Kensington & Chelsea Tenant Management Organisation Evidence - Monday 10th May 2021 (1/2)

Full transcript

00:00:21 [Applause] good morning everyone welcome to today's hearing today we're going to hear evidence from another former member of the tmo staff yes mr kenya sir good morning a mayor

00:00:33 yes mr kenya sir good morning a mayor called sasha jevons thank you

00:00:50 mr germans i understand good morning i understand you're willing to take the make the affirmation so the words are on the screen in front of you would you like to read them out please thank you i do solemnly sincerely and

00:01:01 thank you i do solemnly sincerely and truly declare and affirm that the evidence i shall give shall be the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth thank you very much sit down and make yourself comfortable

00:01:24 right good thank you yes mr thanks sir um

00:01:27 um first of all would you mind confirming your name for the record yes sasha jobbins

00:01:31 jobbins good morning mr evans first of all thank you very much for attending to give evidence today it's much appreciated um if during the course of my questioning you don't understand the question

00:01:41 question or it's unclear please don't hesitate to say so and i'll either repeat the question

00:01:45 question or rephrase it also if at any time during examination you require a break please don't hesitate to say so now you've prepared a number of statements for the inquiry but the one

00:01:57 statements for the inquiry but the one i'd like you to look at today is that dated the 8th of february 2019 and can be found at

00:02:07 three tm00893 i'm sorry to interrupt you at such an early stage but i have to say that

00:02:11 that my scrolling transcript is not scrolling i don't think my colleagues are either i don't know whether others in room mine is yours is working

00:02:22 working especially yours is working yeah um

00:02:27 i don't know how long this might take to sort out but do you want to have it working before you go on

00:02:34 you go on we could manage the time being yeah early can you manage for the time being without it yeah thank you um i think we all feel that we can manage without it for the time being but obviously we'd

00:02:46 for the time being but obviously we'd like to have it um sorted out as soon as you can

00:02:49 you can thanks sir right i'm sorry to uh no thank you break into your questions um first of all mr germans have you read that steve statement recently yes i have and can you confirm that it's contrary to true

00:03:00 contrary to true yes i can um have you discussed your statement or evidence with anyone before coming here today no i haven't and for the avoidance of doubt all the exhibits that statement are taken into the record now the first

00:03:12 are taken into the record now the first topics i'd like to discuss with you today your qualifications and training now at paragraph six of your witness statement

00:03:20 statement which can be found there on the screen you say that you've worked in housing management for 25 years following your degree

00:03:27 degree which was in housing management now before joining the tmo did you receive any particular training in relation to fire safety at all no i didn't know any anything specific

00:03:39 no i didn't know any anything specific in relation to fire safety and high-rise buildings can you remember no did you receive any training about cladding on high-rise buildings and the risks that flow from that no were you aware of the risks

00:03:53 no were you aware of the risks of uh applying cladding to high-rise buildings um no not not the technical aspects no before joining the tmo did you have any training on health and safety risk management at all

00:04:05 management at all um from my recollection i had probably some high level strategic sort of training in health and safety but nothing ever specific on fire

00:04:17 safety but nothing ever specific on fire safety training and after you joined the tmo did you have any first of all health and safety risk management training um i recall one set of training which was delivered after

00:04:28 was delivered after we had a consultant that got that did a review of our health and safety arrangements matt hudson and we had some training then and that was very much about direct level training on your roles and responsibilities on the broadest sense

00:04:41 responsibilities on the broadest sense of health and safety um from from my recollection and can i take it from that that it didn't cover the specifics of fire safety or fire safety management not for my recollection though now just

00:04:53 not for my recollection though now just picking up your reference there to mr hodgson if we just look for the completeness of paragraph 77 of your witness statement which is at page 15.

00:05:09 which is at page 15. if we there you go the final sentence i recall receiving training on matters such as safety leadership from an external consultant called mr hodgson can you remember now when that training took place

00:05:21 um i can't say exactly but i think it could have been around 2013. and did it come after the report he prepared for the tmo yes it did yeah

00:05:33 and apart from the training that flowed from mr hodgson's report did you receive any other health and safety training um no not not that i'm aware of not at the tmo

00:05:44 the tmo no now the second matter i'd like to uh discuss with you today is your role and responsibilities whilst at the tmo now you state that directorial responsibility for health and safety lay

00:05:56 responsibility for health and safety lay initially with anthony parks and then barbara matthews when she succeeded him can you help us with what aspects of your job required health and safety oversight

00:06:05 oversight yes i think i mean i had a operations role so

00:06:08 role so that was quite generic and i had a broad area of responsibility across a number of teams at the tmo and so

00:06:15 so my responsibility was to make sure that those operational teams understood their health and safety responsibilities and also the contractors that we worked with that they

00:06:26 with that they absolutely complied with legislation on behalf of the tmo as well as our consultants so it was a sort of over overview over a broad overview role thank you mr german now can we look at

00:06:38 thank you mr german now can we look at the tmo's health and safety policy from february 2012 which can be found at

00:06:47 zero tm010024402

00:06:52 and there we go the date uh so i should say february 2016 there and if we look at paragraph 2.9 on page three

00:07:03 three and we see their 2.9 provides for the responsibility of the operations directorate and it says resident safety in particular in the areas of fire safety gas safety electrical safety legionella prevention and water quality and lift

00:07:15 prevention and water quality and lift safety

00:07:16 safety taking a joint role with health and safety team in relation to certain aspects of health and safety management such as managing asbestos risk and coordinating fire risk assessment actions thirdly

00:07:29 risk assessment actions thirdly coordinating property site visits inspections tours and audits through on-site neighborhood staff and their managers

00:07:34 managers procuring the appropriate contracts in order to establish an effective and compliant plan preventative and maintenance program for all plant and equipment across the tmo portfolio establishing appropriate reporting tools and statistics in order

00:07:46 reporting tools and statistics in order to demonstrate compliance as above monitoring the health and safety performance of the consultants and contractors under the control and ensuring ensuring senior managers attend the tmo's health and safety

00:07:58 attend the tmo's health and safety committee where health and safety compliance across the company is reported discussed and monitored that's the final one now that list set out at 2.9 would suggest a significant operational

00:08:09 suggest a significant operational involvement in health and safety matters would you agree with that yes i would and in particular regarding resident fire safety um i think yes it's certainly in terms of the operational aspects and

00:08:21 of the operational aspects and the delivery of the work by contractors and the actions that come out of the fire risk assessments was uh responsibility of the operations directorate and that broad and significant uh oversight would require significant

00:08:32 uh oversight would require significant competent management from the operational side would you agree yes and significant competent oversight from you in particular yes now could we go back to your witness statement and paragraph

00:08:44 statement and paragraph 20. so that's at tm00893 page four

00:08:54 page four and the paragraph 20 there you list the four

00:08:57 four uh directorates that reported to you starting with the top neighborhood management now that was led by theresa brown is that right yes that's right secondly the customer service center

00:09:08 service center that was led by olivia hutchinson who reported to theresa brown is that correct

00:09:12 correct yes correct thirdly supported housing which was led by shamshoon is that right yes that's right and finally asset management and regeneration led by you can't remember

00:09:23 regeneration led by you can't remember the first

00:09:23 the first interim position but then later by simon throp

00:09:27 throp then mark anderson and finally by peter madison is that right yes that's correct now in terms of line management is it right that you were the direct line manager for teresa brown and mark anderson who's

00:09:38 teresa brown and mark anderson who's then succeeded by peter madison yes that's great now can you help us with responsive repairs who within the tmo had operational responsibility for responsive repairs the operational

00:09:50 for responsive repairs the operational responsibility for repairs direct which was a separate company set up was um there were a number of different directors but uh latterly graham webb

00:10:02 directors but uh latterly graham webb now is it right that the managing director of repairs direct the tmo subsidiary reported to you and i think the way that we uh structured the organization

00:10:13 the organization was that he had a sort of dotted line management to myself but actually the responsibility was to the repairs direct board

00:10:20 board and on the repairs direct board sat a number of directors myself barbara matthews graham webb himself an independent member and a resident member so it was a board collective

00:10:31 member so it was a board collective responsibility to oversee repairs direct as a company and you sat as a director on that board from 2013 onwards that's right yes now as the direct as the executive director responsible

00:10:42 as the executive director responsible for neighborhood management what responsibility did you hold for the fire safety aspects of neighborhood management i would say on the neighborhood management i had over responsibility

00:10:53 management i had over responsibility through teresa brown around the aspects of

00:10:58 of the state services assistance i think they were a key part of um fire safety and also the housing management and the housing offices the teams within the housing management

00:11:09 the teams within the housing management directorate around that sort of support and tenancy management function thank you and were you the director responsible for meeting the the needs and safety of vulnerable residents whether under the supported housing

00:11:20 whether under the supported housing scheme run by or under general housing led by teresa brown overall they sat within my responsibility yes and as the executive director responsible for assets and regeneration

00:11:32 responsible for assets and regeneration did you have responsibility for ensuring that those assets had appropriate fire safety measures in place um i i would say yes i had a very experienced director peter madison

00:11:43 director peter madison um who was uh delegated a lot of that responsibility but overall yes and did you have budgetary responsibility um for ensuring that assets had appropriate and effective fire safety

00:11:54 appropriate and effective fire safety measures in place we had uh budgets that were set by the council they were delegated to the tmo and it was our responsibility to work within those budgets um if if we needed more money then that

00:12:05 um if if we needed more money then that would be a discussion back with the council it wasn't as such a tmo budget it's a delegated budget from the council now can we just look at a practical example

00:12:16 example of a fire safety measure and in particular the self-closing devices on flat entrance doors if a resident called the customer

00:12:27 if a resident called the customer service center to report a broken self-closer for example the call to the customer service centre would come under your area of responsibility is that right through teresa brown in the housing management directorate yes

00:12:39 the housing management directorate yes now a reactive repair to a self-closing device would then be requested through for example repairs direct yes that's right yeah now who within the tmo would be responsible for ensuring that the

00:12:51 responsible for ensuring that the reactive repair had been carried out satisfactorily and in good time the reactive repairs were all the responsibility repairs direct and they had specific monitoring in place to um

00:13:03 place to um to provide oversight on the quality checking of all repairs but what i would say is that that organization was structured to do a percentage of checking so it wouldn't be a hundred percent um

00:13:14 so it wouldn't be a hundred percent um most

00:13:15 most organizations in the sector recognize that that requires resources so it was around

00:13:20 around 10 to 20 that we post inspected on repairs and that was sort of considered the general normal way to to to manage post inspection of repairs and at any time did the boards fix

00:13:34 and at any time did the boards fix a specific percentage of repairs that had to be

00:13:37 had to be uh inspected for this sampling exercise at 10 or 20 it was around 10 to 20 yes from recollection that was what was uh one of the key performance indicators but no percentage was ever fixed by the board

00:13:49 percentage was ever fixed by the board i think it was i think it was around 10 to 20 percent from my recollection yes so not a specific figure more of a range it's a percentage of the total number of repairs undertaken

00:14:00 repairs undertaken yeah now at repairsdirect who had specific responsibility for ensuring that repairs were carried out was it did it lie with the managing director ultimately yes mansion director yes

00:14:13 um would that mean given your role on the board and your executive function would it mean that ultimately that you were responsible for ensuring that systems were in place at repairs direct to ensure that repairs were carried out

00:14:24 to ensure that repairs were carried out satisfactorily and in good time i think i would say that the board was responsible the collective members of that company board and we received reporting information to help us with

00:14:36 reporting information to help us with our oversight of the performance of the company

00:14:39 company and would the same answer be given to the question as to who was responsible for monitoring performance of the systems to ensure that repairs were carried out at satisfaction yes i would say so yes okay now can we now turn to the tmo's

00:14:52 okay now can we now turn to the tmo's health and safety policy and particularly that date of february 2016

00:14:57 2016 which we looked at earlier that's back at tmo10024402

00:15:05 if we go back to the front page

00:15:18 thank you first of all do you recognize this document mr evans yes i do yes and um if we can go back to paragraph 2.9 on page three and the

00:15:31 paragraph 2.9 on page three and the various aspects of the responsibility of the operations directorate and we see in the second bullet point at the end

00:15:37 the end the final phrase and coordinating fire risk assessment actions now if i can ask you to keep that phrase in mind and compare and contrast the list of

00:15:48 and compare and contrast the list of responsibilities in an earlier edition of the policy from december 2012 now that 2012 policy can be found at tmo one double zero three one zero double

00:15:59 one double zero three one zero double seven

00:16:04 there you go you see the date in the bottom left hand corner and if i could ask us to go to page three

00:16:12 and you see in the bottom half of the page the operations director's responsibility is set out at para 2.8 and you'll see in the second bullet point

00:16:21 point at the end it deals only with asbestos but the later version has the words and coordinating fire risk assessments included

00:16:32 included can you help us as to what the reason was for the addition of responsibility for coordinating fire risk assessments in the 2016 version

00:16:44 sorry i can't i can't recall any discussion around that um i think what i would say is that that clearly there was a lot of work done on at the health and safety committee on

00:16:55 at the health and safety committee on fire risk management and the actions and so it's possible that over time between 2012 and 2016 we developed as an organization and uh we're really focusing on that um

00:17:08 and uh we're really focusing on that um as you as you would have seen from the uh committee minutes and focus and so it's possible that that was felt that it should be identified as more as a priority in in

00:17:19 identified as more as a priority in in the 16 document and was missed in the 12 document and so certainly from 2016 onward would you agree that the operations directorate played a key role in ensuring fra

00:17:31 played a key role in ensuring fra actions were implemented yeah absolutely yes

00:17:34 yes now could i follow on onto that topic which is fire safety management and the implementation of fra actions in more detail now um you were responsible for ensuring

00:17:47 um you were responsible for ensuring that fra actions allocated to operation directorate were carried out in accordance with the time scales set by the fire risk assessor is that a fair and accurate summary i i think i think that is that summarises um

00:18:00 think i think that is that summarises um got that i'm sorry i had a broad role so obviously i had a number of teams but but yes through those teams we would be responsible for undertaking the

00:18:11 responsible for undertaking the completion of the fra actions yes and if we could look at the next level down in your directorate was mr madison responsible for fra actions allocated to assets and regeneration

00:18:22 regeneration yes that's right and within that department ascertain regeneration contract management would be the responsibility of alex bosman that's right yeah and uh in the a r

00:18:33 that's right yeah and uh in the a r project department the responsibility would lie with david gibson is that right um david gibson's capital programme so anything

00:18:42 anything relating to fra actions on capital works is david gibson and were any fra actions allocated to your housing department yes there were responsive repairs who

00:18:54 yes there were responsive repairs who was responsible for ensuring fra actions allocated to responsive repairs were carried out that was uh the managing director graham webb thank you

00:19:02 thank you now what processes did you have in place to ensure that fra actions were completed

00:19:07 completed satisfactorily and in good time so we had

00:19:12 had a health and safety committee a corporate health and safety committee and at that committee we had monitoring reports that set out the numbers of outstanding fra actions in priority

00:19:23 outstanding fra actions in priority and laterally in in age age profile so at that committee we'd regularly review

00:19:31 review our our performance and then obviously we within the individual teams they'd have a whole mechanism of much more detailed management reports and informations that flew

00:19:42 and informations that flew flowed through the w-2 system which was our i.t system that tracked every action that came out of an fra

00:19:50 of an fra into an individual team so team level and individual level they would have the detailed action and then at management level

