Discussion
Was watching the news channels this morning, and the BBC (I think) were interviewing two individuals, who were running campaigns in support of those in dwellings that are deemed unsafe owing to fire hazards including inflammable cladding such as Grenfell house.
the irony was that one of them was sitting in his kitchen, wanging on, about fire safety in these dwellings, and in the background, was his cooker hood, against which was wedged cushions, rolls of kitchen paper and other combustible items....all directly over the top of his cookerFFS!.
You just cannot help some people, and the government cannot legislate against rank stupidity.
Even more ironic, was that much of the cladding which was applied to the numerous buildings in question, As part of a government requirement in Part L of the Building Regulations, which made it mandatory for developers and landlords, to upgrade the thermal performance of existing dwellings, when a certain level of other significant upgrades, were being made to the buildings.
the irony was that one of them was sitting in his kitchen, wanging on, about fire safety in these dwellings, and in the background, was his cooker hood, against which was wedged cushions, rolls of kitchen paper and other combustible items....all directly over the top of his cookerFFS!.
You just cannot help some people, and the government cannot legislate against rank stupidity.
Even more ironic, was that much of the cladding which was applied to the numerous buildings in question, As part of a government requirement in Part L of the Building Regulations, which made it mandatory for developers and landlords, to upgrade the thermal performance of existing dwellings, when a certain level of other significant upgrades, were being made to the buildings.
Pan Pan Pan said:
Was watching the news channels this morning, and the BBC (I think) were interviewing two individuals, who were running campaigns in support of those in dwellings that are deemed unsafe owing to fire hazards including inflammable cladding such as Grenfell house.
the irony was that one of them was sitting in his kitchen, wanging on, about fire safety in these dwellings, and in the background, was his cooker hood, against which was wedged cushions, rolls of kitchen paper and other combustible items....all directly over the top of his cookerFFS!.
You just cannot help some people, and the government cannot legislate against rank stupidity.
Even more ironic, was that much of the cladding which was applied to the numerous buildings in question, As part of a government requirement in Part L of the Building Regulations, which made it mandatory for developers and landlords, to upgrade the thermal performance of existing dwellings, when a certain level of other significant upgrades, were being made to the buildings.
Yes I saw that on BBC1 and couldn't believe what I was seeing, there appeared to be books in a cupboard next to the cooker as well.the irony was that one of them was sitting in his kitchen, wanging on, about fire safety in these dwellings, and in the background, was his cooker hood, against which was wedged cushions, rolls of kitchen paper and other combustible items....all directly over the top of his cookerFFS!.
You just cannot help some people, and the government cannot legislate against rank stupidity.
Even more ironic, was that much of the cladding which was applied to the numerous buildings in question, As part of a government requirement in Part L of the Building Regulations, which made it mandatory for developers and landlords, to upgrade the thermal performance of existing dwellings, when a certain level of other significant upgrades, were being made to the buildings.
Indeed.
One of the chaps seemed to be about to burst into tears to start with. Making it very much an emotional plea.
The wife made the point that these are private individuals purchasing private property so why should the taxpayer have any responsibility to foot the bill.
If something was wrong with our house, it’s not like anyone would be helping us out to repair it - it’s not much different here.
One of the chaps seemed to be about to burst into tears to start with. Making it very much an emotional plea.
The wife made the point that these are private individuals purchasing private property so why should the taxpayer have any responsibility to foot the bill.
If something was wrong with our house, it’s not like anyone would be helping us out to repair it - it’s not much different here.
fat80b said:
Indeed.
One of the chaps seemed to be about to burst into tears to start with. Making it very much an emotional plea.
The wife made the point that these are private individuals purchasing private property so why should the taxpayer have any responsibility to foot the bill.
If something was wrong with our house, it’s not like anyone would be helping us out to repair it - it’s not much different here.
I can understand this point of view but find it a little unfair to the homeowners who have flats built to a government standard only to be told that this standard is now wrong and they need to foot the bill to rectify. One of the chaps seemed to be about to burst into tears to start with. Making it very much an emotional plea.
The wife made the point that these are private individuals purchasing private property so why should the taxpayer have any responsibility to foot the bill.
If something was wrong with our house, it’s not like anyone would be helping us out to repair it - it’s not much different here.
