National permitted development rights play an important role in the planning system, providing flexibility, reducing bureaucracy and making the most effective use of existing buildings. Permitted development rights for change of use are making an important contribution to the delivery of new homes across the country. All homes, whether granted permission on a planning application or through a permitted development right, are required to meet Building Regulations, including fire safety.

A local authority building control body is required to hold a record of any compliance certificate issued in relation to Building Regulations. Where there are outstanding non-compliance issues in relation to building regulations it is for the local authority to consider enforcement.

The data available for the period 2012-13 to 2017-18* can be found at the Housing Ombudsman website: https://www.housing-ombudsman.org.uk/about-us/corporate-information/publications/

The data for the period 2009-10 to 2011-12 can be found at the following links:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/independent-housing-ombudsman-limited-annual-report-and-accounts-2009-to-2010

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/independent-housing-ombudsman-limited-annual-report-and-accounts-2010-to-2011

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/independent-housing-ombudsman-limited-annual-report-and-financial-statements-2011-to-2012

In their 2017-18 Annual Report the Housing Ombudsman confirmed its commitment to reducing the average case time for a determination to six months. Additionally, in the Green Paper “A new deal for social housing” we are consulting on options for speeding up the complaints process for social housing residents.

*A casework system change occurred at the end of 2013-14 and the reporting issues continued into 2014-15. There is not a complete set of data for these years.

We have been working with local authorities to identify private sector residential buildings over 18 metres with potentially unsafe Aluminium Composite Material (ACM) cladding.

We believe we have identified all ACM-clad social housing over 18 metres in England.

To support the identification of private sector residential buildings over 18 metres with potentially unsafe ACM cladding, on 17 I issued a direction to all local housing authorities to pay particular regard to cladding-related issues when reviewing housing in their areas. The direction can be found at:

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/707813/Direction_to_local_authority_chief_executives_17_May_2018.pdf

The Government will fully fund the removal and replacement of potentially dangerous ACM cladding on buildings over 18 metres owned by social landlords, with costs estimated at £400 million.

The Government’s consultation on restricting or banning desktop studies from being used to assess the fire performance of cladding systems closes on 25 May. Inappropriate use of desktop studies is unacceptable and we will not hesitate to ban them, subject to consideration of the consultation responses. We have committed to publishing a clarified version of Approved Document B (building regulations fire safety guidance) in July for consultation, and we will also consult on banning the use of combustible materials in cladding systems on high-rise residential buildings.

We are organising two separate roundtable discussions with both leaseholders and industry which will take place shortly.

9 private owners of leasehold properties, the Leasehold Advisory Service (LEASE), the Leasehold Knowledge Partnership, the National Fire Chiefs Council and the Homeowners Alliance have been invited to the leaseholder roundtable.

Invitations to the industry roundtable are being finalised.

There is a statutory requirement in the Building Act to consult on substantive changes to the building regulations. We will publish a consultation on banning the use of combustible materials in cladding systems on high-rise residential buildings as early as practicable and give consultees adequate time to respond to the consultation before deciding how to proceed.

The Department has no current assessment on how level letter boxes effect postal workers. The statutory guidance which supports the Building Regulations references industry technical guidance which in turn refers to a British and European standard (BS EN 134724: 2013). This standard recommends a range for letter box apertures to be within a height range of 700 millimetres up to 1700 millimetres.

The statutory guidance which support Building Regulations references the Door and Hardware Federation’s technical specification TS 008: 2012, which in turn refers to a British and European standard relating to letter boxes: BS EN 134724: 2013.

The Clean Growth Strategy set out the Government’s intention to consult on options for setting a trajectory for privately rented homes to be upgraded to Energy Performance Certificate Band C by 2030, and confirmed that we will look at how social housing can meet similar standards to the same timetable. The Strategy noted that, when looking at this, we will need to take account of the findings of the independent public inquiry into the fire at Grenfell Tower and the Government’s separate work looking at wider social housing policy issues.

The Regulator of Social Housing Homes Standard sets out the required outcomes registered providers are expected to meet in terms of Decent Homes. A home must meet a number of criteria to be regarded as a Decent Home, including that it has effective heating and insulation. According to the 2016/17 English Housing Survey (EHS), 87% (3.6 million homes) of social housing meets the Decent Homes Standard, up from 71% (2.8 million) in 2006. However, social housing still has significant potential to benefit from energy efficiency improvements to the advantage of tenants, their communities, and their landlords.

In the Clean Growth Strategy, the Government set out that we would work with mortgage lenders to develop green mortgage products that take account of the lower lending risk as a result of the reduced energy costs associated with more energy efficient properties.

The Government also supported the ‘LENDERS’ project with funding from Innovate UK. The LENDERS project, which reported in 2017, looked at the impact of including more accurate estimates of energy bills in mortgage affordability assessments.

Alongside the Clean Growth Strategy, the government published a Call for Evidence on building a market for energy efficiency which included proposals for encouraging lenders to offer green mortgage products. This Call for Evidence closed on 9 January 2018. Following an evaluation of the responses, we will publish an action plan on additional market based measures later in 2018.

Following the publication of the Clean Growth Strategy, BEIS and HM Treasury ministers also jointly set up a Green Finance Taskforce, which brought together senior leaders from the finance sector. Their objectives were to help deliver the investment needed to meet the ambitions and commitments set out in the Clean Growth Strategy, whilst consolidating the UK’s leadership in financing international low carbon investment. The Taskforce published their recommendations in March this year, including how to encourage the development of green mortgage products. The government is currently considering these recommendations and will respond in due course.

We are already seeing progress, and leadership from within the finance sector. Following the Green Finance Taskforce’s recommendations and the success of their Green Bond, launched in November, Barclays recently launched the first green mortgage product by a major UK lender, which will reward homebuyers who choose to buy an energy efficient new build home with a lower interest rate on their mortgage. This is an encouraging step and I hope other lenders will follow suit.

BEIS published the Building Energy Efficiency Survey (BEES) in 2016 which updated and improved the evidence on how energy was used in non-domestic premises across England and Wales. It found that there was 63,160 GWh/year (or 14,750 ktCO2e/year) total energy efficiency abatement potential, representing a 39 per cent reduction from current energy consumption.

This assessment informed our approach to energy efficiency in the Clean Growth Strategy (CGS) that set out our ambition to enable business and industry to improve energy efficiency by at least 20% by 2030. Improvements in building energy efficiency are expected to make a significant contribution to this, and the CGS includes commitments to enable businesses to improve energy efficiency in new and existing commercial buildings.

As we set out in the Clean Growth Strategy, the Government will look at options for a long term trajectory for the sector, with the aim of as many private rented homes as possible being upgraded to EPC Band C by 2030, where practical, cost-effective and affordable. The Department is currently considering options prior to launching a consultation later this year.

The Decent Homes backlog programme provided £1.76 million of funding to local authorities between 2011/16 to tackle their backlog of non-decent homes.

The funding by year as follows:-

2011/12 - £300 million

2012/13 - £394 million

2013/14 - £431 million

2014/15 - £474 million

2015/16 - £160 million

There was no government funding in years 2009/10 or 2010/11. The number of social homes failing to meet the Decent Homes standard is down by 55 per cent since 2007 (between 2007 and 2016), with over 626,000 local authority homes brought up to standard since 2009.

Since the Local Government Self Financing Settlement in 2012 we expect local authorities to use their rental income to maintain the standard.

Local authorities and housing associations are expected to ensure that no more than 10 per cent of their homes is below the Decent Homes standard at any one time.