00:19:58 level at the committee we would have the management reporting and so given that i had quite a broad broad role across a number of teams it would be at that committee that i really had oversight of

00:20:10 really had oversight of how to track these actions and we had i believe over 400 blocks with fras that generates hundreds at times thousands of actions so it was

00:20:23 at times thousands of actions so it was it was it was the through those mechanisms and management reporting and were you consistently satisfied with the robustness of those arrangements for for tracking fra actions um i think that we were on a journey

00:20:34 we were on a journey over a number of years at the tmo and um i think that started around 2013 from recollection 2012-13 and i think um we understood that we

00:20:46 and i think um we understood that we needed to make improvements and we were constantly trying to do that and so i had confidence in all the teams working really hard to try and make

00:20:57 working really hard to try and make those improvements but housing management does require that continuous continuous effort and work actually and something like this with high volumes of of actions coming into a system

00:21:09 of actions coming into a system with large numbers of staff there will be points of you know points where it can it needs improvement so um that that was what that was what we were doing over a number of years we'll come on to the detail of that as

00:21:22 we'll come on to the detail of that as it developed from 2012 onwards but would you accept that the fact of an outstanding action um could itself mean risk to a particular resident whom it affected i i do accept that and i think that's

00:21:34 i i do accept that and i think that's why we wanted to make sure we understood the priority of the extraction um and really focus on high priority that would have a significant risk and if yeah so you focused on high

00:21:46 and if yeah so you focused on high priority

00:21:47 priority i think you have to make judgments and some and and the focus on on a high priority is to make sure that you uh mitigate any any actions there and how were high priority

00:21:59 were high priority actions identified did you for example rely solely upon the advice fire risk assessor or did you take your own separate view of what constituted a high priority i think we um we took the advice of the fire risk

00:22:11 um we took the advice of the fire risk assessor in all circumstances yes i think so i think we we saw him as the qualified person to make a judgment on on on what was a priority would you feel yourself sufficiently experienced or

00:22:23 yourself sufficiently experienced or competent

00:22:24 competent to second second-guess the the view of the fire risk assessor in relation to a priority

00:22:29 priority but certainly not myself i didn't have those technical expertise and i would be expecting to get that advice absolutely from the fire risk assessor and would fire safety issues and a particular fra actions be

00:22:40 and a particular fra actions be discussed at executive team meetings uh i think i think we did have conversations about the progress of fras at particular et meetings yeah now if we can start consideration of

00:22:52 now if we can start consideration of those minutes from april 2012 and if i could ask us to go to

00:23:00 tm00899801

00:23:05 and here we see from the top an executive team meeting on the 2nd of april 2012 you're the second attendee identified at the top

00:23:13 the top together with robert black anthony parks and lornette pemberton and could we go to page five in particular item six now that says this and i invite you to

00:23:26 now that says this and i invite you to read it and the notes accident and incident reports from the meeting the 26th of january were noted problems with completing action from fire risk assessments to be resolved because of our liability if an action

00:23:37 because of our liability if an action had not been completed in the event of a fire

00:23:40 fire because of the current pressures on the morrison contract it was proposed that we get someone in to package the outstanding work and find someone to carry out the work who could be the same contractor who'd carried out the fire risk assessments

00:23:51 carried out the fire risk assessments costs could be covered by the repairs budget janus ray would monitor progress and sasha jevons would check current position on outstanding work with andy marshall now it's plain from

00:24:02 with andy marshall now it's plain from this minute would you agree that the tmo faced problems with fra actions in 2012 um i think this is from my recollection

00:24:13 um i think this is from my recollection this refers to a time with the morrison contract um sorry are these minutes 2012 yes april 2nd of april 2012. so um

00:24:26 2nd of april 2012. so um we had a failing contractor and we'd had a number of years of failing contractors connell and then morrison and this led into how we came about to set up repairs

00:24:37 into how we came about to set up repairs direct

00:24:38 direct and so a failing contractor morrison was in a 10-year contract so to deal with that failure uh is quite a complex process in terms of getting

00:24:49 a complex process in terms of getting out of the contract it takes a number of months

00:24:51 months and we went through that process so therefore

00:24:54 therefore during those months when a contractor knows that they're coming to the end or they won't have that com that 10-year commitment they their failure rate starts to increase and this relates to that

00:25:07 and this relates to that almost effectively a backlog of actions from that contract as we came out of one and went into the setup of repairs direct you have that period where it's really difficult to manage and i think this

00:25:18 difficult to manage and i think this relates to a build-up of work and our response here is to say that we're going to get someone in to package it up and clear that clear that work so there's a backlog in april 2012 of fras which you say was

00:25:31 april 2012 of fras which you say was attributable um to issues arising under the morrison's contract is that a fair summary yes i think so yes now can you help us with what in brief form

00:25:40 form what this scope of the morrison contract was the morrison contract was the responsive repairs service so it's the same service that repairs direct covered so responsive repairs and voids works

00:25:51 repairs and voids works so the backlog related to responsive repairs

00:25:55 repairs into in april 2012 yes now um it's clear that uh from this minute that

00:26:01 that in april 2012 the executive team were aware of a potential liability um if an action had not been completed can you remember what particular liability you were most

00:26:12 what particular liability you were most concerned about

00:26:16 i i can't recall um i i can go by this minute

00:26:20 minute and i think i think what was saying here is uh

00:26:24 is uh it's it's the number of it's the number and the need to to get them all closed and completed that is the issue that we're expressing here

00:26:31 here and i think the response in terms of mitigating that risk is that we're going to get an additional resource in to package that up and and

00:26:42 resource in to package that up and and get through this backlog as quickly as possible on the back of this minute there's no indication that the work to remedy the backlog would be carried out on a priority basis

00:26:53 would be carried out on a priority basis would you accept that as a first reading of this minute i don't think that's minuted but i think there would be an assumption that we would absolutely be trying to prioritize every single action that comes out of the fire risk assessment okay another

00:27:05 the fire risk assessment okay another an unspoken priority yes absolutely and i think that was understood across the organization and repairs direct we really we really knew that we had to work hard on this and we're talking about high volumes in

00:27:17 and we're talking about high volumes in repairs direct you know nearly 30 000 repairs a year a part of that being the fras so it's it's a it's a constant flow of high volume uh work

00:27:29 flow of high volume uh work do you remember articulating at the time any concern that outstanding fra actions uh may raise the risk to particular residents who are affected by that

00:27:40 residents who are affected by that outstanding action i can't recall specific discussions um at that time do you recall anyone raising that concern about the heightened risk potentially to

00:27:51 about the heightened risk potentially to residents affected by the outstanding actions

00:27:53 actions um not in the way you put it but i think that we were trying really hard to make sure that we we closed the actions as quickly as possible

00:28:02 possible would it be fair to say that that too was an unspoken concern yes i would say so yeah

00:28:07 so yeah um with whom did andy marshall work at this time

00:28:10 this time andy marshall was um this is before repairs right so he he would have reported into myself okay and he was he later became the md of repairs director that's right

00:28:21 of repairs director that's right yes yeah at this time so april 2012 was he an employee of the tmo yes that's right yeah now the next document i'd like to take you to is the executive team minutes dated march

00:28:32 executive team minutes dated march 2013 and they can be found at tm01203105

00:28:40 and if i can ask you to go to page there you go just so you can familiarize yourself

00:28:43 yourself if we go to page five the very bottom

00:28:48 there we go we see performance and if we could turn over the page to item to the very top of page six

00:28:57 six we see there under the heading health and safety fire risk assessments it says this

00:29:02 this um health and safety audit was due and fire risk assessments were a risk there was a meeting on the 7th of march

00:29:09 march which would be attended by anthony parks janet sherray and peter madison with sasha jevons when these issues would be discussed peter madison had put john bora in charge of any action from fire risk assessments part of the problem was the

00:29:20 part of the problem was the non-performance of the contractor rg in carrying out the inspect and carry out inspections ricky sam's had overall responsibility for the contract and janice ray had been picking up any failures with them

00:29:32 picking up any failures with them previously when mark anderson raised performance concerns with them there was a short-lived improvement it was agreed that we would aim to carry out any outstanding fire risk assessment action before the audit and then sought out accountability

00:29:44 and then sought out accountability ownership of the work a way forward was to consider what action we could take under the terms of the contract now this minute is uh 11 months or so

00:29:56 now this minute is uh 11 months or so after the previous one we've discussed now the reference to the audit was the forthcoming health and safety audit to be carried out by rbkc is that correct it could be yes yeah i

00:30:07 is that correct it could be yes yeah i think so

00:30:09 think so and it appears would you agree that there was a concern on the executive team

00:30:12 team that the audit might identify outstanding fra actions is that correct

00:30:19 um from from what this minute says um i think it's identifying that uh any any fire risk uh actions outstanding

00:30:30 outstanding is a risk and that we should be trying to complete them as soon as possible and i think i think that was always the focus here and the apparent intention was to clear the backlog and then decide who's going to do the work is that a first summary from what is

00:30:42 is that a first summary from what is said there yeah i think so but where you see the

00:30:45 see the bullet point three accountability ownership i think that is referring to the problems with rg and um the debate between the client contractor role

00:30:58 between the client contractor role so i think that's what that refers to there now

00:31:02 there now the audit by rbkc is mentioned again at an executive team meeting on the 20th of march 2013 um so roughly um a few weeks after this now the minutes are at tmo double zero

00:31:14 now the minutes are at tmo double zero nine

00:31:15 nine double zero five six four

00:31:29 thank you your third on the list of attendees

00:31:34 attendees if i could ask to go to page four which concerns fire risk assessments and under the heading roughly halfway down the page it says a briefing was

00:31:45 down the page it says a briefing was given on the meeting held with janice ray on the 7th march there had been an incident during the health and safety audit when the auditor had visited a block without a check being made beforehand that the firefighting equipment was compliant these issues had been

00:31:57 compliant these issues had been addressed at the meeting and peter madison would also ensure that his team provided better support to the health and safety team however the auditors had focused on processes rather than this incident in their report

00:32:08 their report a fire risk assessment audit was coming up and although we could show that these assessments had taken place there was some confusion on whether the action had been followed up as there was no clear signing off process a list of 200 actions had been

00:32:21 process a list of 200 actions had been compiled which had been checked with rge to see which ones were still outstanding peter madison thought the people carrying out assessments should be able to order works direct which would then be entered on a system for easier monitoring the language being

00:32:33 for easier monitoring the language being used in the assessments also needs to be clearer

00:32:35 clearer it was proposed that the role of health and safety team be reviewed at a high level

00:32:39 level when anthony parks was present it was suggested that an external health check would help with this process another outstanding issue was asbestos management and safeguarding of staff from residents

00:32:50 from residents following discussion with anthony parks someone would be approached to carry out this review now my first question is it seems that the

00:32:58 the concern there there was some concern that the auditor had been shown a block uh with out-of-date firefighting equipment is that correct could you mind going back to the yes of course

00:33:11 course um sorry i lost a bit of track can i just read

00:33:15 just read yes of course um so your question again was the concern

00:33:28 so your question again was the concern appeared to be that the auditor had been shown a block which had out of date firefighting equipment is that right yes and that the auditor was more concerned with process uh in his report is that a fair reading

00:33:42 uh in his report is that a fair reading of that minute yes for that minute yes and we can also see that a separate fire risk assessment audit was proposed at that stage now can you help us did that audit take place or not

00:33:53 place or not i can't i can't recall that i'm afraid no i'm sorry the reference there to the absence of a clear signing off process can you remember whether that problem was resolved and if so

00:34:04 was resolved and if so how

00:34:09 um i think reading this minute it's referring to uh the signing off process with rge and the contractor and the problems that we're having there i'm not sure it's not i'm not clear

00:34:21 i'm not sure it's not i'm not clear whether that's an organization one or an rge specific uh comment from the minutes and looking at the

00:34:30 the the final paragraph on that page we're looking at at the moment where there's a reference to quotes the external health check can you remember what the the substance of that proposed health check was intended to be

00:34:43 check was intended to be um i'm not sure this this may have led into the matt or the commissioning of the matt hudson report if i've got the dates correct sorry what's the date of this minute this minute is the 20th of march 2013.

00:34:56 this minute is the 20th of march 2013. okay so it may it may have been leading into

00:34:59 into the commission of matt hodgson and i think what we're saying here as the executive team is that if there are problems that we've come across let's uh get an independent person in to

00:35:12 let's uh get an independent person in to really understand what those problems are as an organization so that we know what actions to put right and get some expert

00:35:19 expert independent expert advice on that that's what this minute i believe is saying now before we get to mr hodgson let's fill in a gap and look at the rbkc audit in 2013

00:35:30 at the rbkc audit in 2013 and the final audit report is dated april 2013 and can be found at rbk treble00313 excuse me

00:35:47 now we can see from the front page that you are the third individual on the circulation list

00:35:57 including also janice ray anthony parks and peter

00:36:00 and peter madison um why was it circulated to u4 before mr black and laura johnson

00:36:11 uh i i i don't know i don't know actually um i assume uh uh the content of it for for us to review and that and then

00:36:23 for for us to review and that and then the final version circulated the chief at second laura johnson can you remember why mr madison was included on the circulation list well miss peter madison had a a

00:36:34 well miss peter madison had a a an important role in the fire fire risk actions through his um responsibility as director of assets and regions so i think and it covered a broad area around fire safety so i think that would be why

00:36:47 fire safety so i think that would be why thank you if we can turn to page four and paragraph eleven uh we see there that rbkc gave the tmo limited assurance

00:36:58 limited assurance and and goes on to say as a result of the audit review internal audit can only give limited assurance that adequate controls and processes are in place for health and safety at

00:37:09 are in place for health and safety at the tma and if we can now turn back to page three excuse me in this document paragraph seven

00:37:17 it said this a number of external contractors are used to carry out safety inspections and compliance checks for the

00:37:22 the for the the tm with regard to gas electrical and fire safety these contractors are overseen by the building services team asset and regeneration aspect surveys

00:37:33 asset and regeneration aspect surveys and associated works are overseen by the health and safety team and the repairs manager

00:37:37 manager now your directorate was responsible for overseeing gas electrical and fire safety external contractors that carried out those checks for the tmo is that right through peter madison's contract management team yes

00:37:49 management team yes for which you are ultimately responsible yeah and if we could look over the page at paragraphs nine and ten it says this areas were identified where controls can be improved

00:38:01 controls can be improved three high priority recommendations were made as follows gas inspection records on keystone asset management system should be up to date and regularly reviewed by management to ensure it reflects the most current

00:38:12 to ensure it reflects the most current status for tmo properties the electrical inspection reports on keystone systems should be up to date and accurately reflect the inspections carried out by the electrical contractor and all portable firefighting equipment

00:38:23 and all portable firefighting equipment should be regularly inspected by the appointed contractor and any faulty equipment identified replaced on a prompt basis and then turning to paragraph 10 five medium priority recommendations were

00:38:34 medium priority recommendations were also made

00:38:35 also made as follows first one all high priority remedial work identified as part of the annual health and safety inspection checks

00:38:43 checks should be followed up by the health and safety team to ensure it is undertaken on prompt basis the service agreement the gas advisory service should be reviewed and terminated if it's no longer required

00:38:54 and if we go to the final the fifth one appropriate performance indicators relating to health and safety inspections should be developed by management now is it right to say that those

