1 week Ago
At 7.04pm on Friday, an email dropped into the inboxes of commercial tenants based at New England House telling them they would not be able to access the premises for four days due to “serious fire safety issues identified” in the building. The lead up to Christmas is the busiest time of year for lots of the traders and small businesses based in the building, so the news of the temporary closure left many of them reeling and anxious about what happens next and the potential impact on their ability to trade.
Even to the untrained eye it’s clear that New England House needs some TLC. There have been many discussions about money being invested in the building to address issues and make it fit for the future. Yet until recently, these conversations have not centred around there being any “intolerable” fire risk in the building.
This meant the email last Friday came somewhat out of the blue. What’s changed? A key thing is new legislation - the Building Safety Act 2022 - which saw new fire safety laws come into force on October 1, 2023. This is a good thing and it’s something that Greens welcome.
The Grenfell tragedy saw 72 people losing their lives, and the subsequent inquiry made clear their deaths were avoidable, and that the Government was warned 25 years ago about the type of fire safety risks that led to the tragedy – the legislation is long overdue and important. Housing providers and building owners face the prospect of legal action if they fail to meet the legal duties they have, so up and down the country more building surveys, assessments, and tests to establish how buildings will react in the event of a fire are taking place. It’s also why we are starting to see newly established bodies, like the Regulator of Social Housing RSH, issuing critical judgements against councils which are not meeting their responsibilities.
Locally, the Regulator issued a critical judgement in August which and noted information provided to them demonstrated the council is “failing to ensure that it meets a number of legal requirements in relation to health and safety”. The Regulator said the majority of the council’s repairs backlog were issues raised in 2023, so whilst there are historic issues in the council’s housing stock, there is criticism of its management of more recently logged repairs, which is problematic. In July we saw safety concerns raised with the eight large panel system high-rise blocks in the city.
The surveys revealed question marks about whether the blocks are at risk of “disproportionate collapse in the case of an explosion or large fire.” Like New England House, residents have raised criticisms about how the council communicated this alarming news to them, and their response to questions about interim measures. East Sussex has more than 300 high-rise buildings, and 4,000 mid-rise buildings.
Greens are concerned about the potential speed of any surveys needed, and that more support from the Government will be needed to help local councils, who are already struggling financially after 14 years of Tory austerity and cuts to their budgets, so they have the resources they need to undertake urgent remedial work. It is vital the council’s administration lobby their colleagues in Westminster to ensure this funding is available. In the short term, the council needs to commit to full transparency of its building stock for residents and businesses in them.
It’s clearly a significant piece of work for the council to check its building stock and undertake remedial work needed to be compliant, yet needs to happen. Moreover, the council needs to do better in the way it communicates with people when they go about this work. These are people’s homes, these are people’s businesses – good communication is vital and the council needs to ensure that it engages, listens, and responds well to those affected by the disruption remedial work may cause.
Over two months ago Siân Berry MP wrote to the council and asked whether they would publish their fire risk assessments online. There has not been a response to this question. This follows former MP Caroline Lucas asking the council in June 2023 why they no longer published FRAs online and asking them to do this.
The council’s response was: "We are currently updating our online and web presence and there has been a delay in finalising this, we will ensure these are published." Fire risk assessments can offer reassurance, and not just alarm - so go on Brighton and Hove City Council, make a commitment to publish your FRAs, as the Information Commissioner’s Office say councils should be doing anyway. Greens are actively supporting residents and New England House businesses affected by fire safety issues in the city, and I hope the council will respond positively to the call for important safety information to be in the public domain and make it available with immediate effect.
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