Cold said:
fat80b said:
Indeed.
One of the chaps seemed to be about to burst into tears to start with. Making it very much an emotional plea.
The wife made the point that these are private individuals purchasing private property so why should the taxpayer have any responsibility to foot the bill.
If something was wrong with our house, it’s not like anyone would be helping us out to repair it - it’s not much different here.
I can understand this point of view but find it a little unfair to the homeowners who have flats built to a government standard only to be told that this standard is now wrong and they need to foot the bill to rectify. One of the chaps seemed to be about to burst into tears to start with. Making it very much an emotional plea.
The wife made the point that these are private individuals purchasing private property so why should the taxpayer have any responsibility to foot the bill.
If something was wrong with our house, it’s not like anyone would be helping us out to repair it - it’s not much different here.
There’s an interesting case in Ireland where thousands of houses were built in the early 2000’s using defective building blocks which are literally crumbling away making the houses unsafe and in some cases uninhabitable and fit only for the bulldozer
The home owners have been left in the lurch there too
The home owners have been left in the lurch there too
My MIL lives in a block affected by this.
The Government scheme has covered the updates to the cladding - building regulations should never have allowed what was fitted to be fitted.
The real issue is that, in investigating the cladding, they have discovered terrible building defects due to poor build quality, which will cost ~£25k/flat to remedy.
The proposed changes to the law so that developers are responsible for defects for 15 years instead of 6 should mean that the developer will have to pay to remedy their poor workmanship, and it seems only right to me that if they made more money by cutting corners, they should pay to fix them when found out.
loafer123 said:
My MIL lives in a block affected by this.
The Government scheme has covered the updates to the cladding - building regulations should never have allowed what was fitted to be fitted.
The real issue is that, in investigating the cladding, they have discovered terrible building defects due to poor build quality, which will cost ~£25k/flat to remedy.
The proposed changes to the law so that developers are responsible for defects for 15 years instead of 6 should mean that the developer will have to pay to remedy their poor workmanship, and it seems only right to me that if they made more money by cutting corners, they should pay to fix them when found out.
Building regs evolve and aren't retrospective when they do AFAIK.The Government scheme has covered the updates to the cladding - building regulations should never have allowed what was fitted to be fitted.
The real issue is that, in investigating the cladding, they have discovered terrible building defects due to poor build quality, which will cost ~£25k/flat to remedy.
The proposed changes to the law so that developers are responsible for defects for 15 years instead of 6 should mean that the developer will have to pay to remedy their poor workmanship, and it seems only right to me that if they made more money by cutting corners, they should pay to fix them when found out.
This is crap for people with those properties... But I imagine there are lots of people in houses we'll below latest regs who get zero help to remedy it.
The taxpayer shouldn't be expected to cover this IMO. And the owners will struggle getting anyone else to if it was built to spec.
People occupying buildings need to know how to occupy them too.
If you want to scare yourself:
https://www.cross-safety.org/uk
There's a scary one involving blind faith in a sprinkler system in a large office/warehouse. To the point that fire doors were removed/propped, fire exits locked/blocked, paper and cardboard everywhere. Surveyor took a look at the plant room. Sprinkers off at the main valve, with the immediate pipework after removed...
https://www.cross-safety.org/uk
There's a scary one involving blind faith in a sprinkler system in a large office/warehouse. To the point that fire doors were removed/propped, fire exits locked/blocked, paper and cardboard everywhere. Surveyor took a look at the plant room. Sprinkers off at the main valve, with the immediate pipework after removed...
There seems to be an unpleasant undertone in this thread of “Live in a flat or a block? f
k ‘em”
As has already been mentioned, the people who live in these properties are going to be, in many cases, financially destroyed by this, despite the government help, through absolutely no fault of their own.
The post regarding someone having flammable materials near their cooker is an extreme red herring and pointless to mention. Fires started in domestic properties purely by human carelessness are rare these days, and let us not forget that the Grenfell tower fire was started by a fridge-freezer that malfunctioned, so again, nothing to do with domestic carelessness.