00:39:06 now is it right to say that those recommendations both high and medium priority warns were primarily for assets and regeneration to consider

00:39:18 yes yes tis yeah i was looking for responsive repairs but no they are mostly

00:39:23 mostly the areas covered by the contract management team thank you now the final medium priority recommendation was for appropriate performance indicators uh to be developed was that done

00:39:36 uh to be developed was that done yes yes it was we had a quite a detailed suite of kpis and they were produced on a monthly basis and they covered the whole organization

00:39:47 and they covered the whole organization and they had specific kpis in the contract management team so it was it was really important that that's where we measured our performance against gas electrical fire safety lifts for example

00:40:00 fire safety lifts for example and most of the m e contracts covered in the contract management team now you said an answer there that uh i quote we had quite a detailed suite of kpis close quotes did you or the health and safety team

00:40:12 did you or the health and safety team consider kpis to measure for example fire safety or fire risk assessment completions at this point i think i think

00:40:20 think that was being measured through the health and safety committee so the the suite of kpis that i've just referred to was a monthly monitoring that went through um senior management team operations

00:40:32 senior management team operations committee and up to executive team and that covered all of our services across tmo including the contract management services i think the fire safety aspects were measured in more detail through the health and

00:40:43 more detail through the health and safety committee and that's where we developed the monitoring on the actions how many outstanding how many partially completed and

00:40:50 and and how many um due now bearing that in mind can we now look at what is said about performance indicators at paragraphs 9.3 and 9.4 which can be found at page

00:41:01 9.3 and 9.4 which can be found at page 21 within this

00:41:04 document 9.3 is at the top says their audit noted that only limited number of health and safety performance indicators are reported

00:41:13 reported and there is an absence of meaningful indicators for areas such as electrical inspections water quality inspection treatment of asbestos 9.4 in the absence of a full range of performance indicators for health and

00:41:24 performance indicators for health and safety specific areas there is a risk that management cannot monitor performance levels for these areas

00:41:30 areas and take appropriate corrective action where poor or inadequate performance levels are identified it then makes provision for a recommendation which is appropriate performance

00:41:41 which is appropriate performance indicators relating to health and safety inspection should be developed by management this ensures that inspections can be monitored and any performance issues identified for appropriate corrective action to be taken where performance does not meet

00:41:52 does not meet expectations then the management response is set out below quotes the annual report summarizes all health and safety activity in the preceding 12 months however it had been acknowledged that it

00:42:03 however it had been acknowledged that it would be beneficial for the tma to supplement this with meaningful health and safety key performance indicators which could be monitored regularly throughout the year a range of such indicators have now been identified

00:42:15 indicators have now been identified covering a range of areas including health and safety inspections fire risk assessments reviews enforcement deficiency notices received number of accidents fires violent incidents percentage asbestos surgery

00:42:27 incidents percentage asbestos surgery surveys completed percentage legionella risk assessments outstanding over two years old

00:42:31 years old percentage compliance on maintenance of fire equipment wet and dry rises fire extinguishers fire alarm sprinklers etc now bearing in mind

00:42:39 mind the detail of that response um who prepared

00:42:43 prepared the substance of that response um i certainly think a vast amount of that is was prepared by the health and safety team janice ray in preparation for the health

00:42:54 janice ray in preparation for the health and safety committee and some elements were part of the contract management team and our broader kpi reporting mechanism that i have just referred to in terms of our suite of kpis did you yourself contribute to

00:43:07 of kpis did you yourself contribute to that management response um i can't recall a specifically i'm afraid were you aware at this time that kpis had been identified

00:43:19 this time that kpis had been identified and recommended for health and safety inspections yes i think so and actually i was i was really keen to make sure the organization had kpis across all of the teams and specifically here and i think

00:43:31 teams and specifically here and i think the executive team were really concerned when they got this limited assurance report and i certainly was and i think there was

00:43:38 there was a lot of work that went into trying to develop

00:43:41 develop kpis and and i would say that it wasn't something you can just do overnight you know you you can't you've first of all particularly in the contract management team there was an awful lot of work that we

00:43:52 there was an awful lot of work that we had to do on developing the keystone database

00:43:55 database first before you can generate the data that comes out of it to then generate the management reports to make sure that you're on top of things

00:44:04 things so this is a this is a process and we we had a lot of work to do with keystone which was the asset management database so this management response did did reflect how concerned we were and

00:44:17 did reflect how concerned we were and what we needed to do but it was a significant piece of work and i think mr man and his team took some time to work their way through that now bearing in mind uh the detail of

00:44:29 now bearing in mind uh the detail of that answer were you aware that a suite of performance indicators which included fire safety were not introduced by the tmo until january 2016 so some three years after the date of

00:44:40 so some three years after the date of this audit i can't recall the specific date but there were some elements of this that were

00:44:49 that were being reported sooner than that i believe from recollection um and as i said i do think it it was a journey

00:44:58 journey it was difficult we had we had contractors that were underperforming that we needed to reprocure now that process when you try to get rid of an underperforming

00:45:10 try to get rid of an underperforming contractor that can take six months then you need to go into procurement which takes six months

00:45:15 months and then you need to mobilize a new a new contract so that's i'm sorry to interrupt

00:45:22 but what we have here is a situation in which you have said that management the executive team were concerned about the limited assurance rating you've accepted

00:45:33 assurance rating you've accepted that the existence of an outstanding fra action

00:45:36 action raises a risk for the individual resident who's affected by that outstanding action three years was far too long in order to ensure

00:45:45 ensure that fire safety formed part of the kpis wasn't it

00:45:49 wasn't it i i don't i don't think that we weren't reporting um during that three years i think there were elements that we were reporting and we were building up to it and we were all

00:46:00 building up to it and we were all concerned

00:46:01 concerned and that's what we were working towards trying to get the systems in place to make sure we manage that and where we where we identified high risk we were trying to put in place interim mitigating measures well we'll

00:46:13 interim mitigating measures well we'll come on to those measures iran and see what happened during the course of this three years

00:46:19 years but can we look at the follow-up to the audit

00:46:22 audit that was carried out in december 2013 and if we can go to rbk trouble zero double zero three two zero

00:46:36 and there we go that's the the front page

00:46:40 page initially circulated to peter's madison janice ray and alex bosman and then finally circulated also to you and anthony parks

00:46:50 was it first circulated to mr madison and mr bosman because the earlier recommendations were to be carried out by

00:46:57 by uh asset and regeneration i i can't recall but i assume so

00:47:06 now if we turn over to the second page we can see that

00:47:15 matters have now progressed and that in paragraph five the council was able to provide a satisfactory assurance

00:47:25 assurance which is defined as whilst there is basically sound system there are some weaknesses and or emissions which put some of the system unit processes etc objective at risk now can we look at what action is stated to have taken

00:47:36 at what action is stated to have taken place with respect to the kpis we've just looked at and that discussion can be found at page nine

00:47:43 nine in particular item 8.14 in the table and we see there the recommendation appropriate performance indicators set out reading left to right agreed

00:47:55 set out reading left to right agreed action

00:47:58 action a range of kpis which will be monitored regularly

00:48:01 regularly implementation date september 2013 so some three months previously and the action has implemented and if we just look

00:48:12 implemented and if we just look at what has been implemented we can see in the far right column gas safety inspections water quality risk assessments water quality inspection servicing

00:48:19 servicing domestic electrical testing and fire protection and we gave the page equipment

00:48:24 equipment checks and says kpis are reported at both the health and safety operational committee meetings the most recent report that went to the october 2013 meeting was provided as evidence of this

00:48:36 meeting was provided as evidence of this protocol now

00:48:40 that list of action that does not include health and safety inspections does it has been subject to a kpi when you say health and safety inspector if you go back to well health institute

00:48:52 if you go back to well health institute i can take you back to the april audit which identified health and safety expect inspections as being recommended as the subject of a kpi now if we go turn over the page back to page nine

00:49:04 turn over the page back to page nine can you see health and safety inspections identified there as being the subject of a kpi um i think i'm not i'm not sure about the

00:49:12 the um the minute here or the other the drafting here because health and safety inspection feels like a broad uh kpi i'm not i think you

00:49:22 think you need to narrow that down to either an estate services inspection which is undertaken by caretakers or a fire risk assessment well let's narrow it down to fight sorry for let's narrow down that yeah let's narrow it down to fire

00:49:34 that yeah let's narrow it down to fire risk assessments and reviews which was recommended in april 2013 that is not identified there is it is an action taken

00:49:45 action taken so you have the fire risk assessment program

00:49:48 program you have the actions generated out of it and you have premises risk assessments carried out by the health and safety team and you also have

00:49:55 have health and safety inspections by these state services caretaking teams there's four areas there um that i think you could broadly group under health and safety

00:50:06 group under health and safety inspections my question was a simple one mr evans would you agree that fire risk assessments reviews are not identified in that list of actions that have been

00:50:17 in that list of actions that have been taken in response to the april 2013 audits recommendations not in that list there no i think the one

00:50:23 one relating to it is um the fire protection equipment yeah why but fire risk assessment is broader than simply fire protection equipment it is

00:50:35 simply fire protection equipment it is but i don't think it's been specific in the recommendation you see that's that's that's how i'm seeing this that because it's relating to health and safety inspections in the um narrative in in the

00:50:48 in the um narrative in in the recommendation column of 8.14 that really should be more specific to what we mean by that and so what you could say is that the implementation and the evidence provided

00:50:59 implementation and the evidence provided there are elements of health and safety in there

00:51:02 in there so um gas safety is an element of that fire protection is an element of that um i think i think i think the recommendation would need to

00:51:13 i think the recommendation would need to be more specific but i recognize that fire risk

00:51:16 fire risk assessment program is not listed in that implementation column quite and fire risk assessment reviews were identified specifically as the management in the management response

00:51:28 management in the management response to the april 2013 audit that should have been subject of a kpi and it's not referred to there is it would you like to go back to the april 2013 order which set out the match yes

00:51:40 2013 order which set out the match yes yeah let's go back to that which can be found at

00:51:43 found at rbk trouble zero double zero 313 and page 21

00:51:55 and i don't know whether the document manager will allow us to have the management response on one screen

00:52:04 screen and the

00:52:08 december audit response [Applause] on another page that we've just been looking at the rbk zero double zero three one three anyway

00:52:22 three anyway you'll see that read through yeah rain there we go thank you yeah um a range of such indicators now being identified carrying a range of areas including health and safety inspections

00:52:34 including health and safety inspections now let's just take it through one by one are health and safety inspections yes or no

00:52:39 yes or no identified in the implemented actions in the document on the right hand side no they're not but what i would say is that this area is is in relation to um the health and

00:52:50 is in relation to um the health and safety team specifically not not the not necessarily the operations directorate yes but the response on the right-hand side is not limited to the operations directorate it's in

00:53:01 to the operations directorate it's in relation to the tmo generally yes i understand that yes fire risk assessments and reviews are they mentioned in the document on the right-hand side

00:53:12 in the document on the right-hand side yes or no no enforcement deficiency notices received are they referred to yes or no no fires the number of fires are they refer to

00:53:23 are they refer to yes or no no percentage compliance on maintenance of fire equipment specifically is that mentioned or would you say it's caught by the final bullet point i think that's caught by the final

00:53:35 i think that's caught by the final bullet point yes now can you give the panel an explanation as to why enforcement deficiency notice were not identified as the subject of a specific kpi

00:53:46 specific kpi i can't and what i would say is that this is the area of responsibility of anthony parks at the time who managed janus ray and it was his responsibility to um to cover health and safety and so this

00:53:59 to cover health and safety and so this would have been his area of responsibility in terms of the management response to the audit but bearing in mind your executive responsibility and given the limited assurance rating related to

00:54:10 the limited assurance rating related to a number of activities that were subject for your directorate wouldn't you've had a concern to ensure that the implementation of remedial action covered everything that

00:54:21 remedial action covered everything that needs to be covered yes and i understand that and i did take my executive role responsibly and i was focusing on the works of the contract management team that were in my directorate

00:54:33 that were in my directorate and that covers those elements in the bullet points in the implementation and actually the bits that you're reading out around the health and safety inspections the fra reviews and the enforcement deficiency

00:54:44 reviews and the enforcement deficiency notices was the responsibility of anthony parks and he would have inputted into that now can we look at a report prepared by mr parks following the april order that's dated the 25th of july 2013

00:54:56 dated the 25th of july 2013 and that can be found at tmo double zero 873

00:55:04 392.

00:55:09 and if we look at paragraphs 2.2 and 2.3 in march april i'll be casey undertook an internal audit assignment with the brief to assess and evaluate the controls in the tmo management of health and safety

00:55:20 and safety at 2.3 the audit provided limited assurance and medium risk the main areas of risk would consider to be the delay in putting information onto keystone and the management of the contractors the service objectives guidance

00:55:31 the service objectives guidance procedures compliance with corporate health and safety guidelines and routine inspections were all found to be satisfactory now the issues flagged up by mr parks were said to be performance issues would you agree with that

00:55:44 sorry which paragraph is that paragraph 2.3 yep do you agree that the issues flagged up by mr parks were performance issues

00:55:59 i think i think what what he's saying here is the um information onto the keystone asset management system and the management of contractors performance issues um well

00:56:11 performance issues um well they're all performance issues yeah and they they are they are all the elements that we knew about and that we were working hard to to address yes now let's turn over the page to paragraph 3.2

00:56:25 and if we can expand that a health and safety consultant matt hodgson has been appointed to carry a review of health and safety within the organization using an industry standard hsg65 audit this audit methodology breaks down the

00:56:37 this audit methodology breaks down the health and safety management to five categories policy organizing planning and implementing measuring performance audit and reviewing performance the initial report on the audit is expected by the end of july an action plan will follow from the

00:56:49 an action plan will follow from the audit will ensure that the tmo meets the legislative and best practice requirements and embeds health and safety into the culture of the organization in addition mr hodgson will advise on the recruitment and remit of the health and safety officer for repairs direct

00:57:01 and safety officer for repairs direct now was mr hodgson engaged because of the limited assurance mark given by the rbkc audit yes i think i mentioned this earlier that i think the executive team had the limited insurance we were really

00:57:13 had the limited insurance we were really concerned and felt was appropriate to get an external consultant to come and really review what what was what was the issues and help us

00:57:23 help us to to get an action plan to really put this what put this right and that's what matt hodson was was there to do now march 2013 um the coroner's report into the latino house fire was published

00:57:34 house fire was published and the coroner's recommendations were addressed in a report to the tmo operations committee on the second of may 2013

00:57:42 may 2013 and if we can go to that document which is tmo10031056

00:57:53 now that was as you can see from the top prepared by janice ray entitled current tmo position on fire risk assessments do you remember seeing that report mr evans

00:58:05 it's such a long time ago i i can't i can't recall sorry i'm sorry don't worry let's look at paragraph 5.3 which is on page three

00:58:20 and i'll read it out and invite you to read it as well whilst many actions have been progressed it's fair to say that a significant number of items remain outstanding and have not been progressed as swiftly as required therefore all outstanding

00:58:31 as required therefore all outstanding items have now been collated and presented to the relevant team for urgent completion the requirement to give this work priority has now been reiterated to the entire organization and completion of these is being monitored on a weekly basis

00:58:43 monitored on a weekly basis in the executive team regularly provided with a detailed breakdown on progress 5.4 says the need to implement a process to

