Evidence from Andrew McQuatt, Max Fordham project engineer who proposed the ambitious 0.15 U-value target and suggested insulation materials. Admits never checking fire safety requirements in Approved Document B, assumed architect was responsible for compliance, and had no previous experience with high-rise overcladding.
00:00:14 here
00:00:24 [Music] good morning everyone welcome to today's hearing today we're going to begin by hearing some evidence from a representative of the emini subcontractor max fordham i
00:00:37 of the emini subcontractor max fordham i think
00:00:37 think yes that's correct yes ms grange yes mr andrew mcquatt please
00:00:55 i do solemnly sincerely and truly declare
00:00:59 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 mr mccott would you like to sit down and make yourself comfortable
00:01:14 yes it's strange yes thank you thank you very much for attending to get today to give your evidence we we really appreciate that if you have any difficulty understanding anything that i'm asking you please ask me to repeat the question or
00:01:26 please ask me to repeat the question or put it in a different way and if you need a break at any point please just let us know and also try and keep your voice up so that the transcriber who's sitting to your right can take a note of what you're saying
00:01:38 can take a note of what you're saying now you've made one statement to the inquiry date of the 21st of september 2018. can we turn that up it's at max3017292
00:01:50 and if we can look on page 27 of that statement
00:01:54 statement is that your signature there yes and we can see the date actually i think it's the 27th of september 2018 is that correct
00:02:03 correct i think i'd said the 21st of 27th yeah thank you
00:02:06 thank you have you read that recently yes i have and are its content's true yes great and have you discussed your evidence with anyone before coming here today
00:02:16 today no great now just a few questions in terms of your background if we look at paragraph six of your statement on page two
00:02:26 there we can see you helpfully explain that you graduate graduated from the university of edinburgh with an mn mechanical electric mechanical engineering degree
00:02:37 engineering degree and then you began work at max fordham in edinburgh as a graduate engineer in june 2007
00:02:43 june 2007 and then you became a partner in the llp [Music]
00:02:46 [Music] in max fordham on the 5th of may 2011 and you remain working at max fordham to this date and is it right you're still working at max fordham that's correct right
00:02:58 and then in the next paragraph at paragraph 7 you say that during your time working at max fordham prior to working on the grenfell tower project you'd worked on a range of project sectors
00:03:09 project sectors and we can see that included housing individual private dwellings further education colleges offices cultural schools um there had you worked on a high-rise
00:03:20 um there had you worked on a high-rise residential project before the grenfell tower project no what about high-rise residential projects involving the over-cladding of the building no now we know that on the grenfell
00:03:34 no now we know that on the grenfell project max fordham was appointed as building services engineers on the project that's correct isn't it yes and acousticians but the acoustics were run from a separate heroines and
00:03:46 were run from a separate heroines and acousticians yeah thank you and is it right that such building services engineers are sometimes referred to as m e engineers standing for mechanical and electrical that's right yes yeah and you were the
00:03:59 that's right yes yeah and you were the project
00:04:00 project engineer on the grenfeld project is that right that's right and is it correct that in your role as project engineer you were responsible for the day-to-day running of the project for max fordham
00:04:11 project for max fordham yes and we know from your statement that you were involved in the project between the 31st of may 2012 and the 23rd of may 2013 when your involvement with the project
00:04:23 when your involvement with the project ended and you became involved in other projects for max fordham is that right yes thank you now we're going to focus today
00:04:31 today because this is what we're looking at in module one on the exterior of the building and in particular with you on the insulation material that was being used on the spangles and the columns
00:04:42 used on the spangles and the columns and i first want to ask you some just general questions about the use of insulation in the construction industry is it right that the purpose of adding insulation to a building is to improve its thermal efficiency yes i
00:04:54 improve its thermal efficiency yes i agree with that and when people speak of improving thermal efficiency that means reducing the rate at which heat travels from a hotter element to a colder one is that correct
00:05:04 correct yes and does that mean improving the retention of heat in winter and avoiding overheating in the summer yes
00:05:14 and is it right that the rate at which a product for use in construction conducts heat can be measured in watts per meter squared
00:05:22 squared kelvin that's right yes yep and is this known as a lambda value yes yeah and is it right that the lower
00:05:33 yes yeah and is it right that the lower the lambda value the better because this means fewer units of energy are being lost per meter squared
00:05:39 squared that's right yeah the lower the lambda value the thinner the material would need to be yes i understand
00:05:49 now in relation to the building as a whole is it right that when assessing its thermal performance you need to consider how well or badly each of the building elements performs
00:05:59 performs yes and is it right that the building element is a part of the building so for example the walls the windows the roof is that correct yeah that's correct and
