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Cladding remediation in Scotland: what the 2024 Act does for flats with unsafe external walls

Published 2026-11-12

The Grenfell Tower fire in London in June 2017 changed how the whole of the UK looks at the outside walls of tall residential buildings. Scotland had restricted flammable cladding on high-rise flats since 2005, but many flats had been built over three decades under earlier standards, and many owners found they could not sell or remortgage until someone proved their building was safe. The Scottish Parliament's answer is the Housing (Cladding Remediation) (Scotland) Act 2024. This article explains what the Act does, using the text of the Act and Scottish Government guidance as checked in November 2026.

Timeline

Which buildings are covered

Section 32 of the Act defines the buildings that can receive a single building assessment. All four conditions must be met:

Section 33 lets Ministers adjust or clarify these categories by regulations, but not extend the scheme to buildings that are not homes or that have no cladding. Offices, hotels and student blocks that are not dwellings fall outside it; so do houses and low-rise flats under 11 metres.

The single building assessment

At the heart of the system is the single building assessment (SBA). In the words of the Act, it assesses the risks to human life that the cladding creates or makes worse, and ends with a report identifying any work needed to eliminate or mitigate those risks. It must follow standards set by Ministers and be carried out by a person they have authorised.

In practice, the Scottish Government's specification, first published in June 2024 with independent fire engineers, combines two parts: a fire risk appraisal of external walls (FRAEW), which looks at the wall build-up itself, and a fire risk assessment (FRA) of the building as a whole, including escape routes and fire-stopping. Owners may hire any competent provider, but government funding is only available when the provider is on the official list of authorised SBA providers.

If new information comes to light after an SBA, for example when opening up the walls reveals something unexpected, Ministers can arrange an additional work assessment (section 34), which works the same way.

The Cladding Assurance Register

Part 1 of the Act requires Ministers to keep a Cladding Assurance Register. A building is entered once its SBA has been carried out. The entry records when the assessment took place and the work it identified; it is updated after any additional work assessment; and, once Ministers are satisfied that the work has been done, the date of that decision is added. Ministers may charge for access to the register, and section 2 makes it an offence to give false or misleading information for it.

The register matters most to people buying and selling flats. A building with a completed entry, showing either that no work is needed or that the identified work has been finished, gives lenders and conveyancers a single public reference instead of a patchwork of private reports.

Powers to act

Part 2 gives Ministers powers that go well beyond paying for surveys. They can:

These powers exist because remediation of a block of flats needs every owner to agree, and in buildings with dozens of owners, absentee landlords or a disputed factor, that agreement can take years. The Act lets Ministers proceed where they cannot obtain consent. Owners can appeal against arranged remediation work (section 12), and Part 4 requires Ministers to engage with owners and occupiers before an assessment, to share the report afterwards, and to explain any work planned.

Who pays: the responsible developers scheme

Part 5 allows Ministers to set up a responsible developers scheme. Developers who join commit to fixing buildings they built; developers who are eligible but stay out go on a published prohibited developers list, and section 29 allows regulations to bar them from development, to stop building warrants being granted on their applications and to require verifiers to reject their completion certificates, the documents described in our article on building warrants in Scotland. This is the lever that makes membership attractive.

As of the Scottish Government's factsheet updated in October 2026, the scheme is not yet in force: its details still require further development and consultation before regulations are laid before the Scottish Parliament. Meanwhile, the government's position is that responsible developers agree to take forward and pay for the assessment and any remediation of their buildings, while public funding goes to owners such as social landlords, homeowners and factors who register an expression of interest and meet the programme's criteria.

What it means for the construction sector

Progress reports

Section 30 requires Ministers to report on the progress of single building assessments and remediation work. These reports, and the quarterly programme updates the government publishes, are the best way to follow how many buildings have been assessed, how many need work and how many are finished. We do not repeat their figures here because they change every quarter; read the latest update directly.

Sources