Another thing that is neither helpful nor relevant is comparing flat ownership to a house by saying “If you were in a house you would have to pay for all this yourself anyway”. In a house, you are free to do as little or as much maintenance as you want, you can let the place fall to pieces if you want and no one is going to send you a bill for repairs. Further more, if you come to sell your house, problems and dilapidation will dent the sale price, but will not prevent a sale. People have no issues buying houses that need a lot of work.
At the moment, thousands of flat owners are totally unable to sell their homes to escape the nightmare.
It should also be pointed out that homeowners can arrange maintenance at a lesser cost than those in flats can. ‘Uncle bob’ can come and repair your roof and replace your windows in your house, but the person selected to repair the roof and windows on a block will have to have insurance, paperwork, certificates, submit a tender, and so on, and is usually a lot more expensive.
People in flats are quite literally told how much to pay for their maintenance and upkeep, have no choice but to pay up, often they are shafted over the costs, and now they can’t sell because there was incompetence all over the place from ‘professionals’ who are supposed to be involved in the design, manufacture, and approval of building products and the rules that apply to them.
It is a disgrace all round, and the only way out of this mess is for the government to pay for most of it. That idea won’t be popular with some people, but it really is the only way.
If you just demanded that the flat owners pay the £20k, £30k, £50k or whatever, very few of them would be able to pay it, they would go bankrupt, the freeholder of the block wouldn’t be able to pay it, and the situation would continue with no solution to end it.
These people all bought flats in good faith, safe in the knowledge that the rules and regulations would ensure that they were never landed with a massive bill that they couldn’t pay, and now look what has happened to them.
k ‘em”As has already been mentioned, the people who live in these properties are going to be, in many cases, financially destroyed by this, despite the government help, through absolutely no fault of their own.
The post regarding someone having flammable materials near their cooker is an extreme red herring and pointless to mention. Fires started in domestic properties purely by human carelessness are rare these days, and let us not forget that the Grenfell tower fire was started by a fridge-freezer that malfunctioned, so again, nothing to do with domestic carelessness.
Another thing that is neither helpful nor relevant is comparing flat ownership to a house by saying “If you were in a house you would have to pay for all this yourself anyway”. In a house, you are free to do as little or as much maintenance as you want, you can let the place fall to pieces if you want and no one is going to send you a bill for repairs. Further more, if you come to sell your house, problems and dilapidation will dent the sale price, but will not prevent a sale. People have no issues buying houses that need a lot of work.
At the moment, thousands of flat owners are totally unable to sell their homes to escape the nightmare.
It should also be pointed out that homeowners can arrange maintenance at a lesser cost than those in flats can. ‘Uncle bob’ can come and repair your roof and replace your windows in your house, but the person selected to repair the roof and windows on a block will have to have insurance, paperwork, certificates, submit a tender, and so on, and is usually a lot more expensive.
People in flats are quite literally told how much to pay for their maintenance and upkeep, have no choice but to pay up, often they are shafted over the costs, and now they can’t sell because there was incompetence all over the place from ‘professionals’ who are supposed to be involved in the design, manufacture, and approval of building products and the rules that apply to them.
It is a disgrace all round, and the only way out of this mess is for the government to pay for most of it. That idea won’t be popular with some people, but it really is the only way.
If you just demanded that the flat owners pay the £20k, £30k, £50k or whatever, very few of them would be able to pay it, they would go bankrupt, the freeholder of the block wouldn’t be able to pay it, and the situation would continue with no solution to end it.
These people all bought flats in good faith, safe in the knowledge that the rules and regulations would ensure that they were never landed with a massive bill that they couldn’t pay, and now look what has happened to them.
Edited by anonymous-user on Monday 5th July 15:55
Lord Marylebone said:
There seems to be an unpleasant undertone in this thread of “Live in a flat or a block? fk ‘em”
As has already been mentioned, the people who live in these properties are going to be, in many cases, financially destroyed by this, despite the government help, through absolutely no fault of their own.
The post regarding someone having flammable materials near their cooker is an extreme red herring and pointless to mention. Fires started in domestic properties purely by human carelessness are rare these days, and let us not forget that the Grenfell tower fire was started by a fridge-freezer that malfunctioned, so again, nothing to do with domestic carelessness.
