Chamber and committees

Amendment 53 says:

“Each single-building assessment report must state who is responsible for carrying out any remediation work”.

What level of detail would you expect in that? Are you talking about identifying companies or types of tradespersons? What are you driving at, in that amendment?

The minister says that it is common practice to keep in communication with everyone who lives in a building, and he says that factors do that routinely. Factors do not do that routinely. Factors deal with owners, and owners might not live there. That is the reality of the situation, and that is what my amendment 5 seeks to rectify. It is certainly not common practice. People who are renting are not generally communicated with.

Thanks, convener. There is a bit of a pattern developing already, and we will see whether that continues.

I once again share a group with Pam Duncan-Glancy, which is always a pleasure. I have one amendment in the group, but given that the group is on fire safety measures, it is pretty fundamental to the bill. If the convener will allow me to remind the committee of its recommendation in paragraph 73 of its excellent report, it says:

“The Committee notes the Scottish Government’s expressed ambition for the Bill is to address cladding issues and in so doing encourage speedier remediation. However, the Committee heard in evidence concerns about wider fire safety issues broader than cladding and would welcome a response from the Scottish Government on how it plans to tackle these issues in the future. It would appear to the Committee from the evidence it heard that the problems of obtaining building insurance and also resolving issues relating to lending and selling affected properties will persist if these wider fire safety issues are not resolved or managed.”

That is very sensible stuff, and it is that issue of wider fire safety issues that my simple amendment seeks to address. The minister, in his response to the committee on that point, said:

“Whilst additional risks related to building safety or fire prevention may become evident during the process of assessing and remediating unsafe cladding, it’s important that we recognise that there are broader systems and legislation in place to manage these where they fall outside the scope of the Cladding Remediation Programme.”

I am not exactly clear what he means by that, but, in any case, my proposed amendment to section 6, which I now invite members to look at, merely adds the words,

“including any associated fire safety risks”.

Section 6(1) would then read:

“The Scottish Ministers may arrange for work to be carried out that is identified in a single-building assessment report as being needed to eliminate or mitigate risks to human life that are (directly or indirectly) created or exacerbated by the building’s external wall cladding system, including any associated fire safety risks.”

That is within the scope of the bill, but in some ways it alleviates the committee’s justified concerns. People cannot look at just one part of a building when assessing fire risk. If a building has cladding, other things become linked, such as escape routes, alarm systems, the lack of sprinklers or otherwise—I could go on. My amendment is narrowly worded—the convener rejected an earlier effort—and I invite the committee to accept it.

Amendment 66, which is Ms Duncan-Glancy’s substantive amendment in the group, calls for a risk assessment to be done for any occupier with a disability. She and I have discussed that. That throws up a number of issues but, in essence, she is right. I might respond to what she has to say once I have heard it, and I will come back on what the minister has to say. I hope that he will be as positive as he has been so far.

I move amendment 17.

I listened with interest, as I always do, to Pam Duncan-Glancy. She has raised very important issues. Committee members can imagine that, if there is a disabled person in a block of flats, unless they are on the ground floor, they could struggle to get out of a burning building when the lifts are out of action. How do they get out? You just dread to think about it. It would be an awful situation. Pam Duncan-Glancy raises a really important issue.

The minister makes a fair point about sensitive personal data, but I would have thought that, if a system was in place whereby disabled people could declare themselves disabled, some kind of register or list could be kept, so that you would at least know that there was a disabled person in flat 1, 2, 3, 4 or wherever it was, and plans could be put in place in the awful event of a fire breaking out. I think that that is what Pam Duncan-Glancy is getting at.

I am disappointed that the minister has offered only to write to me. I enjoy reading his letters, but I am looking for something a bit stronger than just writing. I am happy to receive his correspondence, but it sounds as though we are probably never going to agree on the issue, so although I look forward to his letter, I will press amendment 17, on the basis that he has not offered to work with me for stage 3. I might as well give the committee a vote.

Amendment 7, which is the only one in the group, deals with section 10, which allows for appeals to a sheriff against arranged remediation work. The view of property managers who have spoken to me is that, as a sheriff is a layman in technical terms, even when they act on a professional witness’s advice, they are unqualified to interpret and singularly determine or make an order on what are often vastly complicated as-built technical challenges. As I agree with that assessment, my amendment says that sheriffs should nominate a panel of experts and take their views into account when dealing with such appeals. I invite the committee to support what is, I say to the minister, another commonsense amendment.

I move amendment 7.

I always think that it is useful for people to listen to the arguments that are presented at stage 2 and be prepared to change their minds, even if they have a voting intention in front of them—and even if they moved an amendment. I have listened to the minister’s arguments, and he has persuaded me, so I will not press amendment 7.

Will you take an intervention on that point?

Minister, Mr Griffin’s amendment 46 simply asks for owners and occupiers to be given the fullest possible information about what the property is actually built of. Is that not reasonable? You are surely not arguing that that is unreasonable.

That is what we need more of, minister.

Amendment 7, by agreement, withdrawn.

Section 10 agreed to.

Section 11—Authority for carrying out assessment or work

Amendments 27 to 29 moved—[Paul McLennan]—and agreed to.

Section 11, as amended, agreed to.

Section 12—Warrant authorising use of force to effect entry

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