00:58:50 to to facilitate better monitoring of fra actions and in particular to identify where these remain outstanding has been highlighted therefore the possibility of a workflow system on the electronic document and record management system

00:59:01 record management system has been investigated and trialled and it is anticipated that following stakeholder training this can be implemented from late may early june 2013 this will ensure a demonstrable audit trial is in place and should ensure that

00:59:13 trial is in place and should ensure that these are treated with priority now were you provided with detailed breakdowns of progress

00:59:21 at this point yes

00:59:25 so may 2013 if you remember the position i can't i can't remember specifically so any any um detail will have gone through

00:59:36 any any um detail will have gone through the health and safety committee from my recollection

00:59:43 and was the exec can you remember sorry to press you on this but did the executive team receive any update on action about clearing the backlog um i'm sure they would have done i can't

00:59:54 um i'm sure they would have done i can't specifically recall and what this is saying here is that we are putting in place a process to make sure that we are able to report that back to the executive team we would we would adapt what we were working on

01:00:06 we would adapt what we were working on was getting the management information in a way that we could have oversight as a

01:00:11 a executive team on the performance of this area of work yeah and and that and that was challenging and that's what we had to work through by putting in place the w-2 workflow system

01:00:23 the w-2 workflow system and that's the workflow system that was put in place yes because otherwise you've just got hundreds of actions that are very detailed as as um as managers

01:00:31 managers with you know in my director i had over 40 managers there would be not five teams um that would all have actions at any point in time in the week so

01:00:43 point in time in the week so the only way to manage this as you go up through the management structure is to have the right management information but you can't get that until you've got your baseline baseline it system working and

01:00:55 baseline it system working and that was what w-2 sought to do and what did you have that information and once you had that baseline information in place how did you monitor work on the on clearing the backlog well

01:01:07 work on the on clearing the backlog well that was that was where that came through the health and safety committee and we understood how many

01:01:11 many actions were partially outstanding completed

01:01:14 completed or fully completed yeah thank you now can we look at the hodgson report that anthony parks mentioned it's dated july 2013 and it can be found at

01:01:27 tm01203124

01:01:32 there we go now um you were interviewed as part

01:01:36 as part by mr hodgson's part of this process that's right isn't it yes i think so yes and if we could uh turn to the final paragraph

01:01:43 paragraph uh on it's tmo one trouble zero three one two four forward slash eight

01:01:55 thank you and it's the paragraph that starts with the words the governance of health and safety and it says this the governance of health and safety requires a serious review

01:02:03 review as the responsibility for different risk areas sit within different departments and not because the decision was made at committee but more through default due to the shortfall in compliance data sent up to the exec committee

01:02:14 sent up to the exec committee there is a lack of focus and leadership in making the important changes or decisions

01:02:18 decisions to manage risk effectively this issue is not helped by breakdown and communication between the health and safety and other departments specifically in relation to the completion of actions as raised in statutory reports

01:02:29 as raised in statutory reports the business needs to decide who has the authority to enforce this process health and safety roles and responsibilities and job descriptions and in the health and safety policy do not match expectation of some directors

01:02:42 not match expectation of some directors involved in compliance management now would you agree that responsibility for different risk areas sitting within different departments um frustrates a holistic assessment of risk

01:02:54 frustrates a holistic assessment of risk affecting the business

01:02:58 i'm sorry i'm not sure i understand your question

01:03:02 question if responsibility sits across different departments that prevents a holistic someone taking a comprehensive view of the nature and extent of the risk prevent affecting a business do you agree with that proposition

01:03:13 agree with that proposition um i think that in in my whole experience of 25 years of work in housing management it's complex there's number of teams and their responsibilities spread across lots of different teams and so the

01:03:24 lots of different teams and so the challenge for directors and senior management is how you get that oversight and then that you can actually enforce or encourage your staff to be accountable

01:03:36 encourage your staff to be accountable for their individual role in that process

01:03:38 process so it's a whole corporate approach that has to be

01:03:43 has to be coordinated and it creates focus and commitment and it creates the right management structures and i think that's what we're always seeking to do now it says here that the executive

01:03:55 now it says here that the executive committee were lacking compliance data can you remember what was missing or thought to be missing i should say um i i can't i can't remember specifically at this

01:04:05 at this at this time but i think this was the start this was the recognition of the limited insurance matt had i did matt hudson had identified the problems and then we were we were on the action plan to make sure

01:04:16 we were on the action plan to make sure that any shortfalls were and gaps were filled and i think i think this is part of it the specifics i can't recall from this and what i would say is that this particular action plan um was was was led by

01:04:30 action plan um was was was led by uh anthony parks now it refers there to a breakdown in communication between health and safety and other departments did that accord with your

01:04:39 with your your view at the time um i i think i think there were gaps and i think that's why we had to have that focus

01:04:47 focus and if i can stop you there what were the gaps um i think it's the i think it was the link between the health and safety which were advising on policy strategy training

01:04:58 training in janus ray's team and creating that link into the operational teams and also the monitoring and tracking and i know that i had conversations with anthony parks about that and how he

01:05:09 anthony parks about that and how he could support janice ray in making sure that the health and safety team was more connected to the operations directorate and i was i was quite i was specific about that now you mentions there that someone had

01:05:22 now you mentions there that someone had to be responsible for enforcing the process first question is did you agree with that assessment at the time i think when you've got a cut you know you've got structures and teams

01:05:33 structures and teams across the organisation at some point there needs to be some level of accountability and i understood that at the time to be the executive director responsible for the health and safety uh function so not you again mr parks is

01:05:45 uh function so not you again mr parks is what you'd say and then later barbara matthews yeah and was the health and safety uh direct executive director specifically allocated authority to enforce the

01:05:57 allocated authority to enforce the process can you remember i i'm not sure but i would i would see that as a given within their role at that level

01:06:08 do you refer do you remember any decision by the executive team or the tmo board fixing the health and safety executive director with that responsibility um i think i think the chief exec very clearly gave that responsibility to

01:06:20 clearly gave that responsibility to um to anthony parts and later barbara matthews and i think that was clear to the

01:06:25 the board and the executive team how did he make that clear um well we we we'd have that discussion in executive team and it was clearly um part of the portfolio and the fun

01:06:38 um part of the portfolio and the fun portfolio of that executive director and so am i understanding your evidence correctly

01:06:45 correctly that it was responsibility for enforcement of compliance with actions going forward within the operations directorate still lay with you though i think the actions and the operational

01:06:57 i think the actions and the operational work is is what might my my teams were there and had responsibility for yes so it wasn't solely a question of health and safety you too still had a role didn't you yes absolutely i think everybody in the

01:07:09 absolutely i think everybody in the organization had a role in terms of health and safety and we understood that and and we were working hard to to to make that happen now if we can turn over the page

01:07:27 thank you this is start of uh 39 recommendations or rather 39 issues that mr hodgson identified as needing redress and if we look at the second one which

01:07:38 which is set out on the left hand side and states take action to resolve the significant volume outstanding actions unresolved in statutory reports especially in relation to fire risk assessments once the backlog

01:07:49 assessments once the backlog has been brought under control establish a process to monitor and track completion of report actions has matched against priorities identified in the reports and that's given a priority level one and a time is given three months to

01:08:02 one and a time is given three months to resolve the backlog of actions now was the backlog resolved within three months yes or no

01:08:12 um i i don't i don't recall i don't know what the number was and what it what it was at the beginning and what it was at the end of the three months it's a bit hard tell from this okay

01:08:25 it's a bit hard tell from this okay now if we can look at recommendation five

01:08:28 five establish an appropriate training matrix for the business ensure that this includes sessions for health and safety duties of senior execs establish a process for running the sessions and keeping appropriate personnel records priority one

01:08:40 records priority one and then the the immediate response is stated to be one month to establish the training matrix and six months to phase in the outstanding courses and sessions

01:08:50 sessions was the training matrix set up um i i i'm assuming so this would have been an area of responsibility for the director of people and performance yvonne birch who

01:09:02 people and performance yvonne birch who had responsibility for corporate training across the organization and she would have uh included the expertise on the um content from the health health and

01:09:13 content from the health health and safety team but effectively training was was really um through uh yvonne burch the director of people and performance so i'm not sure i can can comment on this

01:09:24 i'm not sure i can can comment on this well let's put it slightly differently in your position as an executive director did you receive any training following this report i think your answer is yes um yeah i thought sorry i was taking the

01:09:35 um yeah i thought sorry i was taking the first point about the mech training matrix for the business but yes in terms of

01:09:40 of senior execs we all went on training that matt hudson arranged which i referred to earlier yes yes we did do that now can we look still within this document it's internal page 32 that the urn page is 33

01:09:56 and this deals specifically with the issue of fire risk assessments and if we could look at the third paragraph on that page the one that starts with the word keystone it says keystone is not up to date with fra reports so it's not possible to

01:10:07 fra reports so it's not possible to assess how compliant the business is with regards current fra reports one issue that is known and can be measured is the volume of outstanding fra actions created in the reports held the fra report actions get pushed out to

01:10:19 the fra report actions get pushed out to one of three locations assets and regeneration neighborhood and repairs there are currently somewhere between

01:10:26 between 900 to 1000 outstanding fra actions janice reyes established a spreadsheet showing departmental progress and host meetings to discuss progress matt hodgson said that report actions

01:10:38 matt hodgson said that report actions get quotes pushed out close quotes to three locations first of all asset regeneration secondly neighborhood and finally repairs would you agree that each of those locations

01:10:49 each of those locations is within your directorate yes and and there was also supported housing as well that's missing and that was within your directors as well

01:10:58 well and so you have a responsibility from forcing

01:11:03 forcing compliance with completion of actions is that right i had responsibility and i delegated a lot of a lot of that down through the teams as you'd expect in in a role of my nature of my size and

01:11:15 in in a role of my nature of my size and breadth

01:11:17 breadth so i had the director of assets and regen

01:11:20 regen director of housing and managing director graham webb and and supported housing management and my expectation was that um they would have a a

01:11:31 was that um they would have a a responsibility within their teams to to to complete those fra actions and how did you monitor compliance given the extent of delegation um taking it stage by stage when did w2

01:11:44 um taking it stage by stage when did w2 come online so you could use that as a monitoring tool um i can't be sure but i think it was slightly later than 2013. so we we were monitoring them

01:11:55 2013. so we we were monitoring them through the health and safety committee i also had my operational management team meetings which were the um the directors that i've just explained so i would be having discussions with them i'd have individual and one-to-one

01:12:07 i'd have individual and one-to-one discussions with them there was a focus we we knew that we needed to

01:12:11 needed to get these outstanding actions so it would have been individual discussions my operational management team and the health and safety committee and am i right in thinking that up until about mid

01:12:21 about mid 2013 2015 you chaired the operations health and safety committee yes that's right yeah and did you consider that to be an effective forum in which to monitor uh effective and timely completion of

01:12:32 uh effective and timely completion of outstanding fra actions um i think we had the right people at that meeting the right level of seniority

01:12:38 seniority and there was a there was a significant focus on it so yes i do consider that the right

01:12:43 the right structure within our organization did you consider to be effective in getting the job done i.e reducing the backlog i think things in a perfect world you

01:12:54 i think things in a perfect world you you'd have zero and i just think that was very challenging and in my experience in my 25 years experience in the housing sector

01:13:02 sector this is a challenge for everyone to get to get that work uh down you know it's a it's a constant flow of actions that come through and i think we did we had a lot of discussion about the

01:13:14 we had a lot of discussion about the areas that we could improve on and i think that was important flowing from that can we now go to look at minutes for an executive team meeting from august 2013 and they're at tm00899807

01:13:32 and they're at tm00899807 and if we can look at paragraph 1.4 at the very bottom which goes over to the next page

01:13:37 next page health and safety report although there was a lot of operational action in the report it did not help us with the organizational structure management so it flows on from the point you just made peter madison was concerned that the fire risk assessments were substandard

01:13:49 fire risk assessments were substandard and could put the organization at risk there was also some concern that high risk blocks were being classified as low risk and vice versa however the fire brigade had approved our processes but there was concern that

01:14:00 our processes but there was concern that a and r

01:14:01 a and r asset regeneration were being bogged down with actions which were not addressing the situation it was agreed to set up a meeting with matt hodgson peter madison janice ray to discuss the way forward pete had suggested he take on responsibility for

01:14:13 suggested he take on responsibility for all areas

01:14:14 all areas including asbestos and fire risk which was still with janice ray and janet ray would have a more strategic role and work with the fire brigade

01:14:20 brigade the possibility of adrian bowman transferring to a r to be considered so that peter madison could resource this area of work governance would be the reorganized health and safety committee and also the a on our health

01:14:31 committee and also the a on our health and safety group which sasha jevons would review and chair herself matt hodgson's report to reflect the structure any actions from the a r group to be referred to the health and safety committee or executive team

01:14:42 safety committee or executive team um did you inform was it you who informed the executive team about peter madison's concerns can you remember

01:14:52 oh sorry what are these minutes of which meeting executive team meeting august 2013. i i can't i'm sorry i can't recall

01:15:00 recall can you recall the detail of mr madison's concerns yes i can i think that what was happening is that um the fire risk assessor was generating actions

01:15:11 assessor was generating actions that almost duplicated and so it was really difficult for peter madison's team to close down these actions effectively and i'll give an example the fire risk assessor would go out and

01:15:23 the fire risk assessor would go out and look at a flat front entrance door and rather than make an and then the action from that to peter's team was would be go and inspect to make sure this is a 30 minute fire

01:15:35 to make sure this is a 30 minute fire flat entrance door and he's the fire risk assessor and the expert and he's looking at the door so make that judgment there and then as the fire risk assessor expert don't come back and

01:15:47 assessor expert don't come back and create an action for someone in pete's contract management team to then go out and check the door so it was that was an example

01:15:55 example and then another example would be that carl stokes would say that he needs to check the electrical certification on a communal piece of plant

01:16:06 on a communal piece of plant and so actually if he had access directly to our keystone data where you can view the certification that could just be closed off as an action there and then so it was some of it was quite

01:16:18 so it was some of it was quite administrative these actions they were they were very much about checking whether certification was there so where you see those numbers increasing it's it's relating more to

01:16:30 it's it's relating more to administration a lot of the time all the way in which uh i think the way in which those actions were organized and so peter madison was right to try to challenge those processes and that was part of what i explained earlier

01:16:42 part of what i explained earlier in our journey to try to streamline this process understood now can you remember

01:16:49 remember what mr madison's reasons were for saying that the fras themselves were substandard to quote i i can't recall that no why can you remember why mr madison

01:17:01 why can you remember why mr madison considered that the substandard fras would quote put the organization at risk close quotes

01:17:07 quotes no no i i can't say that and i can only assume that he was thinking about the uh the the actions that flowed from that in terms of the numbers that it was generating and that in itself

01:17:19 generating and that in itself uh creates a risk um did the executive team

01:17:23 team act on peter madison's recommendation that he take on all response responsibility for all areas including fire risk

01:17:31 fire risk no that that was um it was agreed that that would keep uh separate and that that would be undertaken through the through the um health and safety team underneath anthony parks

01:17:42 underneath anthony parks and why did the executive team reach that conclusion i think um i think the chief exec particularly felt that there should be a separation between

01:17:50 between fire risk health and safety and the operations team and that that that function should be kept separate can we look at the document which sets out the actions from this meeting which

01:18:02 out the actions from this meeting which can be found at tm0090485 and item 1.4 is addressed midway down that

