After safety concerns were found at 10 blocks of flats, fire chiefs served enforcement notices on Brighton and Hove City Council.
The council also received official “record of inspection letters” which it said was “in line with a more formal and robust approach” by East Sussex Fire and Rescue Service.
The safety concerns were found during an inspection at Hazel, a six-storey block of flats in Turton Close, on Tuesday 18 March.
The council declared a critical incident and changed its advice in the event of a fire from stay put to evacuate immediately.
It put in place a 24/7 waking watch, told residents to keep all common ways clear and reminded them that, in the event of a fire, they should use the stairs instead of lifts.
The 10 blocks affected by the change are Allamanda, Calendula, Cherry, Damson, Hazel, Hollyhock, Jasmine, Meadowsweet, Sorrel and Viscaria.
The latest concerns follow a critical report from the Regulator of Social Housing which was set up after the Grenfell Tower fire in which 72 people died in June 2017.
The regulator, an official watchdog, said last August that the council’s housing department had “serious failings” and needed to make “significant improvements”, with particular concerns over fire and electrical safety.
An update on housing safety prepared by the council’s director of homes and investment Martin Reid is due to be considered by the cabinet on Thursday (15 May)
The report said that the fire safety inspection in March “identified a high level of risk” in relation to panels in the stairwells of the flats.
Work to render the stairwells safe had made good progress at five of the blocks – Allamanda, Hazel, Jasmine, Meadowsweet and Sorrell – according to the report.
It said that in those five blocks, the fire service had confirmed “a return to the remain in place evacuation policy”.
The report said that its immediate actions included
• delivering individual letters and holding resident drop-ins to provide clear communication and reassurance
• completing enhanced tenancy visits for 94 per cent of the 248 households affected, with four scheduled visits, three empty flats and seven flats where the council had not been able to agree access – and, therefore, they have all been sent enforcement notice letters as part of continued attempts to engage with them
• starting planned upgrades to escape route ventilation and fire door replacements• submitting mandatory occurrence reports (MORs) to the Building Safety Regulator (BSR) for all affected blocks
The report said: “The Bristol Estate response was treated as a critical incident. A strategic co-ordination group (SCG), chaired by our corporate director (Genette Laws), is currently meeting thrice-weekly to co-ordinate the response across the directorate and the wider council.
“The council is also scheduling a lessons learned session … to identify any areas for improvement in our historical and current processes which will feed into the wider root-cause analysis, learning and subsequent continuous improvement plan for Being a Great Landlord.
“Although currently focused on Bristol Estate, the council is actively assessing the implications across the wider portfolio.
“Simultaneous evacuation and waking watch measures have been extended to St James House, Conway Court and Livingstone House, blocks with similar issues to those identified on the Bristol Estate, with MORs submitted for each.
“Drop-ins and enhanced tenancy visits are under way at these locations.
“As a precautionary measure, waking watch is also in place for Nettleton Court and Dudeney Lodge. A decision on evacuation strategy will be made following receipt of updated fire risk assessments.”
The council is carrying out extensive inspections of more than 12,000 homes after the regulator found “serious failings” in the council’s housing department and said that it needed to make “significant improvements”.
The regulator’s report said that more than 1,700 medium and low-risk fire-related repairs and improvements were overdue by at least two years in council homes in Brighton and Hove.
Opposition councillors plan to raise their concerns that fire risk assessments in high-rise blocks – due to be completed by September this year – are not on schedule.
Fire-risk assessments have been completed for all medium-rise buildings as have 99.8 per cent of homes in low rise buildings.
Green councillor Chloë Goldsmith said that the fire-risk assessments were not published and were being chased by the Greens, including by the Green MP for Brighton Pavilion, Siân Berry.
Councillor Goldsmith said: “They’re just not available to residents to see what these risk assessments are. It is absolutely astonishing that it’s still not happened.”
A programme to fit hard-wired smoke detectors in all homes is expected to be completed by October, with the council having committed £15 million to tackle the failings identified by the regulator.
