THURROCK Council is struggling to implement a range of new fire safety rules in the wake of the Grenfell disaster, it has emerged reports the Local Democracyy Reporter.
The council’s audit committee met on Tuesday to discuss concerns around fire safety in the borough’s housing stock following an audit report which revealed an “action log” of 20 high risk, priority actions that had not been completed, with some dating back to September 2021.
The overdue work included an upgrade of fire alarm systems, fitting additional fire detection, fitting 30-minute fire resisting doors and windows and removing UPVC panels that create an enclosed space
At the meeting, Deborah Arnold, Conservative councillor for Ockendon said the report was “worrying”. She said: “There’s some real high-risk stuff around fire here and it’s quite disconcerting to read as a member. It says there are known high risk priority fire safety actions that have not been completed across a number of high-rise buildings and sheltered schemes dating back to 2021.
“The housing team does not have a dedicated system to effectively manage all its building safety compliance requirements which includes fire safety. I can see there is recommendations about what they should be doing and some of the things they are going to put in place but it’s not until March 2026. That’s nearly a year away. I’m just concerned about how high is the risk because it’s quite worrying.”
In response Satinder Jas, the council’s head of internal audit, counter fraud, risk management and insurance said: “There’s a significant amount of work being done around fire safety and there are action plans and a lot of logs in place which is really good to see.
“The reason you have 20 high risk priority actions is because unfortunately there is a backlog because demand on management and limited resources. That’s fundamentally due to all the changes from central Government and all the public scrutiny due to the Grenfell disaster. That’s why it’s not a low risk and there are some key bits they need to deal with.”
Councillors heard high-rise tower blocks are inspected annually and medium to low rise every three years. There are also regular fire safety audits carried out by specialist fire safety engineers.
However, fire safety controls were tightened in the wake of the Grenfell high-rise fire tragedy in West London in 2017 but the council is yet to develop an action plan of how it will implement recommendations from the Grenfell Tower Inquiry.