01:18:10 that first page and it states there you can see it health and safety report initial report has been received from matt hudson and the meeting would be arranged with him which be attended by anthony parks

01:18:21 him which be attended by anthony parks yourself janice ray and peter madison did the meeting happen can you remember

01:18:28 i can't is this um what minutes are these e.t

01:18:32 these e.t yeah this is the this is the summary of actions arising from the meeting held on the 7th of august i'm sure it did but i i can't specifically recall it and do i take it from that you can't recall

01:18:43 do i take it from that you can't recall what was decided at any such meeting i can't recall a meeting i'm afraid could we now turn to the operational health and safety committee uh meeting um following publication the hodgson report and that was on the 12th

01:18:54 hodgson report and that was on the 12th of september 2013 and the minutes can be found at tmo one trouble zero three six zero four [Applause]

01:19:06 [Applause] and there we go you're the first on the list of attendees and if we look at the introductions section it says this the purpose of the meeting is to review the current health and safety procedures and enhance current processes ensuring the correct members within the

01:19:17 the correct members within the organization have the appropriate management strategies and the necessary resources in place to meet compliancy um am i safe in assuming that that review was initiated triggered by the

01:19:29 review was initiated triggered by the hottest report yes now if we can look at paragraph 2.2 which is at the bottom of the third page of this

01:19:38 and jw that's janice ray explained she felt much of the health and safety approach was reactive and responsive rather than proactive and was in line with budgetary implications and felt there was no assurance that

01:19:49 and felt there was no assurance that agreed actions were were being met going forward i.e void standards firestopping and felt processes need to be put in place to confirm things are effectively progressed and concluded

01:20:02 effectively progressed and concluded would you agree with her assessment that the health and safety approach was reactive and responsive

01:20:09 um i'm not i'm not sure i entirely agree with that but i i do know that this was at the point in time where we knew we knew we knew we needed to make improvements

01:20:20 improvements did you agree with it at the time i should have asked you a more precise question i apologize

01:20:26 yes i think i think you can see from this minute that we we needed to do work to improve things now looking at that phrase in line with budgetary implications was

01:20:37 in line with budgetary implications was the absence of sufficient funds an obstacle to the efficient and effective closing down of fra actions no could you help us on the panel as to what was meant by the

01:20:48 on the panel as to what was meant by the phrase in line with budgetary implications in this method can you just go back to the course

01:21:02 okay

01:21:07 i'm not i'm not sure i understand the minute

01:21:10 minute i'm afraid i i would say that um the the budget was was never an issue around is never a blocker it was never stopping us from completing anything to do with health and safety

01:21:22 anything to do with health and safety safe to say if there was a large capital program for example that wasn't something that was planned into our budget and that was over and above what we had in our service plan or capital program

01:21:33 in our service plan or capital program then that would be a different matter to be approved by rbkc but in terms of our responses to all of this reactive work that come out of fire risk assessments

01:21:45 assessments but budget was was not the problem or issue

01:21:48 issue so if it wasn't cost can you help us as to what janice ray said at the time was meant by in line with budgetary implications

01:21:59 implications i can't i can't i don't think i understand the minute i understand the first part about reactive and responsive rather than proactive which i think she's referring to having a more planned approach rather

01:22:10 having a more planned approach rather than just reacting um now if we can now go to a separate um set of minutes and that's for the executive team yeah i'm just wondering whether we're reaching a convenient point as good as any sir

01:22:24 convenient point as good as any sir well i can wait for the next question after the break sir are you sure i am all right as tim as you probably know we have a break during each half day session and we're going to take it now okay

01:22:35 it now okay so we'll break now we'll resume please at 20 to 12. and i have to ask you as i have everyone else please don't talk to anyone else about your evidence or anything related to it

01:22:47 evidence or anything related to it while you're out of the room okay is that right okay okay thank you we'd like to give the usher please

01:23:03 thank you 20 to 12.

01:40:47 yes would you ask mr evans to come back in please

01:41:06 all right mr evans yeah all right ready to carry on yeah thank you thank you sir mr evans can i ask you to turn to some executive team minutes 18th of september 2013 can be found at

01:41:19 tm00849798

01:41:27 and if we could turn to page two and item two

01:41:30 item two assets and regeneration

01:41:33 and that's uh just to fix you in the minute and then if we could turn to page six

01:41:44 and it's the second bullet point

01:41:48 from the top which says clienting of fire risk assessments had been taken over by a

01:41:52 over by a r which were due to be completed by mid-october um first of all what was meant by a r taking over quotes the client in close quotes of fras

01:42:05 uh i i'm not sure i'm not sure on this point

01:42:08 point um my understanding of a r was always about completing the virus actions not not clienting the fire risk assessment process itself

01:42:19 and can you remember whether there was any transfer of responsibility for clienting to a at about this time so we're talking september 2013.

01:42:30 september 2013. no the um the a r team never had responsibility for the fire risk assessment program only over the actions i i don't know if clienting is the wrong word for the minutes um but certainly they never took on

01:42:42 um but certainly they never took on responsibility for that what exactly does clienting mean in this context

01:42:48 context i my understanding of the word clienting is the oversight of a program or a contractor and the monitoring of that and so um i'm very clear that anr was never

01:43:00 i'm very clear that anr was never in in had the responsibility of the work with carl stokes and the fire risk assessment program that always sat in the health and safety team and particularly janice thank you yes um

01:43:11 and particularly janice thank you yes um could we move forward then to minutes of the operational health and safety meeting

01:43:15 meeting on the 17th of january 2014 and they can be found at tm00840384

01:43:28 and if we look at the fourth bullet point on that first page the one which starts the fire brigade and the fire brigade haven't come back with dates for visiting they've said they are interested in seeing the w-2

01:43:40 they are interested in seeing the w-2 workflow process so that's the process we're talking about earlier looking particularly in the outstanding fra actions which relate to compartmentation janus has been asked to talk to michael about the information they will be shown

01:43:52 about the information they will be shown as they will be looking to make sure that we are completing the actions which means they will be looking at things in more detail and if we go to the next paragraph which starts at the moment it says at the moment we're working from

01:44:04 it says at the moment we're working from fire risk assessment reports and have until june to complete all actions michael suggested that the fire brigade be advised the volume of outstanding fora actions however consensus of the group was that

01:44:15 however consensus of the group was that this would result in more scrutiny from the nfb

01:44:18 the nfb and also possible enforcement action so agreed that we would not disclose this level of detail at this stage jrp have reported back and have put the actions into programs of works for

01:44:29 actions into programs of works for alex's team michael will look at these programs and see how these can be best progressed in order to see the lfp's time scale michael said it would take him about two weeks to go through everything so he would give an update at the next

01:44:41 so he would give an update at the next meeting now michael is that michael lyons yes and what was his role at this time since january 2014. michael lyons was

01:44:50 lyons was um recruited as a health and safety manager

01:44:53 manager to uh for the operations team so he his area of responsibility covered support to the a r team as well as our repairs responsive repairs um now

01:45:06 responsive repairs um now we saw that michael lyons suggestion about informing the lfb about fras and progress

01:45:11 progress um it's fair to say that that suggestion didn't find favor would you agree with that

01:45:17 that um i can't recall the discussion from from this minute yes the stated reason was that it would increase the lfb scrutiny of the tmos fra performance

01:45:28 fra performance that seems to be a fair reading of the minute would you agree yes and that might lead to possible enforcement action would you agree with that

01:45:35 that i'm not sure about that actually well it says so in a minute it says so in a minute that i'm not sure it would have led to enforcement action or not i think i think that would have been a matter for janice to advise on

01:45:47 been a matter for janice to advise on well can we take it from here that you didn't correct that minute later so can we assume that you accepted that observation as correct at the time

01:45:57 the time absent a correction absent of correction

01:46:03 didn't those comments uh tell you or indeed any other member of the executive team

01:46:07 team something about the state of the fra issue as the tmo is clearly conscious that enforcement action might be a pro in prospect um and i think i think uh from this

01:46:18 um and i think i think uh from this group which met monthly we absolutely understood that and we were we were we were trying to do a number of different measures to get these actions completed

01:46:28 completed given that why would you not take the transparent route with the lfb as being the enforcing authority under the rro

01:46:40 the rro um i i can see how you would read it that way

01:46:43 that way and i can't particularly recall this discussion at the time but what i would say is that there was an absolute focus on on trying to get the actions complete

01:46:54 on trying to get the actions complete can we now turn to the operational health and safety committee meeting on the 12th of may 2015 so that's some 16 months or thereabouts from

01:47:03 from this minute and that can be found at tmo one

01:47:07 one zero

01:47:15 now you gave your apologies there you see first

01:47:18 see first identified we look at item 1.2 under fra stats and it's recorded that jw said janice ray distributed the fra action stats and confirmed that she had sent a breakdown

01:47:29 confirmed that she had sent a breakdown to each team of the actions allocated to them still a significant number of actions outstanding for contract management and also repairs direct and then if we can go to item

01:47:40 can go to item five on page five

01:47:46 then we see there at 5.1 sj so you had previously asked for a more detailed breakdown of high-risk cases so janice ray had provided a breakdown of responsive and contract management actions

01:47:57 and contract management actions definition of priority time scales and breakdown of categories for each for each team now my first question is uh when did you first go ask for that detail would it be about this time so may 2015

01:48:12 um it appears so from this minute that i think we would have had discussions before that time from my recollection and apologies if this is a question directed to the obvious but why was it important

01:48:23 obvious but why was it important um to have a breakdown of high-risk cases um

01:48:26 cases um i i think i explained this earlier to to manage such a large number of actions it's really important to make sure you focus on the high risk as a priority and i think that's what we're trying to do

01:48:37 trying to do to understand the categories across hundreds of actions now barbara matthews joined the tmo in june 2015

01:48:45 june 2015 in succession to anthony parks is that right yes that's right yes and so she then assumed responsibility for ensuring fra actions were closed down uh in accordance with the prescribed timetable yes in her role as health and safety

01:48:58 yes in her role as health and safety director yes now um did you retain any responsibility in that regard for actions that came within the remit of the operations directorate in terms of all the actions that were

01:49:09 in terms of all the actions that were generated to the operations team i had responsibility for that barbara matthews had the overall responsibility for health and safety thank you now if we now turn to the tmo corporate health

01:49:21 we now turn to the tmo corporate health and safety committee meeting minutes on the 29th of september 2015 can be found at zero tm0100 one three five nine

01:49:36 and let's see your present first one on the list of attendees and if we can turn to item 3 at the bottom of page 2 which again dealt with file safety and

01:49:47 which again dealt with file safety and risk assessment and if we turn over the page item 3.3

01:49:54 following his minute item 3.3 paul who was paul i think paul is paul chaveaux from repairs direct who's the interim md

01:50:05 repairs direct who's the interim md thank you that answers my next question uh and he says that james ray that our dear going through the responsive fra actions he should be able to confirm the programme and time skills in the next couple of weeks

01:50:16 in the next couple of weeks a b will discuss with paul gervais um did you retain the management function over paul javo as the executive operations director within the tmo um

01:50:29 operations director within the tmo um i can't remember whether i think paul paul jabo was in the new repairs direct structure yes he is and so that would have been um the board uh structure that i explained earlier

01:50:41 uh structure that i explained earlier that had oversight of the interim managing direction we'll come on to the dotted line organogram in due course now it's a recorded there that a b will discuss with paul gervais can you help us why was alex bosman

01:50:53 can you help us why was alex bosman who's head of contracts management why was he dealing with repairs direct in this regard

01:51:04 um i i can't recall specifically maybe there was a crossover because um before we set up repairs direct or at the beginning of repairs direct

01:51:14 direct um peter madison's team undertook a clienting role of repairs direct and so this will be in relation to that now can we move on to the 11th of november 2015 and to meeting the executive team and

01:51:26 and to meeting the executive team and the minutes can be found at tmo double zero 843 593

01:51:43 just before we come on to this just playing from your your last answer can you help us as to when the clienting role that alex bosma may have exercised came to an end can you remember i think it's when graham webb was

01:51:55 i think it's when graham webb was recruited as managing director and can you help us when that was um 2015.

01:52:04 um 2015. thank you apologies um going back to this executive team meeting on the 11th of november 2015 um you're there fourth one on the list of attendees

01:52:16 of attendees and if we can go to item three at the bottom of page two

01:52:25 and we see there the penultimate paragraph sasha that's you noted that she has asked jillian kennedy to put together a spreadsheet detailing all outstanding fra actions there was a health and safety audit in early december so that'd be 2015

01:52:38 early december so that'd be 2015 and sasha and barbara are working together to clear the jams so that we can be compliant and can you remember what precisely was discussed about fra outstanding actions at this meeting

01:52:49 outstanding actions at this meeting um no no i'm sorry i can't know um what was gillian kennedy's role in relation to outstanding fra actions julian kennedy was a pa assistant

01:53:02 julian kennedy was a pa assistant so it was an administrative function that she would have been undertaking for barbara and myself what did you and barbara matthews do to clear the jam before the prospective audit i think

01:53:14 before the prospective audit i think this continues with the the um general approach of trying to identify where the where the where the backlog is what's caused that problem and trying to clear up was the executive

01:53:27 and trying to clear up was the executive team

01:53:27 team forum the principle means by which robert black was kept in form of the state of progress in relation to outstanding fra actions yes i would say so yes did you know of any other

01:53:37 any other organizational forum in which he was kept updated and there was also the um risk and audit committee where health and safety reports went to which is part of the board structure

01:53:49 which is part of the board structure okay thank you um the next tmr health and safety minutes i'd like to take you two are those dated the 19th of january 2016 and they can be found at tm010012174

01:54:16 okay thank you and just looking at um 1.1

01:54:19 1.1 graham was welcome to the groups that'd be graham webb so the date of this is january 2016. so it seems that mr webb started in the new in january 2016. i think that was his

01:54:31 in january 2016. i think that was his first health and safety meeting i believe he was recruited at the end of 2015 but yeah yeah

01:54:39 now um from january 2016 onwards it appears that um someone from repairs direct whether it was graham webb or adam brooks or shannon mckinnis or indeed derek singleton would attend the tmo health and safety

01:54:50 would attend the tmo health and safety committee meeting and why was that

01:54:55 i can't recall exactly but i think barbara

01:54:59 barbara had reshaped this committee and i think she probably felt that we needed a broader representation of some of the key areas where some of the some of the sort of main problems were which is repairs direct

01:55:10 problems were which is repairs direct now can we turn to page four of this minute and item 3.1 and 3.2 so 3.1 is under the subheading wt workflow fra

01:55:21 workflow fra actions it says jw and bm so janice ray and barbara matthews highlighted the main points of the fra summaries in particular it was emphasized that significant progress had been made with completing the backlog of outstanding

01:55:32 completing the backlog of outstanding actions by contract management and by repairs direct item 3.2 pm asked for a copy of the detail behind this report pm noted that the system should be more robust to ensure actions are escalated if they

01:55:44 to ensure actions are escalated if they are out of time or allocated to staff who are no longer within the with the organization graham webb advised the process will be reviewed to avoid outstanding historic actions um can you remember now what detail

01:55:57 um can you remember now what detail peter madison was after i i can't remember the detail but his point here is to to make sure that managers within within the organization are able to understand what problem is

01:56:09 are able to understand what problem is with their particular staff and their team so i think i think that's the issue but the detail i'm sorry i can't recall and did you agree at the time with his view that the system needed to be more robust

