The Government's Remediation Bill promises unlimited fines, prison time for non-compliant landlords, and a backstop letting authorities do the work themselves (with costs recoverable from the landlord). The Bill first appeared in the Remediation Acceleration Plan two years ago, resurfaced in the July 2025 update, and got a nod in the King's Speech on 13 May 2026. Yet, no draft text appears to exist. The introduction date is the legislative equivalent of "we'll get back to you".
In a recent House of Lords debate on 11 September 2026, the Government reaffirmed a manifesto commitment to accelerate remediation and make the responsible parties pay, but it remains concerned that extending protections to lower-rise flats could make them unmortgageable. It says it is considering how it can go further. Going by the Remediation Acceleration Plan and parliamentary debates, if the Remediation Bill does ever go further we expect to see:
- legally enforceable deadlines for remediation (being the end of 2029 for Higher-Risk Buildings and 2031 for those between 11 and 18 metres);
- criminal penalties;
- a backstop enabling Homes England and local authorities to step in and send the bill to the freeholder (potentially undermining the financial model on which some freeholders rely.);
- making the updated PAS9980 fire-risk assessment standard legally enforceable, rather than advisory; and
- strengthening the ability to claim against product manufacturers.
Meanwhile, Baroness Pinnock’s private member’s bill, the Leaseholder Remediation (Building Safety) Bill, is now past Second Reading and has unanimous cross-party backing in the House of Lords, with peers effectively inviting ministers to adopt its proposals. The proposals include protecting all leaseholders regardless of building height (yes, low-rise too), tighter deadlines (28 days for a remediation plan, 24 months for completion, 6 months for urgent defects), and covering all systemic defects including structural, fire stopping, compartmentation, the lot.
The direction of travel is clear, with teeth in the form of criminal penalties and hard deadlines. The gap between political promise and actual legislation, however, remains.
In related news, Matthew Pennycook, Minister of State for Housing and Planning, recently attributed the leasehold system for a downturn in the residential property market at the Labour Party conference. He said his ambition now is to tackle the leasehold system because those contemplating purchasing their first home are put off by a tenure requiring service charge and other payments.
So…it isn't the cost of living? It isn't wages that stopped keeping up with inflation? It isn't house prices that now need a mortgage and a small inheritance? No, it's leasehold tenure. Apparently first-time buyers all over the capital are sitting on their deposits and refusing to buy until the Government eradicates the service charge.
It doesn’t seem likely that most first-time buyers are lying awake over the finer points of the Landlord and Tenant Act. They're lying awake over their rent, their energy bills and whether they can afford a coffee that costs more than their grandparents' first car. Ask the average 28-year-old viewing a one-bed flat in Zone 3 whether they'd buy it "if only it were commonhold," and you'll probably get a blank look, then a polite question about whether the price is negotiable. Tenure is rarely what kills the deal. Affordability usually does.
Of course, commonhold doesn't make costs disappear. Someone still has to pay the gardener, the window cleaner, the lift engineer and whoever fixes the communal door that has been "temporarily out of order" since 2019. Under commonhold, the service charge doesn't go away. It gets a new name, probably "commonhold assessment," and goes to a residents' association meeting where Colin from Flat 4 argues over the hanging baskets for 45 minutes. The bill still comes. It just comes with more committee minutes.
That doesn't mean leasehold is perfect. But blaming slow sales on tenure is a bit like blaming your overdraft on the font on your bank statement.
