Agenda item

The Panel will receive an update on all compliance recommendations resulting from the compliance review and ongoing FRA Actions notified to the Regulator.

Asad Bhatti – Head of Building Safety, Homes and Neighbourhoods.

Asad Bhatti – Head of Building Safety, Homes and Neighbourhoods presented an update on all compliance recommendations resulting from the compliance review and ongoing Fire Risk Assessment (FRA) Actions notified to the Regulator.

Questions and comments were invited from Panel members, with the following issues being covered:

·       In response to a question, it was clarified that the 901 total work actions, of which 83% related to fire door replacement, just related to the high-rise actions and all were medium and low priority actions.

·       All works other than those relating to the high-rise and high priority actions had been packaged and tendered, six returns had been received and these were to be evaluated the following week. The expectation was that these works would be in progress from April 2022. Information on the programme period and milestones could be provided to the Panel once the programme was established.

·       In respect of the 70 assets assigned as communal assets, these had already been identified under the compliance programme but just not assigned as a communal asset.

·       In respect of the exceptional and widespread issues across the sector in terms of the availability of suitable contractors and resources and the potential for flexibility in procurement; it was explained that if the initial tendering process was unsuccessful then a second round would be tried and in the event of a similar response consideration would have to be given to this.

·       A formal process for completion and sign-off (of actions) was in place, with a pro-forma, with supporting evidence, being submitted to the independent consultant. This was then sent to the sponsor for approval and from there to the Building Safety Advisory Board (BSAB) for sign-off. In terms of visibility of  timescales, if any dates were pushed this would be agreed by the working group and the consultant and would be recorded in the smartsheet. Now the dependencies had been identified the dates were not expected to move.

·       It was clarified that the ‘original review’ (the Anthony Brown Compliance Review) had identified 48 recommendations resulting in 55 actions, in addition there were 13 historical recommendations from the Mazar’s Audit.  It was clarified that the dashboard at paragraph 2.0.3 of the report related to the  compliance review, Mazars audit and regulator actions whereas the dashboard at paragraph 2.0.4 related purely to the compliance review and Mazar’s audit, the additional actions  and sub-actions having been removed at the request of the BSAB to avoid distorting progress on the compliance review. The BSAB had sight of all on a monthly basis.

·       It was questioned how the Panel could understand the relative risk of uncompleted actions and it was explained that a priority had been assigned to each action together with a completion date and this information could be submitted to a future meeting

·       Further detail could be provided in respect of the Fire Risk Assessment (FRA) works to the balance of the housing stock. The work would be undertaken on a block by block basis and the programme would be developed around priority areas based on the vulnerability of the residents and the risk assessment.

·       Clarity was sought in respect of how all risk was being kept in view at any one time.

·       In terms of resourcing and capacity, as the focus moved towards the remainder of the housing stock, it was explained that recruitment was to take place to twenty-seven new posts within the building safety structure. It was acknowledged that there were currently challenges in the market and to help address this a graduate and apprentice cohort was being pursued, in addition to a workforce development programme for existing staff.

·       The timeframes for the completion of the works would be clearer once the tenders had been evaluated. It was necessary to work with the contractors to achieve a deliverable programme.

It was noted that:

-       Information on the low-rise programme period and milestones would be provided to the Panel.

-       The Panel wished to understand the relative risk of uncompleted actions and how all risk was being kept in view at any one time.

-       Further detail would be provided in respect of the Fire Risk Assessment (FRA) works to the balance of the housing stock.