Another thing that is neither helpful nor relevant is comparing flat ownership to a house by saying “If you were in a house you would have to pay for all this yourself anyway”. In a house, you are free to do as little or as much maintenance as you want, you can let the place fall to pieces if you want and no one is going to send you a bill for repairs. Further more, if you come to sell your house, problems and dilapidation will dent the sale price, but will not prevent a sale. People have no issues buying houses that need a lot of work.
At the moment, thousands of flat owners are totally unable to sell their homes to escape the nightmare.
It should also be pointed out that homeowners can arrange maintenance at a lesser cost than those in flats can. ‘Uncle bob’ can come and repair your roof and replace your windows in your house, but the person selected to repair the roof and windows on a block will have to have insurance, paperwork, certificates, submit a tender, and so on, and is usually a lot more expensive.
People in flats are quite literally told how much to pay for their maintenance and upkeep, have no choice but to pay up, often they are shafted over the costs, and now they can’t sell because there was incompetence all over the place from ‘professionals’ who are supposed to be involved in the design, manufacture, and approval of building products and the rules that apply to them.
It is a disgrace all round, and the only way out of this mess is for the government to pay for most of it. That idea won’t be popular with some people, but it really is the only way.
If you just demanded that the flat owners pay the £20k, £30k, £50k or whatever, very few of them would be able to pay it, they would go bankrupt, the freeholder of the block wouldn’t be able to pay it, and the situation would continue with no solution to end it.
These people all bought flats in good faith, safe in the knowledge that the rules and regulations would ensure that they were never landed with a massive bill that they couldn’t pay, and now look what has happened to them.
I agree with just about all of that but I think the problem is wider still; I am not sure that tall blocks are really, in the long run, suitable for individual ownership by people of low/average wealth. They tend to throw up huge maintenance bulls out of all proportion to the wealth of the flat owners, especially pensioners.k ‘em”As has already been mentioned, the people who live in these properties are going to be, in many cases, financially destroyed by this, despite the government help, through absolutely no fault of their own.
The post regarding someone having flammable materials near their cooker is an extreme red herring and pointless to mention. Fires started in domestic properties purely by human carelessness are rare these days, and let us not forget that the Grenfell tower fire was started by a fridge-freezer that malfunctioned, so again, nothing to do with domestic carelessness.
Another thing that is neither helpful nor relevant is comparing flat ownership to a house by saying “If you were in a house you would have to pay for all this yourself anyway”. In a house, you are free to do as little or as much maintenance as you want, you can let the place fall to pieces if you want and no one is going to send you a bill for repairs. Further more, if you come to sell your house, problems and dilapidation will dent the sale price, but will not prevent a sale. People have no issues buying houses that need a lot of work.
At the moment, thousands of flat owners are totally unable to sell their homes to escape the nightmare.
It should also be pointed out that homeowners can arrange maintenance at a lesser cost than those in flats can. ‘Uncle bob’ can come and repair your roof and replace your windows in your house, but the person selected to repair the roof and windows on a block will have to have insurance, paperwork, certificates, submit a tender, and so on, and is usually a lot more expensive.
People in flats are quite literally told how much to pay for their maintenance and upkeep, have no choice but to pay up, often they are shafted over the costs, and now they can’t sell because there was incompetence all over the place from ‘professionals’ who are supposed to be involved in the design, manufacture, and approval of building products and the rules that apply to them.
It is a disgrace all round, and the only way out of this mess is for the government to pay for most of it. That idea won’t be popular with some people, but it really is the only way.
If you just demanded that the flat owners pay the £20k, £30k, £50k or whatever, very few of them would be able to pay it, they would go bankrupt, the freeholder of the block wouldn’t be able to pay it, and the situation would continue with no solution to end it.
These people all bought flats in good faith, safe in the knowledge that the rules and regulations would ensure that they were never landed with a massive bill that they couldn’t pay, and now look what has happened to them.
Edited by Lord Marylebone on Monday 5th July 15:55
For example, my wife used to live in a council block; council decided to replace all the windows; it was a good idea for better insulation but was not essential(and possibly compromised fire safety to a degree). No problem for the council tenants, but some had bought their own flats- they were not wealthy - and were landed with a bill that I think was around £20k each . Whether their contribution was fair or inflated, who knows? Not something I would trust a council on. I'll bet it contained admin fees that did not go to the contractors. Luckily we had chosen not to buy, for just this reason.