01:56:20 robust to ensure escalation were necessary and appropriate um i i can't recall the discussion at the time i'm afraid can you remember whether there was a problem at the time that uh actions would be allocated to

01:56:32 that uh actions would be allocated to staff who'd left the tmo i don't recall that at all

01:56:37 and you don't recall any concerns broader concerns that the system wasn't picking up allocation to departed staff i can't recall that i'm afraid can you

01:56:48 i can't recall that i'm afraid can you remember now what precisely was done uh to remedy the deficiency identified by mr madison um

01:56:59 well i think i think this was um mr madison's um view that needed to have more of an aged profile analysis that would give enough um early warning and detail of escalation

01:57:11 and detail of escalation from the individual individual officers and then up to team level so that that's that's what that comment is referring to and yes i think it was done remember whether graham webb carried out

01:57:22 remember whether graham webb carried out his promised review yes i think he did yeah and can you remember its essential findings now um i think graham uh was working to understand what what what had

01:57:35 understand what what what had generated some of this backlog and i think he worked through issues with staffing material supply delays

01:57:45 delays and also some process issues within within the teams i think that was a the general

01:57:51 general background to it thank you now can we turn to a document entitled health safety and facilities team update from february 2016 and that can be found at tmo

01:58:01 at tmo double zero eight four three six four four

01:58:11 and if we can look at item three on that first page

01:58:17 it says frn h and s actions barbara and i the second sentence have met with sasha pete alex and graham webb to look at the detail of the actions being raised and how each other progressed accepted

01:58:29 and how each other progressed accepted that there is no need to continue with these meetings but just to identify the key trends have now agreed an improved procedure with repairs direct which should enable work to be progressed in a timely manner once backlog cleared now was the meeting

01:58:42 once backlog cleared now was the meeting held to consider the backlog of fra actions that had arisen and about responsive repairs um i can't yes i think so i can't recall it specifically

01:58:54 it specifically can you help us to why you attended but mr madison and mr bossman did not this is because it's relating to repairs direct i think oh sorry the earlier sentences

01:59:05 sentences um no no i can't say from this minute it looks like it was a focus on repairs direct specifically now is it right that the new procedure

01:59:16 now is it right that the new procedure would only be effective once the backlog had been cleared was that your view at the time

01:59:26 um sorry can you repeat the question of course yes um was it your view that the new procedure that was proposed to be put in place would only be effective once the backlog itself had

01:59:38 be effective once the backlog itself had been cleared it's never good to have a backlog so that is a given that that has to be cleared

01:59:43 cleared the procedure would would be yes would would be operational um i think they're two separate issues in my mind now why was it agreed that

01:59:54 in my mind now why was it agreed that there would be no need to continue these meetings

01:59:57 meetings i think we had uh assumed that we'd got the right

02:00:01 the right procedure and escalation and management processes in place and so actually uh staff and the md graham webb would be able to take responsibility for that

02:00:10 that and can you help us as to what the substance of those escalation procedures was

02:00:14 was that's about making sure that they escalated when uh items became overdue so it's around priority and age and can you remember now did the procedure achieve its stated goal

02:00:26 procedure achieve its stated goal of efficient and effective closing out of fra actions yes i think it i think it improved yes definitely

02:00:35 now can we move forward to an email sent by janet ray on the 7th of june 2017 which attached papers for a health and safety meeting which is due to take place on the 13th of june

02:00:46 place on the 13th of june now the email just for reference is at

02:00:52 tm008422 but what i'd like to go to is something called paper 4 which concerned fras which was attached that email and that can be found at

02:01:06 tm0084218

02:01:15 now what we have there is paper four and title fra's current progress with completion of actions and if i could probably just invite you just to read

02:01:26 probably just invite you just to read that so you can you can familiarize yourself with it

02:01:33 yeah now what we have got here if um is a number of total outstanding actions

02:01:45 is a number of total outstanding actions and if we look at the second page

02:01:52 and we have the age of the outstanding actions

02:02:00 now it appears that the age of uh the acts or looking at these total outstanding actions that's four months or older seems to be about 250 or thereabouts

02:02:16 now given the numbers that are summarized on this form would you agree that there was still scope very significant concern about the scale and the

02:02:26 and the age of the backlog

02:02:31 um i think it's showing an improving position on the last month um and there are still outstanding actions

02:02:40 actions um that needed to be completed now can you help us as to why certainly to the lay eye there appear to be so many outstanding actions that are more than four months

02:02:51 actions that are more than four months old

02:02:52 old i think you need to look at the detail behind the specific action um to answer that question and there'll be a range of different complexities around different

02:03:03 complexities around different activities in the different teams can you help us as to why this form doesn't identify

02:03:09 identify high risk medium risk low risk priorities here i i from recollection we identified that that elsewhere um surely it would have

02:03:21 that elsewhere um surely it would have been useful to have that information on this sheet because it identifies the potential risk to residents who are affected by the relevant outstanding action

02:03:31 action would you agree with that it could be seen yes i do agree and i think that a lot of that detail was being undertaken within the teams in the specific area in the heads of service

02:03:44 but is there a prospect though that if the information regarding priority isn't set out in this document the full consequence of failing to deal

02:03:56 the full consequence of failing to deal with the backlog isn't known to decision makers such as yourselves i think that people at the team would have been expressing that at the meeting and the trends you say would have been

02:04:09 and the trends you say would have been did they i can't see the minutes but from recollection we had we had discussion around um challenges that the teams were having over particular areas and that and that committee was where we

02:04:21 committee was where we tried to understand what we could do to help unblock those problems now following on from that answer where you've got these outstanding fra actions that are more than four months old

02:04:32 more than four months old can you set out for the panel what if any

02:04:36 any interim measures you put in place to address and mitigate the risk caused by the outstanding nature of the action um i think that's hard

02:04:49 um i think that's hard to do that without seeing the actions and from recollection i'm afraid can you remember whether you yourself raised at this time concern about the

02:05:00 raised at this time concern about the raised risk that would be borne by a resident who is affected by an outstanding action i think i think from my perspective i was always

02:05:11 was always um concerned and pushing and keen that the teams were able to resolve all of these matters as quickly as possible and i think it's difficult here without looking at the

02:05:22 here without looking at the circumstances behind the actions to to give that detail to you to echo a previous answer to a previous question was that concern essentially unspoken in these meetings

02:05:34 these meetings i think we were all working together to try and to try and work through these actions and i think barbara brought an additional focus to it now can we go to the minutes of the health and safety committee that took place on the 13th of june

02:05:45 that took place on the 13th of june 2017. so i the one for which this paper was prepared

02:05:50 prepared and they can be found at tm01007155

02:06:02 and they can be found at tm01007155 and if we could go to um paragraph 3.1 on page

02:06:06 on page three i said that can't be the right document

02:06:11 document tmo one double zero one seven it's the wrong document so the reference you need is one double zero one seven one double five

02:06:29 one seven one double five [Music]

02:06:36 thank you there we go health and safety meeting 13th of june 2017.

02:06:43 you are listed fourth down on the list of apologies and if we go to para 3.1 on page three

02:06:54 there we go into the heading of fra actions

02:06:57 actions matthews expressed concern of the volume of actions which remain outstanding she emphasized the importance of completing these in a timely manner not least because they will continue to be raised particularly as the fra

02:07:08 be raised particularly as the fra reviews become more frequently now would it be fair to say on the basis of what is summarized there that the large number of outstanding fra actions were continuing to cause concern in june 2017.

02:07:21 in june 2017. um i wasn't at that meeting but that's what the minute says there and given the problems regarding the tmos fra

02:07:30 tmos fra arrangements have been identified sometime previously would you accept that the problem had still not been resolved certainly by the 14th of june 2017. um i

02:07:41 certainly by the 14th of june 2017. um i think

02:07:41 think that there were there were multiple issues in trying to achieve um clearing the backlog i think we made good progress and particularly um in the sixth month prior to that

02:07:53 prior to that and it would in my experience be difficult to ever get to zero when new actions are constantly being generated but notwithstanding the general nature of the last part of your answer it is

02:08:06 of the last part of your answer it is plain

02:08:06 plain that barbara matthews was not assured that sufficient progress was being made that's a fair reading of what is sunrise at 3.1 isn't it of what summarized here but i think barbara was also working very closely with myself and the

02:08:19 working very closely with myself and the teams and she understood in some detail the actions that we were taking and i think this is expressing the urgency and the need to keep up the focus and certainly there are a number

02:08:31 focus and certainly there are a number of people at this meeting a much wider group of people at this meeting and that would be important that they understood that executive view now um can you recall what mr black's

02:08:43 now um can you recall what mr black's view

02:08:44 view was in relation to outstanding fra actions

02:08:47 actions uh in the six months before the fire in 2017.

02:08:52 i think i think mr black understood that um

02:08:56 um we were managing this process he understood the challenges and that we myself and barbara through this

02:09:03 this health and safety committee were trying hard to

02:09:07 hard to complete them and rectify the issues now i'm now going to move on to a separate issue which is self-closing devices on flat front entrance doors

02:09:18 entrance doors now on the 12th of october 2015 the lfb issued a deficiency notice to the tmo in respect of a dare tower and first of all were you aware of the fact of the issue of that notice

02:09:31 of the fact of the issue of that notice i was aware of it in terms of discussions at the executive team yes yes and were you aware of the particular deficiencies that had been identified by the lfb yeah i had an overview of that yes

02:09:43 overview of that yes overview does that mean you'd read the notice i can't recall at the time because i know that barbara matthews was managing this process with janus and the fire brigade but i certainly had an executive team

02:09:54 certainly had an executive team overview of it and can you remember whether your staff were involved in remedying the deficiencies identified by the lfb in that notice uh there would have been yes now a fire

02:10:05 uh there would have been yes now a fire broke out at their tower on the 31st of october 2015 so 19 days after the deficiency issue the deficiency notice has been issued now as a consequence of that fire

02:10:17 issued now as a consequence of that fire janice ray met rebecca burton of the lfb on the 13th of november 2015 and janice ray emailed you and others at the tmo following that meeting and if we

02:10:29 the tmo following that meeting and if we go to that email which is a tmo double zero eight four zero four one

02:10:40 five

02:10:45 there you go you can see the email sent on the 13th of november at 1752 your last of the addresses and if we go to just confirms that in

02:10:56 and if we go to just confirms that in the opening paragraph now that she'd met rebecca burton and if we go to the penultimate paragraph on page two of this chain which starts however

02:11:11 which starts however she says however it seems that specifically they the lfb are focusing on self-closers on flat entrance doors and ventilation her that's rebecca burton's stated preference would be to have both staircase

02:11:22 staircase cases close as opposed to one unenclosed however she's keen to see the reviewed risk assessment i asked if she needed to see action on both these points if we fitted self-closure she would she

02:11:33 if we fitted self-closure she would she could accept could she accept the ventilation and she reiterated that she needed to see the revised fra i had the impression that if the fra recognized the need to fit self-closers and this was programmed swiftly for both

02:11:45 and this was programmed swiftly for both blocks

02:11:46 blocks this might be acceptable now can we look next at the email you sent on the 17th november 2015. so four days afterwards which is at tm00840418

02:12:08 i'll just let you have a quick read of that email to re-familiarize yourself with it

02:12:29 would you like the document manager scroll down yes please

02:12:46 yeah now essentially uh and correct me if this is unfair uh your view is the tmo should push back against the lfb's position uh based on what carl stokes had said in his fra

02:12:59 what carl stokes had said in his fra would you agree with that as a fair and accurate summary of your view in this

02:13:14 email

02:13:18 i think what um from recollection what we're trying to work out here is the practical element of um

02:13:25 of um of the door closer program so we're saying here about wait wait and see from the fra advice

02:13:37 i can't recall it specifically i can i can only see what i've written here okay now in due course an enforcement notice was issued by the lfb in respect of a dare tower on the 23rd of december 2015

02:13:50 tower on the 23rd of december 2015 and if we could go to tm00840703

02:14:03 can you remember when you first saw that enforcement notice uh no i can't i'm sorry no

02:14:09 presumably given what you'd already been told and read and seen you are not surprised by its content i.e the issue with the lack of self closes on doors is that right

02:14:20 on doors is that right um if you want to see the further elements of the notion yes yes okay yes could turn over the page

02:14:30 and turn over again

02:14:34 yeah so you weren't surprised my understanding is that they were asking us to make sure that we did a program of fire door closes on a dare tower that's that's my recollection of

02:14:46 tower that's that's my recollection of what happened now was the issue of self-closures something which fell within the remit of asset and regeneration um no the self-closures would have been

02:14:58 um no the self-closures would have been responsive repairs sorry repairs direct unless it was a specific capital programme of fire door replacement now if we can now turn to

02:15:09 replacement now if we can now turn to the tmo health and safety committee that met on 19th of january 2016 and those minutes can be found at

02:15:17 tm01001

02:15:20 986.

02:15:27 there we go you're an attendee second in the left-hand column we can go to page five and item seven we have health and safety kpis 7.1

02:15:40 we have health and safety kpis 7.1 janice ray has put together a list of proposed kpis which can be edited by the committee

02:15:45 committee janice ray asked the committee to let her know if they have any changes in the next two weeks 7.2 it would be useful to develop a process to show that the detection systems that have been installed have been checked

02:15:56 been checked the lfb have suggested that detection systems and door closed door closers need to be tested peter madison sasha jevons discussed the difference between tmo's legal obligations and lfb aspirations tmo will have to

02:16:08 and lfb aspirations tmo will have to consider whether this work is feasible in terms of cost and practicality janus is ready to check tmr obligations in relation

02:16:16 relation to this 7.3 just for the sake of completeness sash germans asked james ray to transfer the kpis into a management report for the next committee meeting with items yet to be decided being left

02:16:29 with items yet to be decided being left blank

02:16:30 blank now looking back at paragraph 7.2 and in particular the penultimate sentence which refers to your discussion with peter madison about the difference between legal obligations and lfb aspirations

02:16:42 aspirations what's the thrust of that discussion that the tmo should only do what it was strictly legally required to do

02:16:51 do i think we were always set up to make sure we

02:16:54 sure we installed and maintained fire doors and fired all closers or fire door sets that come with that the inspection process is a different

02:17:05 the inspection process is a different process

02:17:05 process completely and what peter madison and myself were discussing here is that the lfb had suggested an inspection process which is very different to

02:17:16 different to maintenance and fitting of door fire doors and fire door closers it would require a different set of procedures and a different way of structuring our organization which we currently weren't

02:17:28 organization which we currently weren't set up to do and that's what we were trying to work out and if i just draw a comparison with the gas safety individual boiler checks we had a team of three people doing that it was an obligation you had to do a gas

02:17:39 it was an obligation you had to do a gas safety boiler once every 12 months um and so you'd have to

02:17:43 have to that process of getting access where you take on that they'll be so you could to could take up to two months with uh resulting in an injunction to get access so we were trying to work out whether

02:17:54 so we were trying to work out whether our tenancy agreement and whether we could structure the organization to deliver an inspection program

02:18:00 program that's the difference here and think that's what we're going out to check now if we can now look at what happened at the board meeting in march 2016 and those minutes are at tm010013646

02:18:22 and we can see your present so at the bottom of the page

02:18:29 i think you're all there fifth from the bottom and if we can turn to page two

02:18:37 we see item 9 chief executives report 9.1 barbara matthews presented the chief execs report to the board she drew the attention of the board to the progress update on the enforcement notices received in respect of a darren hazelwood towers

