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<p>Under the Building Safety Act 2022, those responsible for creating historical safety
defects will bear the burden of costs for remediation and will be held accountable.
Building owners and landlords who are, or are connected to, the developer must fix
historical safety defects in their buildings above 11 metres or five storeys.</p><p>The
Act also gives developers, landlords and leaseholders new legal remedies against construction
product manufacturers whose products fail to comply with regulations, which results
in a construction product being installed in a building and the product causing or
contributing to a dwelling being rendered 'unfit for habitation'.</p><p>The Act also
gives the Secretary of State the power to establish a statutory scheme to distinguish
between industry actors that have committed to take responsibility where historic
defects are identified, and remediation is needed and those that fail to do so. In
addition, the Act gives the Secretary of State powers to prevent those that have failed
to take responsibility from carrying out development for which planning permission
has been granted, and to prevent them from receiving building control approval on
their developments.</p><p>As the final backstop of the leaseholder protections, section
133 of the Act (once in force) will create a duty that landlords take reasonable steps
to explore alternative cost recovery avenues before asking leaseholders to contribute
to remediation works - including pursuing third parties responsible for defective
buildings.</p><p>To protect residents in high-rise residential buildings who are facing
the most serious safety risks, £5.1 billion has been committed by Government to fund
cladding remediation where developers, industry or building owners are not doing so.
The Building Safety Levy will be charged on new residential developments and raise
an additional estimated £3 billion to remediate buildings over 11 metres tall, where
no responsible developer has been identified.</p>
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