unacceptable for people whose lives and financial futures have been put on indefinite hold. The bill represents progress but not the final solution. Successful execution of the remediation programme will require on-going vigilance, creative problem solving, adequate funding and resources, and a true collaborative partnership with those whose lives have been upended by the crisis.
If we can finally get this right after such a delay, we will not only make Scotland’s homes safer but restore peace of mind to thousands of our constituents who have suffered sleepless nights wondering whether their largest investment was safe. They deserve nothing less than our full and undivided commitment to delivering on the promise of the bill. I will continue to support the legislation and monitor its roll-out.
When the First Minister took office recently, he indicated that he wanted people in Scotland to live with a sense of safety. Good communication, especially with people who are living with uncertainty in the homes that are part of the cladding remediation programme, is key to providing that sense of safety. Too many lives have been disrupted for far too long already, and it is time to make this right now.
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