Update: The Building Safety Pledge Contract

• Law Firm: Birketts
• Subject Matter: Corporate/Commercial Law, Real Estate and Construction, Contracts and Commercial Law, Construction & Planning
• Author: Lauren Barden-Williams
• Published date: 09 February 2023

Developers are given six weeks to sign the Building Safety Pledge contract.

In response to the Grenfell Fire, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities ("DLUHC") wrote to major residential property developers and, where applicable, the Home Builders Federation, on 31 March 2022, inviting parties to sign a pledge letter setting out that leaseholders should not have to pay for any costs associated with life-critical fire-safety remediation work arising from the design, construction or refurbishment of buildings of 11 metres and above. This pledge was intended to be formalised by a legally binding contract, the first draft of which was published in July 2022 - as referred to in our article published in July 2022.

The final version of this legally binding contract; the 'Self Remediation Terms and Deed of Bilateral Contract' ("the Contract") was issued to developers on 30 January 2023. Developers now have just six weeks (until 13 March 2023) to sign.

A copy of the Contract can be found here. It includes a number of obligations on the part of developers with the aim of "fix[ing] all life-critical fire safety issues in buildings over 11 meters which they had a role in developing or refurbishing in England"; such as:

• Identifying and assessing buildings which require work as soon as reasonably practicable after the date of the Contract being entered into between the developer and the DLUHC;
• Carrying out and completing the works at the developers own cost, as well as procuring suitably experienced and qualified sub-consultants, sub-contractors or suppliers or any other persons;
• Engaging with certain third parties no less than 40 business days after either entering into the Contract with the DLUHC or from when the...