14 June 2025 marks eight years since the tragedy of the Grenfell Tower, yet the cladding remediation process remains painfully slow, so why the delay?”
Scale of the Crisis
According to the latest Government data, as of April 2025, there are 5,052 residential buildings 11 metres and over in height identified with unsafe cladding as of the end of April 2025.
Funding & Bureaucracy
The funding and bureaucracy surrounding cladding remediation in the UK has created major barriers to swift remediation action. The Government has pledged £1 billion to improve fire safety (specifically targeting the remediation of unsafe cladding on high-rise buildings), but the allocation of funding has been slow and complex, causing setbacks.
Ministers have pushed developers to pay for remediation but negotiations on contributions have been slow and contentious. Whilst 54 developers signed the developer remediation contract (agreeing to assess and fix unsafe buildings), some developers are making faster progress than others. Barriers to greater pace include disputes between developers and freeholders over access to buildings and scope of works and quality of assessments.
Regulatory Complexity
Multiple government departments, local councils, and private firms are involved, making coordination slow and inefficient. The shortage of qualified inspectors has exacerbated wait times as buildings must undergo risk assessments, before funding is approved, but the lack of skilled professionals has created a bottleneck in the process. Further delay to actual construction work is worsened as agreements between developers, landlords, and government bodies are taking years to finalize.
The slow implementation of The Building Safety Act, brought into force and expanded upon by layers of secondary legislation is highly complex and adding to the challenge. Its introduction of new building control regimes for higher risk buildings has contributed to additional delay, as it prohibits remedial works to higher risk buildings from commencing until the scope of works has been approved by the Building Safety Regulator (BSR). Initially, the timeframe for approval was set at 8 weeks but evidence suggests now that a more realistic timeframe is now beyond 20 weeks or so, significantly impacting remediation schedules. The BSR’s approval process has been criticized for its outsourced delivery model which has contributed to this delay leading to inefficiencies and extended wait times.
Summary
Despite these challenges, the Remediation Acceleration Plan (RAP) sets out the Government’s approach to tackle these issues for buildings in England. It aims to ensure that by 2029, all residential buildings over 11m with unsafe cladding will have been remediated, have a date for completion or the Landlords will be liable for severe penalties.