02:18:49 hazelwood towers following the fire at dare tower and then 9.2

02:18:52 then 9.2 jeff zitron questioned why enforcement notices had been issued given the fact that the company had commissioned and had valid fire risk assessments in place at the time of the fire incident sasha jevons explained that the fire risk

02:19:03 jevons explained that the fire risk assessment had been even though there were no issues uh reported by the consultant the london fire brigade in there in their fire audit before the fire incident the occurrence of the fire had created the opportunity to reassess the

02:19:15 created the opportunity to reassess the acceptable standards which then led to the issuance of the enforcement notices it was reiterated that the key area of focus for the nurses were the ventilation stairwells and self-closures on all flat

02:19:26 stairwells and self-closures on all flat entry doors simon brisenden commented on the qualification of the risk assessors being used by the company and reiterated the need to use experience consultants who could highlight any eventualities as

02:19:38 who could highlight any eventualities as well in their reviews of the properties and the board agreed that the company needs to reconsider the frequency of the fire risk assessments being undertaken and the installation of door closes barbara matthews confirmed that it was

02:19:50 barbara matthews confirmed that it was intended to install door closes by the deadline

02:19:52 deadline and negotiate an extension the works required on the ventilation issues the board requested that a report on the conclusions of the review of the stock that should be presented at a future meeting covering any decisions

02:20:03 meeting covering any decisions and recommendations in respect of a fire incident now

02:20:12 the fire deficient the pre-fire deficiency notice in relation to a dare tower was not mentioned at all in that summary you gave to the board

02:20:20 board can you explain why not

02:20:24 um i can't recall the sequence of events at that time i'm afraid i'm not sure well the enforcement notice was issued on the 12th of october

02:20:35 on the 12th of october the fire happened on the 31st of october would you agree that not putting the fact of the enforcement notice the pre-fire enforcement notice before the

02:20:46 pre-fire enforcement notice before the board

02:20:47 board had the potential to mislead them regarding the nature and duration of the lfb's concerns about self-closures at a dare tower

02:20:59 at a dare tower efficiency notice sorry

02:21:05 um i think that my understanding of the deficiency notice is it it um it's picking up areas of concern that need to be implemented which is

02:21:16 need to be implemented which is different to the enforcement notice so it's possible that um we were we were working through that and unders and we're trying to understand what what what to implement but i i'm afraid i can't recall this discussion

02:21:28 can't recall this discussion but would you agree that not identifying the fact of the deficiency notice and its contents had the potential to mislead the board about the nature and duration of the lfb's concerns about door closes at a

02:21:41 lfb's concerns about door closes at a dare tower i think it was a an ongoing discussion door closes um and a priority so i i'm not sure about mislead but

02:21:52 information obviously at board level is helpful

02:21:56 helpful and it was a material fact which would have been relevant to the board's considerations wouldn't it um the fact of the deficiency notice in its substance i think it would have been helpful for them to know that on reflection yes

02:22:10 you said the occurrence of the fire had created the opportunity to reassess the exte

02:22:14 exte the acceptable standard which then led to the issuance of the enforcement notices

02:22:19 notices um on what basis did you say that i think what happened is that we'd had a fire risk assessment the lf from carl stokes they'd never picked up this issue before around ventilation

02:22:33 this issue before around ventilation and also the lfb hadn't picked up that in their visits but what i understood the lfb was saying after the fire is that now that they had seen how smoke traveled around the building having had

02:22:45 traveled around the building having had a real live fire that their initial their original assessment what wasn't correct and that's why they wanted to reassess it and

02:22:52 and and the enforcement notice was because you'd have to change the original design of the building doesn't that answer give the impression that you're trying to

02:23:03 that you're trying to attribute responsibility to the lfb rather than to yourselves no i don't think so i think it is a reality it's it's um a situation that they hadn't picked up neither had a

02:23:14 they hadn't picked up neither had a fired consultant and once a fire had happened and they'd seen how smoke traveled around the building they wanted to reassess that i think it was

02:23:23 was it wasn't attributable to anyone in particular i think it was the reality in the fact that now there'd been a fire and bear in mind the block is is is a number of years old

02:23:34 number of years old that actually needed to be changed then but i hope i'm writing saying that the minute set out there puts the the weight of responsibility

02:23:46 puts the the weight of responsibility for the change on the lfb rather than anyone else would you agree with that

02:23:51 with that well i think so-called reassessment

02:23:55 i think i think it was driven by the lfb that they they felt that there needed to be changes to the building following their assessment um of of the fire and and you know the

02:24:06 um of of the fire and and you know the tmo was there to make sure that we did the works

02:24:09 the works on recommendation of either our consultant or the lfb now it says that simon brisson commented on the qualification the risk assess has been used by the company and react reiterated the need to use

02:24:20 and react reiterated the need to use experienced consultants can you remember any more detail about the

02:24:26 the comment made by mr brissenden there no i think he was asking the question in the board um and and i assume barbara matthews would have would have answered that question

02:24:37 have would have answered that question or

02:24:38 or mr black um did you have cause to question mr stokes's competency as a result of

02:24:47 result of the facts and matters arising out of the adair tower fire no no

02:24:54 now can we turn to a tmo executive team meeting that took place on the 5th of october 2016 uh which you again attended and that can be found at tm00843 861.

02:25:16 thank you adele tower is at item 3 which is at page 2

02:25:23 and we can see it 3.2 it says this the lfp are putting pressure on us to fit door closers on all our stock across

02:25:31 across the business laura johnson has said no to this

02:25:35 to this but sasha feels that there should be a discussion at e.t

02:25:40 insofar as you're able to answer this why had laura johnson said no i think laura had to make consideration on a

02:25:51 laura had to make consideration on a balance of maybe budget um versus practicalities and and this is maybe this is an example of something that would be outside of the

02:26:01 the agreed budget and it would be unforeseen and so the tmo would need to go back to the council and ask for for more money now on the basis of this you don't appear to agree with laura johnson and felt that there

02:26:13 with laura johnson and felt that there should be presumably broader discussion at the executive team can you remember now what were your concerns at the time let's say october 2016.

02:26:24 2016. i i think that we were it was quite clear from the lfb that we should fit door closes on all the stock and i was keen for that to happen um item 3.2 goes on to say this the fire

02:26:35 um item 3.2 goes on to say this the fire strategy has been updated with the recommendation that this work is done over a five-year period although it's likely the lfb will expect a shorter period

02:26:43 period sasha will speak to her team about doing some profiling on this as with 9 000 properties we would need to know the estimated cost for this and also what others are doing rbkc would need to be spoken to about this

02:26:54 would need to be spoken to about this and given options can you remember now where did the five-year time frame come from

02:27:05 i i think that came from rbkc if if i recall why did they pitch for a longer time frame when it was

02:27:15 was known or anticipated that the lfb would want a shorter time frame i think that's a question for rbkc and they had their ways of profiling their housing revenue account

02:27:28 profiling their housing revenue account and the

02:27:28 and the amount of works that they put into capital investment for the tmo and flowing from that and previous answers the final sentence here which says

02:27:36 says rbkc would need to be spoken to about this and given options uh presumably because extra funds would be required and it would only come from rbkc yes yes that's right now on the 17th of november 2016 a

02:27:50 now on the 17th of november 2016 a deficiency notice was issued by the lfb in relation to grenfell following an lfb inspection now that notice is at tm010017254

02:28:03 now that notice is at tm010017254 if we go to page five of that document

02:28:19 i'll let you familiarize yourself with what's set out there and when you need the page to be moved on please say so

02:28:52 so

02:28:57 yes okay okay now looking sorry i'll let you

02:29:01 you read the rest

02:29:12 yeah now if i could ask us to go back to page five

02:29:19 would you agree that it was now crystal clear that the lfb were concerned about the failure to maintain flat entrance doors particularly in relation to self-closing devices in numerous

02:29:29 numerous tmo blocks i think they had identified that yes i agree and would you agree that given the deadline was set for the 18th of may

02:29:40 the deadline was set for the 18th of may 2017

02:29:41 2017 that time is of the essence in remedying the deficiencies identified here yes now

02:29:49 yes now looking at some of these um items in the notice and looking at the second one on the page we're looking at now fire doors not fitting into their frames

02:29:58 frames would you say that had been an issue for repairs direct um so if if it wasn't part of the original capital replacement program

02:30:09 original capital replacement program within the defects period then anything um thereafter in terms of a responsive repair or repair to a particular door individual door would be repairs direct uh a breach in the

02:30:20 repairs direct uh a breach in the service duct is that something for the contracts team or someone else um i'm not sure if you're looking at the first sorry if you're looking at the first deficiency article 11.

02:30:37 that's the final bit penultimate the final sentence of that the particulars of that breach

02:30:44 i think that would have gone to um the to repairs direct and so absence of self closers and flats 44 and 50 153 which is over the page

02:30:56 50 153 which is over the page would that be repairs direct again yes uh

02:31:00 uh storage of items in common parts would that be for housing management rather than repairs housing management yes and lack of fire action notices whose responsibility was that

02:31:10 that that was um uh health and safety team janice ray can you help the panels to whether all of those deficiencies were remedied by the 14th of june june 2017

02:31:25 and i i expect so i can't recall can you remember whether you yourself were required to take particular action to remedy these deficiencies not myself

02:31:37 to remedy these deficiencies not myself i think janice ray would make sure that these actions went out to the teams i think what we did identify is that

02:31:45 is that that the health and safety committee and janice ray was overseeing deficiency notice in a separate process to the fra actions and i think it was identified that we really needed

02:31:58 it was identified that we really needed a much

02:31:59 a much uh much stronger management control over the deficiency notice actions so that as an executive team we could make sure that they were completed the actions that came out of deficiency notices

02:32:10 notices bear in mind your executive role and the fact you're a director of repairs direct as well

02:32:15 as well what did you do to ensure that those tasks that fell to repairs direct were done

02:32:21 done and done by the prescribed deadline of the 18th of may i think that that was um so those actions were delegated to graham webb and as a board we oversaw that and particularly barbara matthews who was on

02:32:33 particularly barbara matthews who was on the board had responsibility for managing

02:32:35 managing janice ray who managed the deficiency notices so it was very much her responsibility as well working with me to make sure that anything that was overdue was escalated and i think that is the

02:32:46 escalated and i think that is the issue that i was referring to is that we identified we needed a much closer management control over deficiency notices which was separate and outside of the fra

02:32:57 of the fra assessment process that we'd been focusing on now we're going to move on to a separate topic now which is maintenance of fire safety systems and could i ask you to go to paragraph 76 and 77 of your witness

02:33:10 to paragraph 76 and 77 of your witness statement

02:33:11 statement which is at tmo triple zero double zero 893 and internal 14 to 15.

02:33:25 now there you in 76 set out where responsibility lay 77 you say this elements of safety were nevertheless an important element of my job

02:33:35 job generally as an executive director but also specifically in relation to the work that was undertaken within the operations department by repairs direct i saw my safety role as providing leadership in the operations directorate

02:33:46 leadership in the operations directorate putting structures in place with competent staff and to show support for safety initiatives whenever possible i can recall receiving training on matters such as safety leadership from an external consultant called matt hodgson now

02:33:59 hodgson now to summarize this you weren't formally responsible for health and safety at the tmo

02:34:02 tmo that's plain from the evidence previously would you agree with that yes but you had the oversight responsibility for health and safety as an executive director

02:34:11 director yes and as the operations department and repairs direct carried out work to health and safety systems you had a responsibility for that is that right yes and you provided health and safety

02:34:22 yes and you provided health and safety leadership by putting structures in place

02:34:24 place and showing support for health and safety initiatives is that fair yes what structures are you referring to in paragraph

02:34:33 paragraph 77 at the top of the play at the top of the page putting structures in as an example when we were looking at the design of repairs direct and how that company structure and the management structure should be

02:34:45 management structure should be um devised we specifically felt that we should have a dedicated health and safety role that um in in repairs direct so it would

02:34:56 that um in in repairs direct so it would be

02:34:56 be that would be an example of that did you or

02:35:00 or von burch or indeed anyone else um organize

02:35:03 organize uh any specific training on the maintenance of fire safety systems for your staff whether in the operations directorate or at

02:35:11 at um i had an expectation that graham webb was um

02:35:15 was um managing the training and the health of the

02:35:18 the operatives within repairs direct and i believe he did have a training program and and put some focus on that and across the organization i know there was

02:35:29 across the organization i know there was specific training for our state services assistants our caretakers in the neighbourhood team and um i know yvonne butch and her team implemented a corporate wide e-learning training on

02:35:40 a corporate wide e-learning training on health and safety so there were a number of different aspects to it so were your expectations as to the detail and quality of health and safety training satisfied i think it's um it's an area that's

02:35:52 i think it's um it's an area that's large and i think it has to be ongoing and i did rely on some of the expertise from the health and safety team to advise adequately on what the training needs are for the

02:36:03 what the training needs are for the teams

02:36:04 teams but bearing in mind your ultimate executive responsibility were you satisfied as the quality and detail the health and safety training given to your staff

02:36:11 staff i think the e-learning module that we put in place covered a range of the health and safety for the organization and i think that was um was was was adequate at the time now can we look at the tmos fire safety

02:36:23 now can we look at the tmos fire safety strategy and what it says particularly about the maintenance of fire safety systems

02:36:27 systems and the strategy itself can be found at

02:36:34 tm00830598 and if we go to paragraph 1.1 on the first page and it says this as acknowledged in the tmo health and safety policy statement the company is fully committed to providing a safe and healthy environment

02:36:46 providing a safe and healthy environment for residents employees and contractors the area fire safety in particular is highlighted as being of significant importance in a residential setting and as such is an area which is subject to intensive inspection

02:36:58 to intensive inspection maintenance and assessment activity now flows from that that appears to be the intention that the tmo would have an and quotes intensive maintenance regime

02:37:09 intensive maintenance regime is that correct that was the intention

02:37:17 um yes from from that paragraph yes which is the fire safety strategy yeah can we turn to page three of this

02:37:30 document

02:37:34 you can turn if we can look

02:37:38 under this and we go um just sorry just looking at the first substantive bullet point at the top which starts inspection testing and maintenance of all fire safety systems plants and equipment

02:37:49 systems plants and equipment as per the requirements of the relevant british standard by competent contractors under a planned preventative maintenance regime in the case of emergency lighting the maintenance contractors

02:38:00 maintenance contractors regular checks are supplemented by monthly inspection and testing by the estate staff records are maintained of these checks now would you agree with the general proposition that

02:38:11 proposition that this bullet point this substance identifies the policy objective rather than the practical

02:38:17 practical arrangements by which the objective is to be achieved

02:38:24 um i'm not i'm not sure i understand the question sorry this sets out the objective

02:38:29 objective not the practical arrangements to achieve that objective would you agree with that proposition um well competent contractors under a planned preventative maintenance regime is

02:38:39 is is the application of the okay would you agree looking it slightly differently that there is no description here of

02:38:50 that there is no description here of what

02:38:51 what a planned preventative maintenance regime would look like would you agree with that yes i'd agree it's not in detail though and would you agree that there is no comprehensive or indeed any list of the fire safety measures that

02:39:03 list of the fire safety measures that would be subject to the preventative maintenance regime not in this document no

02:39:11 no and there is no mention for example that the smoke control system would require planned preventative maintenance would you agree with that not in that paragraph no i don't know if it's somewhere else in the document or develop this in due course but there

