London council takes legal action against owner of block with Grenfell-style cladding

Tower Hamlets says it is the first local authority in the country to bring a legal action of this kind against a freeholder of a private building.

If the freeholders do not carry out the work within a set timeframe, the council said the matter could be enforced through the county court.

Inside Housing understands its officers are also currently working on securing more remediation orders against freeholders of other high-rise buildings.

It comes as ministers announced on Monday they wanted to speed up the removal of unsafe cladding by creating target dates for making buildings safe and handing out tougher penalties to those that refuse to comply.

Under the plans, high-rise buildings higher than 18 metres with dangerous cladding that are covered by government-funded schemes will be fixed by the end of 2029.

By the same date, unsafe cladding in buildings over 11 metres should either be fixed or have a date for completion, otherwise landlords will face penalties.

Lutfur Rahman, executive mayor of Tower Hamlets, said: “It is shocking that seven years after the devastating Grenfell Tower fire, there are still high-rise buildings clad in ACM in this country.

“I believe everyone deserves to live in a safe and secure home in Tower Hamlets and this action proves we will do everything within our power to get this.

“We are taking this approach with other private building owners who are failing to remove dangerous cladding from their buildings and we expect to secure more orders in the near future.”

Tower Hamlets is the latest council to take legal action against a building owner. Inside Housing revealed in October how the Building Safety Regulator (BSR) had signed off just 14% of developers’ remediation plans in the past year.

A Freedom of Information (FOI) request submitted by the Fire Industry Association appeared to confirm developers’ concerns about bottlenecks at the fledgling regulator, which must approve all fire safety plans before work can begin.

According to the FOI results, from 1 October 2023 to 16 September 2024, the BSR received 1,018 applications by developers to its Gateway 2 screening service, where fire safety plans are examined and approved.