Major fire in London Tower Block

[VWD]

57 TOWER BLOCKS IN Glasgow HAVE SIMILAR PROBLEMS

https://inews.co.uk/essentials/news/uk/glasgow-flat-owners-not-told-grenfell-fire-risks/

[CWARD]

The final death count on the Grenfell fire has been announced at 71. Horrible way to die and an unpleasant job for those involved during and after the fire.

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-42008279

 

Meanwhile a similar fire broke out in Dunmurry but luckily didn't end up the same.

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-42004752  

[mac11irl]

33 minutes ago, CWARD said:

The final death count on the Grenfell fire has been announced at 71. Horrible way to die and an unpleasant job for those involved during and after the fire.

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-42008279

 

Meanwhile a similar fire broke out in Dunmurry but luckily didn't end up the same.

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-42004752  

Didnt go the same way, thankfully,

But a lot of the residents said the alarms only went off on the floor where the fire was.. not throughout the building, despite the severity..

Not good if not being maintained..

[CWARD]

It one of those things that are hard to enforce. It's not a like business or school doing a fire drill and no doubt with with false alarms and human nature some will ignore any alarm until the last moment which could then be too late. 

 

it's going to be one of those tricky situations with alarms even if they do cover the whole building is getting people to react to them every time they go off, false or real. With the Grenfell investigation hopefully they will be new coming in both the building regs, landlord responsibilities, responses by emergency services and residents to ensure they both react to alarms and keeping fire escapes etc clear.  Maybe extending the powers of the fire brigade to make on the spot fines much higher than they are currently can after much redtape.

[@Lee]

This hasn't gone away.
People STILL haven't been re-homed  after almost a year.

Something I read today;

 

I can be the chair of the Grenfell inquiry. I'll be cheap (well, actually free) because I've already reached my conclusion:-

It was the cladding.

We all saw it was the cladding.

We saw the cladding on the outside burning.

We all saw it on live TV.

The eye-witnesses said it was the cladding.

The people there showed us bits of the burnt cladding.

The survivors had been complaining about the cladding being a fire-risk for years.

Someone decided to use the cheapest possible option.

It was flammable - but it was cheap

This concludes my inquiry. Now..... Who was responsible for the cladding..?

This is the bit that's going to take years and to establish. It's not as simple as just looking at the paper trail to find out who made the decision to stick highly flammable material on the outside of a concrete tower-block you know. Oh no..! This will take years. There are officials to retire and files to be lost. Responsibility needs time make its slow downward journey until it can nailed on some poor sod who'll be thrown to the wolves.

Whatever the result, you can be absolutely sure it won't be the fault of the council or the government. At the end of this ridiculous process, it’ll be some poor ****** who was paid to do a job and didn’t tick the correct box in the health & safety risk assessment. My favourite to be named as the culprit is the bloke up the scaffolding who screwed the crap onto the walls.

Trickle-down blame. Works every time.

And yes; this is a genuine picture of our PM, eyes devoid of any emotion, completely lacking any air of compassion with a Grenfell survivor.

[VRS Mike]

legislation is the cause, I know a colleague who knows the person who did the fire risk assessment 

[skomaz]

1 hour ago, Lee01 said:

it’ll be some poor ****** who was paid to do a job and didn’t

 

And with all due respect that is EXACTLY who should take the blame...   The person who didn't do their job didn't assess the risk properly and allowed a lower spec cladding to be used.  If it met standards then the individual responsible for that standard should be that person because the same applies.

 

There is too much passing the buck and not taking responsibility within society these days and using the 'it's not my pay grade' excuse doesn't wash.

Edited 11 May, 2018 by skomaz

[@Lee]

Very interesting Newnight special last night on BBC2 about the scandal of cladding and people who are now effectively trapped in homes they've bought through no fault of their own. This scandal came about after the tragedy of Grenfell.

"We wanted to speak to a minister on this programme to explain to you what changes they've already made, what they're planning and how to address the concerns of all those affected. Over two weeks ago. as we planned this programme, we went to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government asking to speak to Secretary of State Robert Jenrick to talk about this issue. When he nor any other Minister in this department was available, we asked the Conservative party if a back bencher would come on to give the Governments position. No one was provided"

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000z947/newsnight-02092021
 

 

[cheezemonkhai]

Taking the politics out of it, the housing developers and cladding manufacturers plus those who passed it as safe should frankly be made to pay.

[cheezemonkhai]

Grenfell risk assessor reckless over cladding, inquiry hears https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-58507434

 

Interesting that professional negligence has been suggested. My understanding is that negligence would mean professional insurance liability?

