Levelling up minister Michael Gove gave house builders until 5 April to sign the pledge threatening them with commercial and financial consequences if they failed to fix historical fire safety problems like dangerous cladding.

Gove warned this could include blocking planning or even a ban on trading.

According to industry sources other volume house builders are expected to fall into line today as the industry agrees to pay for the building crisis en masse.

This morning Crest put the cost of meeting the Government pledge at up to £120m, coming on top of £48m already committed since the Grenfell tragedy in 2017.

Crest said that it had a strong balance sheet with net cash of £253m, allowing to meet expected outflows to remediate the affected buildings occuring over several years.

In a Stock Market statement this morning, the house builder said: “The board of Crest Nicholson today announces that it has confirmed to DLUHC its intention to sign the Building Safety Pledge, which it believes is in the best interests of the group, taking further steps to support those living in affected buildings.

“As a result of making these new commitments, the group will need to record a further exceptional charge in its financial statements.

“This is a complex and judgemental area, and the group will continue to work at speed to refine its latest estimate of these costs.

“As such the board consider that a charge in the range of £80m to £120m currently represents its best estimate of this further liability.”