And that is before you get to less predictable structural decay, These structures are not like traditional low rise masonry buildings capable of lasting indefinitely with relatively cheap but frequent maintenance by the householder or a local small builder.
Edit for speeling!
Edited by mac96 on Monday 5th July 16:20
Murph7355 said:
Building regs evolve and aren't retrospective when they do AFAIK.
This is crap for people with those properties... But I imagine there are lots of people in houses we'll below latest regs who get zero help to remedy it.
The taxpayer shouldn't be expected to cover this IMO. And the owners will struggle getting anyone else to if it was built to spec.
People occupying buildings need to know how to occupy them too.
Yes, building regs evolve and generally not retroactive however from the Phase 1 report of the Grenfell disaster (this is from the executive summary):This is crap for people with those properties... But I imagine there are lots of people in houses we'll below latest regs who get zero help to remedy it.
The taxpayer shouldn't be expected to cover this IMO. And the owners will struggle getting anyone else to if it was built to spec.
People occupying buildings need to know how to occupy them too.
2.16 It was not my original intention to include in Phase 1 of the Inquiry an investigation into the
extent to which the building complied with the requirements of the Building Regulations.
However, as I have explained in Chapter 26, there was compelling evidence that the external
walls of the building failed to comply with Requirement B4(1) of Schedule 1 to the Building
Regulations 2010, in that they did not adequately resist the spread of fire having regard to
the height, use and position of the building. On the contrary, they actively promoted it. It will
be necessary in Phase 2 to examine why those who were responsible for the design of the
refurbishment considered that the tower would meet that essential requirement.
So if the materials were substandard to Building Regs - and were self-certified - then how can it be expected that the owners of properties with the same cladding, in other buildings are liable for their replacement?
Go after the manufacturer/certifying body of the cladding but we know that won't recover enough funds to fix everything.
Hoofy said:
It is possible that he never cooks, though. Or at least never uses the hobs but only uses the microwave.
If you live in a building with say 20 flats plus, and therefore probably at least 50 other people, it's a reasonable assumption that most days some idiot is doing something stupid . That assumption SHOULD be taken into account in building design, not used as an excuse to say it's all the individual idiots' fault when the rest lose their homes, or worse.
Lord Marylebone said:
...
Another thing that is neither helpful nor relevant is comparing flat ownership to a house by saying “If you were in a house you would have to pay for all this yourself anyway”. In a house, you are free to do as little or as much maintenance as you want, you can let the place fall to pieces if you want and no one is going to send you a bill for repairs. Further more, if you come to sell your house, problems and dilapidation will dent the sale price, but will not prevent a sale. People have no issues buying houses that need a lot of work....
There's nothing "unpleasant" about pointing this stuff out. It may seem "cold"...but ultimately it's just a fact of life (though see further reply later).Another thing that is neither helpful nor relevant is comparing flat ownership to a house by saying “If you were in a house you would have to pay for all this yourself anyway”. In a house, you are free to do as little or as much maintenance as you want, you can let the place fall to pieces if you want and no one is going to send you a bill for repairs. Further more, if you come to sell your house, problems and dilapidation will dent the sale price, but will not prevent a sale. People have no issues buying houses that need a lot of work....
The big difference here is that a large number of people are all impacted at the same time via circumstances that stem from a tragic event.
If you let your house get run down to a big enough degree then it will be unsaleable. Conversely I'm sure everything has its price.
GroundEffect said:
Yes, building regs evolve and generally not retroactive however from the Phase 1 report of the Grenfell disaster (this is from the executive summary):
2.16 It was not my original intention to include in Phase 1 of the Inquiry an investigation into the
extent to which the building complied with the requirements of the Building Regulations.
However, as I have explained in Chapter 26, there was compelling evidence that the external
walls of the building failed to comply with Requirement B4(1) of Schedule 1 to the Building
Regulations 2010, in that they did not adequately resist the spread of fire having regard to
the height, use and position of the building. On the contrary, they actively promoted it. It will
be necessary in Phase 2 to examine why those who were responsible for the design of the
refurbishment considered that the tower would meet that essential requirement.
