Could there be a more damning indictment from the Grenfell Tower public inquiry than that? Writes BESA's Director of Specialist Knowledge, Rachel Davidson.
At the publication of the final report into the Grenfell Tower tragedy, inquiry chair Sir Martin Moore-Bick said ALL the 72 deaths were avoidable and the tower's residents had been "badly failed over a number of years and in a number of different ways", but not all the named organisations and companies bore the "same degree of responsibility for the disaster".
He said some displayed "dishonesty and greed" while others were simply incompetent.
The implication of that statement is that because you are bad at your job you don’t bear the same level of blame as those who deliberately set out to lie and cheat for profit. Can that be right? Ignorance, lack of training, complacency…these are mitigations of guilt?
The Building Safety Act, which was brought into force because of the disaster, makes it clear that you are legally obliged to inform your client if you are not fully competent to carry out the task you have been employed to do. You cannot plead ignorance. And your client must be able to produce evidence that you were competent.
“Sorry, I was just incompetent,” doesn’t wash.
Cascades
The report highlighted the failure of the Grenfell cladding contractor Rydon to properly manage its sub-contractors which is a salutary lesson for anyone involved in appointing and managing construction supply chains. Responsibility cascades down from the top so you must ensure everyone is competent to carry out the specific task they are appointed to do, but we shouldn’t need an Act of Parliament and a public inquiry to tell us that.
The report made 58 new proposals for the government to consider. Many of these are admirable and most should be adopted, but time is marching on. The inquiry took six years, and the Metropolitan Police say they will now start going through the report “line by line” with a view to bringing legal actions in 2026 which may end up in court a year later – TEN YEARS after the fire.
As one of the Grenfell families said: “We did not ask for a public inquiry…all we wanted was justice.”
Waiting for prosecutions is not a reason to delay making changes, but seeing the full force of the law in action is a powerful motivator for getting laggards to do the right thing. So, a decade of waiting for justice sends out all the wrong messages.
It is very unhelpful, even though we already knew in broad terms, what the report would tell us: People cut corners to save money and Grenfell was just the latest in a series of building fires caused by the same industry failings. We know this, we have known this for years – even before Grenfell.
The industry model is broken but it can change.
The Building Safety Act has been in force for two years now, many people in the industry are already in the process of changing their ways, but even more are not because this extraordinarily drawn-out process is giving them an excuse to wait to be told what to do…when they already know.
One industry body, who will have to remain nameless here, issued a statement to the effect that Grenfell and the subsequent inquiry did not impact its members because few of them work on high rise buildings. However, they would be encouraged to adopt the “spirit” of the findings as they should always want to raise quality standards.
Wow! This is not a voluntary thing, and it does involve everyone working in construction: “From Shed to Shard”. Are people really still not getting this? We need to address the competence of everyone working on building projects.
It is clearly stated in the Act that failure to provide evidence of competence should preclude a company or individual from carrying out ANY building work. The Act and its secondary legislation have precipitated a deluge of new rules including significant revisions of the Building Regulations, which yes, apply to ALL buildings.
At BESA, we support the findings of the report and hope the government will enact all the important proposals, but not at the expense of further delay. We know what to do and many BESA members and others are getting on with it. We should not still be talking about this seven years after the fire but if more talking is required let’s have that going on in parallel while we push ahead with what is already in place.
We support the creation of an over-arching construction regulator with responsibility for every aspect of building safety, but the job description is mind blowing and it will take considerable time to set that up. In the meantime, we already have a Building Safety Regulator managed by the Health & Safety Executive and they have made it clear they expect the industry to be bringing about change now. Yes, now.
We support the proposal for a ‘licensing scheme’ for contractors appointed to deliver higher risk buildings (HRBs), but again there are some practical issues with this, so it is not an overnight job.
There must be a fresh approach to the review of the Building Regulations, which involves the widest possible range of views – we accept that too – and would welcome starting work on that immediately. Equally welcome is the proposal to redefine what constitutes an HRB because the current definition is based primarily on building height which is arbitrary and open to abuse.
While continued legislative change and regulatory reform is clearly required, BESA and its members are increasingly concerned that there should be no loss in momentum on progress already being made under the Act, specifically around the need for everyone involved in construction to provide evidence of their competence and compliance.
We have also urged the new Labour government to use the publication of the report as an opportunity to explain how it plans to invest in the necessary resources to improve enforcement of existing legislation and in reforming the country’s under-resourced planning system. We have hundreds of building inspectors on the brink of retirement, for example.
And what about the proposed new construction product safety rules? There has been little progress on this, a fact that was highlighted in the report. The manufacturing sector also knows what to do and most of the individual companies we speak to are more than willing to provide evidence of their quality and safety – so why is that not yet enshrined in law?
The inquiry panel have done an amazing job and their diligence and attention to detail will prove increasingly vital in the years ahead. The BESA team was inspired by the comments of one panel member, the architect Thouria Istephan, who called for a greater commitment to the development of professional skills:
“If we are not professionally curious, we will not become technically competent,” she told the report launch. That sums up rather nicely the argument against any who would seek to lean on ignorance as any sort of mitigation.
“Our recommendations place new burdens and responsibilities on people and organisations. I make no apologies for that,” she added. “Put simply, if you work in the construction industry and you do not feel the weight of the responsibility you have for keeping people safe, you are in the wrong job.”
She also added that, while the Act was welcome, it did not go far enough.
“The change we need to bring about is partly about structures and regulations…but [it] is also one of culture and behaviour. Change on this scale needs to be owned and led by those of us working in the sector. It is not enough to pass an Act of Parliament and to sit back and think the work is done,” she added.
Perfectly put. The Act is just the jumping off point, and we are reinforcing its message to our members, but the key point we take from the whole exercise is that we really must get on with the process of change ourselves. We are not waiting to be told, in fact the Regulator has already warned companies not to expect to have their hands held through this process.
To that end, the BESA ‘Play it Safe’ interactive guide seeks to help everyone identify their roles and responsibilities under the Building Safety Act and their duty of care to all building residents.
We have also produced a summary of the main proposals and implications of the Grenfell Report which is available for free here – and there is further information about competence and compliance on our BESA Building Safety Act Hub.
BESA is committed to this and to providing a suitable legacy for the victims of the Grenfell fire. We have already suspended companies from membership who failed to meet their technical and professional obligations and we will not hesitate to do so again.
Some smaller contractors may be finding the scale of this overwhelming but in fact its simply a case of doing your job as well as possible, but that does mean fully understanding what is involved. Be competent, prove your competence, and ensure everyone who works for you is also competent – then make sure all your work is compliant and you have the evidence to prove it.
If everyone takes accountability for their own actions and calls out others’ bad behaviours that’s how change happens – and why shouldn’t that change come from the bottom up? We cannot carry on waiting for this to be pushed down from the top, and we already know what to do, we need to be brave and just make it happen.
The BESA Building Safety Act Advisory Group will be holding an open debate during the Association’s National Conference to debate the latest developments and answer questions about how to comply with the law, provide evidence of competence, and meet our social, moral, and professional obligations.