The report said that 3,600 council homes out of about 12,100 did not have an electrical condition report.
The council said that it was on target to complete electrical safety tests in all homes and communal properties by December next year.
The council has 12,145 rented homes and responsibility as a landlord for 2,210 leasehold properties, with a portfolio that includes 46 high-rise blocks – eight of which have “large panel systems”.
The blocks with large panel systems were built in the 1950s and 60s before a number of modern safety standards were brought in.
The council is considering its long-term options – including possible demolition and redevelopment – in consultation with residents.
The cabinet is due to meet at 2pm on Thursday (15 May) at Hove Town Hall. The meeting is scheduled to be webcast.
BHCC are irresponsible hypocrites that provide some of the worst accommodation in this city. BHCC demonises private landlords, charges exorbitant fees to private landlords that are then passed onto tenants inflating rental prices in the city, and they turns a blind eye to safety transgressions by their favoured providers (slum landlords) of so called “temporary, emergency accommodation”. One big racket.
That’s not quite accurate. BHCC still manages over 11,000 council homes directly and is one of the few councils to keep control rather than sell them off. The licensing fees for private landlords are there to improve standards in HMOs—especially where rogue landlords put tenants at risk.
The council doesn’t “turn a blind eye” to poor temporary accommodation. It’s a national issue: councils are legally obliged to house people in emergencies, but the shortage of decent temporary housing means they sometimes have to use poor providers. That’s not ideal, but it’s a symptom of a broken housing system, not a local conspiracy.
Calling it a “racket” ignores the real challenges: rising homelessness, cuts to housing budgets, and unaffordable private rents. BHCC isn’t perfect, but oversimplifying the problem helps no one.
It’s the least surprising news EVER that the council have been issued with more enforcement notices.
It’s shocking that the council don’t even share fire assessments with residents – have the council learnt nothing from Grenfell – absolutely appalling that the Labour council are not listening to requests for more safety information to be shared and that it’s left to the fire service to have to threaten legal action before the council put dangerous defects right.
Calm down with the hysteria. You just have old buildings that just need some simple retrofitting to meeting the new higher standards. It took no time at all to install.
Benjamin – I don’t think you properly understand the seriousness of the issue. The fire service have issued enforcement notices – they don’t issue them lightly. They get issued when landlords have failed to meet their legal duties to ensure adequate fire safety measures are in place.
It might seem like a small issue to you, but when things like evacuation notices are not correct, it could have catastrophic results in the event of a fire. Personally, I don’t see that having a door that can withstand fire compared to one that can’t is really a “higher standard”, it’s actually a basic that all homes should have, and something that the law has only finally caught up with after 72 people lost their lives in Grenfell.
It’s not nice to have things that need replacing and actioning in these properties, it’s changes to make them safe.
Having had a quick look on ESFRS website, the notices have been largely dealt with (https://www.esfrs.org/public-register-of-notices), only Hazel left showing, so that would imply that the council (for all their sins) has acted and managed the situation quickly.
I’m all for council bashing, but I think its not always as black and white as to why things either havent been done or within a quick timescale, I know that there have been a few changes in legislation for high rise buildings which might affect things and I guess leaseholders are chargeable for some of the costs which means there would be some sort of consultation time maybe?
If it’s all hunky dory, why did the council’s external auditors report in January say that based on the evidence they had seen they were not satisfied that the council has proper arrangements in place to secure economy efficiency and effectiveness in its use of resources and say they found significant weaknesses. What with the Building Safety Regulators report, the limbo people in the large panel system blocks face, the enforcement notices issued by the fire service – it’s not just me saying it – it’s multiple independent bodies.
There are things like replacing individual flat doors that the council needs to arrange with leaseholders, but these issues have been known for around 5 or more years. It should not still be a problem. There is zero reason why things like fire notices with evacuation plans should take more than six months for the council to replace. It’s not something they can just excuse away imo.