So if the materials were substandard to Building Regs - and were self-certified - then how can it be expected that the owners of properties with the same cladding, in other buildings are liable for their replacement?
Go after the manufacturer/certifying body of the cladding but we know that won't recover enough funds to fix everything.
I'd agree - if the thing did not meet regs then whoever built it should pay. Big time.2.16 It was not my original intention to include in Phase 1 of the Inquiry an investigation into the
extent to which the building complied with the requirements of the Building Regulations.
However, as I have explained in Chapter 26, there was compelling evidence that the external
walls of the building failed to comply with Requirement B4(1) of Schedule 1 to the Building
Regulations 2010, in that they did not adequately resist the spread of fire having regard to
the height, use and position of the building. On the contrary, they actively promoted it. It will
be necessary in Phase 2 to examine why those who were responsible for the design of the
refurbishment considered that the tower would meet that essential requirement.
So if the materials were substandard to Building Regs - and were self-certified - then how can it be expected that the owners of properties with the same cladding, in other buildings are liable for their replacement?
Go after the manufacturer/certifying body of the cladding but we know that won't recover enough funds to fix everything.
And nobody should be allowed to self certify (IMO) without a very, very large bond that extends over a very long time (IMO).
The taxpayer should categorically not be paying for this outright. With money being "cheap" at the moment, I'd support the govt acting as a guarantor or even lending the money at "cost" to places needing it. But that's as far as it should go.
I manage a block of six flats, flats immediately above my flat, I don't know who resides in each, whether they are rented, whether the electrics, gas appliances have had their five, and/or yearly checks etc.
Imagine a block on twenty floors, mixture of private, council and immigrant tenants. Try asking these not to store their furniture, motorbikes, cycles, propane gas cylinder etc. etc. in the communal stairwell.
Imagine a block on twenty floors, mixture of private, council and immigrant tenants. Try asking these not to store their furniture, motorbikes, cycles, propane gas cylinder etc. etc. in the communal stairwell.
Wings said:
I manage a block of six flats, flats immediately above my flat, I don't know who resides in each, whether they are rented, whether the electrics, gas appliances have had their five, and/or yearly checks etc.
Imagine a block on twenty floors, mixture of private, council and immigrant tenants. Try asking these not to store their furniture, motorbikes, cycles, propane gas cylinder etc. etc. in the communal stairwell.
Then with all due respect you don't manage them.Imagine a block on twenty floors, mixture of private, council and immigrant tenants. Try asking these not to store their furniture, motorbikes, cycles, propane gas cylinder etc. etc. in the communal stairwell.
oakdale said:
Pan Pan Pan said:
Was watching the news channels this morning, and the BBC (I think) were interviewing two individuals, who were running campaigns in support of those in dwellings that are deemed unsafe owing to fire hazards including inflammable cladding such as Grenfell house.
the irony was that one of them was sitting in his kitchen, wanging on, about fire safety in these dwellings, and in the background, was his cooker hood, against which was wedged cushions, rolls of kitchen paper and other combustible items....all directly over the top of his cookerFFS!.
You just cannot help some people, and the government cannot legislate against rank stupidity.
Even more ironic, was that much of the cladding which was applied to the numerous buildings in question, As part of a government requirement in Part L of the Building Regulations, which made it mandatory for developers and landlords, to upgrade the thermal performance of existing dwellings, when a certain level of other significant upgrades, were being made to the buildings.
Yes I saw that on BBC1 and couldn't believe what I was seeing, there appeared to be books in a cupboard next to the cooker as well.the irony was that one of them was sitting in his kitchen, wanging on, about fire safety in these dwellings, and in the background, was his cooker hood, against which was wedged cushions, rolls of kitchen paper and other combustible items....all directly over the top of his cookerFFS!.
You just cannot help some people, and the government cannot legislate against rank stupidity.
Even more ironic, was that much of the cladding which was applied to the numerous buildings in question, As part of a government requirement in Part L of the Building Regulations, which made it mandatory for developers and landlords, to upgrade the thermal performance of existing dwellings, when a certain level of other significant upgrades, were being made to the buildings.
That guys flat is a death trap on its own, doesn't need any flammable cladding to help.
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