Buildings safe despite expected £150m repair bill

Dudley Council tenants have been told their buildings are safe despite plans to spend up to £150m on works called for by watchdogs.

A meeting of the authority’s Housing and Assets Scrutiny Committee, on September 24, was told the cash will be required over the next five or six years for a programme of work in response to a combination of three enforcement notices and eight contravention notices issued to the council by the Building Safety Regulator.

The notices required specific information about the council’s high-rise stock, particularly Kennedy Court, Baylie Court and Tenbury House.

Cllr Daniel Bevan, Dudley cabinet member for development and regulation, told the meeting details of the work and costs will be presented to cabinet members in due course.

Cllr Bevan added: “I want to be absolutely clear to everybody in the room and outside the room for residents in these buildings.

“Neither the building safety regulation notices or the report before us say that these buildings aren’t safe.

“The notices required further information, they did not say the buildings were dangerous or required any immediate physical works.

“Any feedback that suggests the regulator deemed these buildings unsafe would be inaccurate and cause unnecessary alarm to residents.”

The council has already spent £10m on specialist surveyors to provide the detailed fire safety reports required by the regulator for the 11 buildings subject to notices, plus another ten high-rise blocks owned by the authority.

A report signed by Iain Wallace, Dudley lead consultant, building safety and compliance, said: “All required information has now been collated and submitted to the Building Safety Regulator on time. 

“Had the council not acted, failure to comply with the enforcement notices would have resulted in further enforcement action including but not limited to a prohibition notice being served on one of the buildings.”

Councillors were told thousands of blocks around the country were subject to similar enforcement notices as a result of new regulations and tougher safety inspection requirements introduced in the wake of the Grenfell Tower disaster in 2017.