02:39:24 or develop this in due course but there is no list there of the relevant standards

02:39:26 standards to which systems should be maintained would you agree with that um it's not a detailed list i think it is an overview statement yeah and it doesn't identify which department or departments

02:39:38 department or departments would be responsible for maintaining fire safety systems does it not not in detail here i think it it's a strategy so it's meant to give an over overarching approach to our fire

02:39:50 over overarching approach to our fire safety

02:39:50 safety well let's look at the procedure that was drafted to supplement the policy and that the first version is dated the 10th of february 2012 and that can be found at tm00870933

02:40:08 now first of all were you familiar with this document during your time at the tma

02:40:13 tma um i knew of it but i didn't know in detail because um this was one of those areas that would have been

02:40:20 have been managed through mr madison and his team so you never read it not not indeed no no i don't think i would have done can we turn over to page two

02:40:29 two and paragraph 1.2

02:40:33 and there we have a list of systems sprinklers fire alarms wet and dry risers domestic smoke alarms fire extinguishers hose reels would you agree that there was no mention there of smoke control systems

02:40:45 systems not in that list no can you help us to why the smoke control system was not identified there um i i can't help in the drafting of this document no so you can't help in respect of any

02:40:57 no so you can't help in respect of any of the substance of this no so you wouldn't be able to assist why uh there's no detail as to how a planned preventative maintenance regime would be carried out in relation to communal fire doors or flat entrance

02:41:09 communal fire doors or flat entrance doors or door closers i can't because this sort of level of detail in terms of procedure i would have been drafted from the expertise of the health and safety team in conjunction with the contract

02:41:20 in conjunction with the contract management team and any other external guidance or resource that we needed and it really wouldn't be within my scope to comment on on this type of level of detail

02:41:32 detail now can we go back to the hodgson review from 2013

02:41:36 from 2013 and in particular some of the points he made in respect of planned maintenance and if we go to tmo 1 treble 0 3 1 2 4 and page 19

02:41:54 and it's the top of the page with the first paragraph which starts there is a policy

02:41:58 policy arrangement section in the kctmo policy however it does not adequately detail what risks the business is exposed to and lacks the finer detail to explain exactly what processes risk assessments

02:42:11 exactly what processes risk assessments british standard checks and tests best practice inspections etc should be implemented in order to fully meet the statutory and mandatory obligations in relation to the plant and equipment under kctmo control

02:42:22 under kctmo control across the estate the following issues require attention there are only a handful of arrangements in the policy many are missing eg pressure vessels working at height contractor management etc

02:42:34 contractor management etc and many of the fire arrangements have been bunched together and by doing so lack the detail in relation to what the planned preventative maintenance process should look like

02:42:42 look like eg all fire protection systems recorded together

02:42:46 together now mr hodgson made that point in 2013 that there appeared to be a lack of detail

02:42:53 detail in relation to the planned preventative program what it should look like do you remember that conclusion of his i don't recall it um i can see it here but i don't recall it at the time but

02:43:05 but i don't recall it at the time but what i would say is that um my expectation would have been that anthony parks at the time would have would have led on making sure the policies are

02:43:17 on making sure the policies are correct and that following up from this report

02:43:21 report redrafting and the correct policies were put in place with uh in conjunction with the contract management team and any other advice that we needed given that your department or sub departments within it would be involved

02:43:33 departments within it would be involved in those discussions did you make any contribution to ensuring these deficiencies were remedied

02:43:40 remedied i'm sure there was discussion in our in the monthly health and safety meetings in terms of my technical input i really don't have that technical background so it it wouldn't be for me to make comment

02:43:52 it it wouldn't be for me to make comment on

02:43:53 on and a ventilation system i i don't have that technical expertise now can we look at the fifth paragraph on this page which is the one at the very bottom of the screen at the moment which starts the policy arrangements and

02:44:06 which starts the policy arrangements and they refer to the purpose of this procedure is to identify the action to be taken by the tmo following a report of a breakdown or malfunction this is a reactive approach to health and safety when the real purpose of effective

02:44:18 when the real purpose of effective policy arrangements is to clearly define the planned preventative maintenance regime

02:44:22 regime that should be followed to cover statutory and mandatory processes to keep the tmo stock operating effectively and safely i.e is about compliance and not breakdown

02:44:32 breakdown now again mr hodgson makes the point that tmo has a reactive approach to maintenance would you agree with that as a first summary of his view i think that was his point at this point

02:44:44 i think that was his point at this point sorry that was his remark at this point in time

02:44:47 in time and i think we understood about um plan preventative maintenance and that was what we were working to to pick up this gap that's why we did this audit to make sure we understood what we needed to do

02:44:59 sure we understood what we needed to do now he recommended a full review of the property policy arrangements was that full review carried out i this would have been the responsibility of anthony parks on policy do you remember being involved

02:45:12 policy do you remember being involved in the in that review at all um not myself but i would have expected that to if it was happening to have happened with the technical teams so they can input the right technical

02:45:24 so they can input the right technical knowledge into policy decisions and so you won't be able to assist the panel on what if any policies were changed or what if any new policies were introduced no i think that's a health and safety team um i'm afraid no i couldn't

02:45:40 now can we turn to the topic of repairs direct

02:45:43 direct and in particular first of all oversight in the managerial role um just to summarize am i correct in thinking that from the date of its incorporation in

02:45:54 from the date of its incorporation in 2013

02:45:56 2013 reactive repairs were carried out by repairs direct yes that's right and repairs direct was a wholly owned subsidiary of the tmo is that correct yeah and as we touched on earlier you're a director of repairs direct

02:46:08 a director of repairs direct yes and uh along with uh you're a member of the board along with barbara matthews when she joined in 2015. yes that's right was anthony parks a director before barbara matthews joined can you remember

02:46:21 barbara matthews joined can you remember um yes i believe he was yeah and as a board member of repairs direct you have had an oversight role into health and safety is that right um i in all our roles we've got an

02:46:33 um i in all our roles we've got an element of health and safety but on the board i would have expected and did expect anthony parts and then barbara matthews to have the health and safety

02:46:41 safety oversight repairs direct and that i would have the operational response effectively but as you said earlier everyone in their business has a health and safety role i think that's a given

02:46:51 given an executive level yeah and so you had some function in that respect yes i do but i think we all had to take a focus in different areas it's you know it's a lot of work and we took different leads and that's

02:47:02 and we took different leads and that's where the responsibility sat on the now can we you referred to a dotted line responsibility earlier and i said we take you to the document and that document is the tmo board member's handbook

02:47:13 member's handbook and it can be found at tmo one trouble zero

02:47:17 zero three five zero eight and if we go to page 11 within that document

02:47:29 there we go and i suppose the first question is you can see the managing director of repairs direct md a dotted line uh through to executive director of operations off center and is that the dotted line

02:47:42 off center and is that the dotted line to which you were referring earlier

02:47:47 now um in your witness statement to paragraph 29 we don't need to go back to it but you say grain was directly responsible that's graham webb was directly accountable to the repairs direct board

02:47:58 accountable to the repairs direct board however i had a dotted line management function over him this meant that if graham wanted to apply for leave or if he needed support he could turn to me graham was in the same pay grade as me to reflect

02:48:09 to reflect the fact that repairs director was intended to be largely self-sufficient on a day-to-day basis now just to give some context for the panel and anyone listening mr webb was md from january 2016

02:48:21 mr webb was md from january 2016 until november 2017 is that correct i think so i i recall december uh 215 but yes there yes yes now can you help us what does that

02:48:32 yes now can you help us what does that or what did that dotted line mean in practice i mean in practice somebody

02:48:37 somebody has to have some point of contact into the organization and and so it really is about um annual leave um some basic

02:48:48 annual leave um some basic um you know so so some employment oversight

02:48:51 oversight but also you know if he did want to talk to me he could do um we could discuss his general progress and making sure that he had the resources in place in md to make

02:49:02 to make to fulfill his his responsibilities now the impression from this organogram is that you as executive director of operations had direct responsibility for the management of the md

02:49:14 management of the md for repairs direct is that a fair and accurate summary no i don't think so i think it is a dotted line and actually the manager it was a separate limited company and he was

02:49:23 was responsible to the board and that was a collective group of people under their responsibilities as company directors and and he was accountable to that board now can we talk look to a 2016 um version

02:49:39 look to a 2016 um version of the organogram which is at tm01014959 and page 13.

02:49:55 and page 13. now you'll see there you at the top the dotted line to the md of repairs direct has gone can you explain why what's the date of

02:50:06 can you explain why what's the date of this one

02:50:06 this one this one's 16 16.

02:50:11 no i i can't explain why sorry no it is missing

02:50:15 missing okay now can we um now move on to the topic of concerns with the quality and efficiency of repairs direct service and could we first of all turn to rbk

02:50:25 to rbk treble 0-60576

02:50:36 treble 0-60576 now as its frontis piece indicates this is a final audit report may 2014 into repairs direct conducted by rbkc first of all did you receive a copy of this report i think it would have done

02:50:47 this report i think it would have done yes yes

02:50:48 yes yes and did you read it yes now can we turn to page six within this document

02:50:56 and if we look at the last paragraph on this page it explains that it was an interim audit and a follow-up audit would be undertaken on the progress and direction of travel of the service

02:51:08 travel of the service after a full year of operation and if we can

02:51:11 can stay within this document but go on to page 12.

02:51:18 page 12. and you'll see in the top left hand corner management action plan underneath that repairs quality monitoring and you'll see there in areas of concern

02:51:29 and you'll see there in areas of concern identified at the bottom of the far left hand column and the first one identified is general level of poor quality workmanship and if we go over the page

02:51:41 we'll see the third bullet point from the top failure by some operatives to adhere to basic health and safety processes

02:51:49 processes final bullet point quality of work produced by subcontractors is not included in surveys and if we can turn to the management response of page 14

02:52:03 and we see there the third bullet uh bullet point on that page in the bottom half of that page

02:52:09 page says greater focus on the quality of workmanship during the post inspection process

02:52:15 process fourth bullet point says there will be further health and safety training with random spot checks on both employees and subcontractors now first of all did you agree with the analysis of failings that was described to be balanced and

02:52:27 that was described to be balanced and fair in the opening line of this management response at the top of the page um i think that we were five months into a new service and and this um did

02:52:39 a new service and and this um did identify some of the issues so yes that would be fair and can you remember now what practical steps did you yourself take to remedy uh that the identified

02:52:50 to remedy uh that the identified failings

02:52:51 failings so um the managing director was directly responsible but there are a number of actions you can see here and we worked our way through those and we

02:53:02 worked our way through those and we discussed that at board level and there was a lot of work in terms i know graham was doing a lot of work in terms of

02:53:12 these particular items focus groups so for example we had a lot of work in the contact center

02:53:19 center on our processes a lot of work on improving the i.t systems we did health and safety gap analysis more training so we had a range of

02:53:30 more training so we had a range of different

02:53:31 different elements to cover and what i would say is that we had just taken over and we were five months in and so the staff are cheapied from wilmot dixon from the previous contractor so some of

02:53:43 from the previous contractor so some of their culture and experiences would have come from

02:53:45 come from morrison which i mentioned earlier then trippied over into wilmot dixon and then cheapered over into uh transferred into repairs direct so five months in you would have to do a lot of work around

02:53:57 lot of work around culture and training and starting to embed your processes so it was at that point in time and there was

02:54:03 there was there were lots of different work streams when uh mr webb started at the tmo did the board or indeed anyone else brief him on the conclusions of this audit and what had been done to remedy the

02:54:14 what had been done to remedy the deficiencies um so sorry mr black mr webb mr webb can you repeat your questions yes of course uh when mr webb started

02:54:26 yes of course uh when mr webb started started work at the tmo so whether it's december 2015 or january 216. um did you or anyone else brief him on the contents of this audit report and

02:54:37 on the contents of this audit report and what had been done to remedy the identified deficiencies yeah he he would have been aware of of this report and also sorry can i stop you would have been or was um

02:54:48 you would have been or was um i can't specifically recall at the time that so you're assuming he was briefed yep okay

02:54:55 now could i now take you to an email from andrea newton of the lancaster west residents association and that's at tm01026082

02:55:11 now if i could ask you to go to page three within that email chain

02:55:20 and there you see at the top the email from andrea newton email sent on the 9th of march 2016 at 8 59 addressed to you as well as mr black and others but you're the specified as the

02:55:31 others but you're the specified as the addressee

02:55:33 addressee and she raised a number of concerns about the repair service being provided saying i feel there was a huge lack of coordination with the t within tmo and rd repairs direct and

02:55:45 within tmo and rd repairs direct and that's

02:55:45 that's set out in the fifth line of that email she then goes on to explain uh the substance

02:55:53 substance in detail of her concerns now my first question is at the time was it your assessment that there was a lack of coordination whether it's huge or not between the tmo

02:56:05 whether it's huge or not between the tmo and repairs direct

02:56:10 uh i'm not i'm not quite sure what between the team and rd i i think um there were a huge number of processes um in a responsive repair service

02:56:21 responsive repair service and the resident's um entry point into the organization would have been through the contact center so i'm not sure how wide that means in terms of the tmo and the contact centre is where repairs

02:56:34 and the contact centre is where repairs residents would report repairs and then they'd be raised and repairs direct would complete them so i think that's what she's referring to

02:56:42 to just put go further down into email you'll see third paragraph below the fifth line which starts but despite despite management at tmo literally micromanaging specific repairs

02:56:53 literally micromanaging specific repairs that are then passed on to the relevant people within the repairs department staff are seeming to completely ignore procedure or or are incapable of getting bookings finalized and contractors to arrive to the jobs on the right day

02:57:05 the jobs on the right day if at all and then she goes on to give other practical examples was that a concern that was more broadly expressed by residents in tmo housing stock to you at

02:57:18 residents in tmo housing stock to you at the time

02:57:19 the time i think we were we were trying to get feedback from residents and we were always working on trying to improve and one of the areas that needed

02:57:30 and one of the areas that needed improvement was the contact center diagnosis and then the planning process which is about getting the jobs to the contractors and then we had a series of issues with

02:57:41 and then we had a series of issues with subcontractors and appointment systems and we also had processes to get right with materials suppliers

02:57:49 suppliers so there are there are at least 10 to 15 points

02:57:53 points at which every responsive repair could could uh could create a a interruption so to speak and so i think it's it's not straightforward it's quite

02:58:05 it's it's not straightforward it's quite complex

02:58:05 complex and i think that's what we're working on on that and that's what she's referring to

02:58:09 to i think my question was put differently is andrea newton's email is that an exemplar of broader concerns that were expressed to you via residents when you ask for their

02:58:20 via residents when you ask for their feedback

02:58:23 no no i don't i don't think so i mean i i i can't this is this is one email i'm not sure that i saw other information from residents expressing that but i think we definitely knew the areas we needed to

02:58:34 definitely knew the areas we needed to focus on which i've just sort of gone over with you okay so i'm mindful of the time this is probably as convenient point as i need to break right

02:58:42 right well thank you very much um yes we'll stop at this point as jefferson said we can all go and get some lunch we'll resume at two o'clock please

02:58:50 please okay and remember not to talk to anyone about your evidence or anything related to it

02:58:55 to it over the break all right thank you thank you very much you'd like to give the usher please

02:59:08 thank you two o'clock then please thanks

02:59:23 you