Abolish leasehold ownership post-grenfell, says Gove

LEASEHOLD ownership should be scrapped by the end of this Parliament in the wake of the Grenfell fire, Michael Gove has said, calling the system, which affects almost five million homes in England, “outdated” and “feudal”.

Mr Gove’s Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities will also order developers to fix unsafe cladding within six weeks or face being banned from building new homes, in a new contract issued today.

In an interview with Sky News, Mr Gove said the Government bears some responsibility for the Grenfell fire and apologised to those who lost loved ones.

“I think that if you look at what happened to Grenfell, there were lots of factors but yes, Government collectively has to take some responsibility,” he said, adding that responsibility extends beyond the Conservative Government.

“It is undeniably the case that the system of building regulation was not right,” he said.

Mr Gove said the new contract issued today “should end” the policy of leaseholders having to pay to fix unsafe cladding, which has come under major scrutiny since the 2017 fire.

Under a leasehold, properties are owned for a fixed period of time, after which ownership returns to a landlord.

The housing secretary had previously said that developers were expected to pay a combined £5 billion to fix buildings with cladding or other fire safety issues. “The people responsible for erecting buildings which we now know are unsafe have to pay the costs of making sure those buildings are safe,” he said yesterday, adding: “We want legislation in the final sessions of this year to change the system.

“You’ve got a tangle of deals going back hundreds of years – unstitching all of that is difficult – but the fundamental thing is that leasehold is an unfair form of property ownership.

“If you buy a flat, that should be yours You shouldn’t be on the hook for charges which managing agents and other people can land you with.”