 

Does anyone know if that is the case.

[skomaz]

If it's negligence then I would expect professional indemnity insurance would kick in.  However, that would probably be limited in value to £xm and there may be a get out by way of a 'reasonable' type of clause, whereby it would only apply in cases where failure was deemed to be a failure that would not normally be expected of someone performing the same service in a similar capacity (I've not explained that very well but I think you get what I mean)...  As such it could be argued he was not qualified to pass comment on the suitability of the cladding and hence the insurance was void.

[VWD]

On 04/09/2021 at 13:22, cheezemonkhai said:

Taking the politics out of it, the housing developers and cladding manufacturers plus those who passed it as safe should frankly be made to pay.

I'd suggest ( from my experience in being an  LA tenant of a block of LA+ owners) is that ( in our area, and possibly others) this was an exercise in "Pyramid Contracting/Sub contracting". For those experienced in contracting/sub/sub subcontracting, the signs were obvious. in our case, there was no responsible supervision of the sub/sub ( and I'd suspect even sub/sub/sub ) contractors. Complaints to the "supposed " person wearing a major company jacket got nowhere.

Clean up, each day -forget it. We had to trek through a layer of discarded render and then cladding to get inside. Safety -I had to threaten the blokes removing render with action after we went out ,to find someone on a ladder over our front door cascading large lumps of render around the area.

In the end , being unable to find any recourse, I got the camera out and handed my councillor a CD full of evidence. Owners complained violently ,and in the end the power company did not charge them.

Strangely ,after I handed the CD to my councillor, the complete circus got moved on.

But what have we got cladding our walls. And how many "covered up" Grenfell are waiting to erupt? Hindsight is a marvellous thing. I wish I'd kept samples of what was fitted under the poor quality render . ( Quote was from a plaster who claimed to have been on a render course).

[cheezemonkhai]

14 hours ago, skomaz said:

If it's negligence then I would expect professional indemnity insurance would kick in.  However, that would probably be limited in value to £xm and there may be a get out by way of a 'reasonable' type of clause, whereby it would only apply in cases where failure was deemed to be a failure that would not normally be expected of someone performing the same service in a similar capacity (I've not explained that very well but I think you get what I mean)...  As such it could be argued he was not qualified to pass comment on the suitability of the cladding and hence the insurance was void.

 

I did wonder and to be honest, you do have to question why said person thought they were.

I think it brings into question how the UK looks at professional qualifications and what is necessary to call yourself an engineer, scientist and other key but unprotected titles.

It also suggests that requlations need updating to tighten up/specify the type of qualifications a person carrying out an assesment requires, rather than just saying an assesment needs to be done.

Edited 10 September, 2021 by cheezemonkhai

[skomaz]

2 hours ago, cheezemonkhai said:

I think it brings into question how the UK looks at professional qualifications and what is necessary to call yourself an engineer, scientist and other key but unprotected titles.

It also suggests that requlations need updating to tighten up/specify the type of qualifications a person carrying out an assesment requires, rather than just saying an assesment needs to be done.

 

I totally agree there - I'm a Chartered Civil Engineer so professionally qualified with over 30 years experience of civil engineering, highway and transport planning schemes, but if someone asks me for a Road Safety Audit to be carried out I wouldn't dream of doing it myself, even though I have the relevant experience and knowledge - I bring in a team who hold Certificates of Competency in Road Safety Audit to do it.

[@Lee]

Update. The Government will not implement key recommendations from the Grenfell inquiry which won't come as a major shock if you follow politics even slightly.

 

Quote

In a consultation document published today, the Home Office said it does not believe it is “proportionate” to follow the recommendations and will continue to place its faith in ‘stay put’ advice in most buildings. 

Instead, it is launching a new consultation on sharing the location of disabled residents with fire services, but will only apply this to buildings known to have serious fire safety issues. 

The decision represents a major break from the recommendations of the first phase of the Grenfell Inquiry, which had said all building owners should be required by law develop a ‘plan B’ in case it becomes necessary to implement an evacuation.

https://www.insidehousing.co.uk/news/government-rejects-grenfell-inquiry-recommendations-on-evacuation-of-buildings-as-not-proportionate-75664
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/grenfell-priti-patel-fire-disabled-b2082104.html
Hmmm. 

 

Edited 18 May, 2022 by @Lee

[cheezemonkhai]

If they got rid of paying for MP's second homes and gave them all a flat in a high rise, I wonder if they would still believe that not listening to the consultation output is valid?.