Leaseholders demand to be heard ahead of Bristol protest
Residents facing crippling bills to fix fire defective buildings say they should not have to pay
Leaseholders will gather in Bristol this afternoon to protest about the cladding scandal.
Thousands of people nationwide are facing unpayable bills to fix fire safety defects which resident's say aren't their responsibility.
The event, which is due to start at midday on College Green, will feature speeches from several people including former Shadow Housing Secretary and now Shadow Leader of the House of Commons Thangam Debbonaire, Bristol City Councillor Alex Hartley and Steve Day, who's proposed an amendment to the government's building safety legislation that would see the developers responsible for defects, forced to pay to fix them.
The Facebook event for the protest says some leaseholders are facing bills of more than £100,000 to fix issues.
Steph Pike who has organised the protest, is facing a £70,000 bill herself. She's been campaigning on the issue for more than a year.
"There has been some progress," she tells us.
"The government announced in February that they were going to increase the fund for taking cladding off high-rise buildings to £5 billion.
"Previously I think it was £1 billion or one and a half, so that was obviously welcome news, however the government knows that's not enough."
Only buildings taller than 18 metres are eligible to apply for money from the fund, while the cash is only for removing dangerous cladding and not other fire safety defects like combustible balconies or inadequate fire safety doors.
"I still feel we're all banging our heads against brick walls because we just don't seem to be being listened to in respect of the other issues," Steph added.
On Thursday (28 October), speaking to the BBC former Housing Secretary Robert Jenrick said the UK treasury is aware the current funding pot is not big enough, but is unwilling to use more tax payers money on solving the problem.
You can watch his comments below:
"I kind of had a suspicion in the past that the treasury won't give any more money, but the comments that Robert Jenrick made kind of implied there's going to be no movement at all on this."
What are the alternatives?
Steph tells us there are other ways to solve the crisis without using billions of taxpayer's money.
"The issue is the government won't listen to alternative solutions that leaseholders have put forward," she says.
"For example the Polluter Pays Bill, that's been proposed by one effected leaseholder, who's working really hard to get that implemented into the Building Safety Bill, and it essentially means anyone who has done something wrong, where someone has not built a building in compliance with regulations, they will be responsible for putting it right."
She says she doesn't understand why the government seems unwilling to consider such an option, calling it a "mystery".
"Whoever is in charge of solving this crisis really needs to actually understand the issues on the ground and listen to the proposed solutions that we are making, and put them into practice."
Calls grow for an inquiry
A Parliamentary petition calling for an independent inquiry into the cladding scandal has received just over 10,000 signatures at the time of writing, meaning it has surpassed the threshold at which the government has to respond.
If it goes on to receive 100,000 signatures it will be debated in parliament.
Steph tells us she backs the idea.
"I've already signed that petition," she says.
"I just think the response from the government has been shambolic.
"They're not taking it seriously, they're not listening to the issues. They keep doing these little announcements, drip feeding us, for instance the announcement that we could have an extended time period from six years to 15 years to sue our developers.
"Well that's absolutely useless because most of our developers don't exist anymore, we don't have a contract with them to sue on and we don't have the money or the time to sue.
"They keep putting forward these proposals but they're not right and they won't fix it."