Leaseholders could miss out on billions of pounds of funding to remove unsafe non-ACM cladding, as new figures reveal less than a quarter (22%) of applications to the Building Safety Fund (BSF) are currently proceeding to funding.

According to analysis by cladding remediation specialists Cladding Consulting, of the latest figures from the Ministry of Housing, Communiities and Local Government (MHCLG)1 just 624 out of a total of 2,820 registrations to the BSF, have been assessed as eligible to proceed with an application for funding. And with the deadline to submit eligible applications for funding the end of June 2021 - which is just over three months away - thousands of leaseholders are in danger of missing out on funding, and could be forced to pay for the cladding remediation works themselves.

Even more worrying, the updated MHCLG figures also reveal that 891 registrations to the Building Safety Fund haven’t even progressed beyond the ‘registration of interest’ stage. 

Applicants had to register interest to the BSF by 31st July 2020, which means more than seven months on, almost a third (32%) of registrations, basic information hasn’t been submitted to the BSF team to assess whether they are eligible for funding.

MHCLG figures also show that of the remaining BSF registrations, 354 were ineligible for funding, 349 have been withdrawn, 238 - information has been provided and eligibility is being checked, 364 - some but not all evidence has been provided to allow verifications. The £4.5bn Building Safety Fund (BSF) has been set up by the Government to pay for the removal of non-ACM cladding from high-rise buildings 18m or above.

Cladding Consulting are the UK’s first specialist cladding remediation service, helping and supporting leaseholders, landlords, Right to Manage (RTM) companies and property managers applying for both ACM and non-ACM cladding funds.

Steven Truman, managing director of Cladding Consulting, comments:  “It’s worrying that with just over three months to go before the deadline for completed BSF applications passes, less than a quarter of registrations are currently proceeding, while a third of applications haven’t even submitted information to assess eligibility for funding.

“Thousands of leaseholders could miss out on billions of pounds of life-changing funding to remove unsafe cladding from their buildings, and will be forced to dig into their own pockets to pay for the remediation work. The Government needs to address this problem urgently. The entire BSF application process is proving too complicated and time-consuming for leaseholders, and it’s hard to see how many applications will meet the deadline if more support is not provided.”