00:06:10 is that correct yeah that's correct and is it right that the thermal resistance of each building element is shown by its u-value yes and this is also measured in watts
00:06:22 yes and this is also measured in watts per meter square kelvin as well is that correct that's right so yeah i think that's what's per meter squared kelvin would be the u value the the lambda value isn't doesn't have the meter squared it's it's to do with
00:06:35 meter squared it's it's to do with it's to do with the linear i see thickness
00:06:38 thickness yeah okay and again here is it right that the lower the u value the better yes in terms of thermal efficiency
00:06:49 yes in terms of thermal efficiency efficiency
00:06:51 and is it correct that generally i think you've already confirmed this that you will need less of a material with a lower lambda value to achieve the desired u-value than you would of a material with a higher lambda value that's correct yes
00:07:05 now in terms of the building regulations do you agree that the u-value of a building element is important because there are rules on how high it can be under the building regulations i do yes
00:07:16 under the building regulations i do yes [Applause] and um were you aware at the time that the statutory guidance about this is contained in approved document l which is one of the practical guidance documents issued pursuant to
00:07:28 documents issued pursuant to the building regulations yes and is it right that on the grenfell project you were looking at approved document l1b
00:07:40 yes um you look so you want to add something no i don't i don't i just i always get confused between the two there's parts a and b and there's parts one and two and
00:07:52 parts one and two and often it's i always have to look up to tell yeah which one's fair enough you're understood we'll go to it in a moment and did you take approved document l into consideration when you were setting the
00:08:03 consideration when you were setting the u value for grenfell tower i personally
00:08:16 yes i took it into consideration as far as
00:08:20 as i checked that the u values that were proposed
00:08:24 proposed we're in line with yeah
00:08:29 yes yeah thank you now let's go to approve document l1b this is
00:08:38 inq3011283 now can you confirm that this was the version of adl in force at the time you were working on the grenfell project we can see it's the 2010 edition and it incorporates further 2010 and
00:08:50 and it incorporates further 2010 and 2011 amendments we get that in the bottom right hand side can you see that yes
00:08:55 yes yes i think it is the document that we were using thank you and if we turn on to page 19 we can see in the right hand column that
00:09:07 we can see in the right hand column that there's a heading renovation of thermal elements
00:09:11 elements and it makes clear there that for the purposes of this approved document renovation of a thermal element through the provision of a new layer means either of the following activities
00:09:23 means either of the following activities cladding or rendering the external surface of the thermal element or dry dry lining the internal surface of a thermal element do you see that there i do yes and was
00:09:34 do you see that there i do yes and was that consistent with your understanding that that
00:09:36 that that that's what uh renovation of a thermal element meant yes thank you now the next paragraph at paragraph 5.8 explains that where the renovation
00:09:48 explains that where the renovation covers a certain amount of the surface the performance of the whole thermal element should achieve or better the u-value in table
00:09:57 table three is that correct yes
00:10:02 and we're going to look at table three in a moment and see what it said in terms of u
00:10:09 u values and the guidance it gave but before we go over to table three if we just look while we're in this part of the document over on page 20
00:10:20 at paragraph 5.9 and if we can just read this i'm going to read this out to you so 5.9 appears in the left-hand column
00:10:32 so 5.9 appears in the left-hand column towards the bottom of that page i wonder if we could just blow it up a little bit more
00:10:40 there we go can you see that there 5.9 yes and it says if achievement of the relevant u values set out in column b of table three is not technically or
00:10:51 of table three is not technically or functionally feasible or would not achieve a simple playback of 15 years or less the element should be upgraded to the best standard that is technically and functionally feasible
00:11:02 functionally feasible and which can be achieved with a simple payback of no greater than 15 years and then there's some guidance on that approach in appendix a now i just want to check did you understand that at the time
00:11:13 understand that at the time of the grenfell project that if you couldn't achieve the you values that were set out in the guidance here you had to achieve whatever was the best standard that was technically and
00:11:25 standard that was technically and functionally feasible yes i did yeah now then at the bottom of this page we get table three and is it right that on the grenfell
00:11:38 and is it right that on the grenfell project
00:11:40 project we needed to be looking at the it's the second item down uh under element wall external or internal insulation is that right
00:11:52 internal insulation is that right that's right yes yeah so this is what was relevant to grenfell and we can see in the right hand column column b that the improved u value the watts per
00:12:03 that the improved u value the watts per meter squared kelvin had to be or the guidance was saying 0.30
00:12:08 0.30 is that correct that's great yeah thank you
00:12:14 now just before we leave approved document l um i just want to look back at page four at towards the beginning of this document
00:12:24 document and on the right hand side we see a heading consideration of technical risk yes thank you
00:12:33 and here we get a paragraph and i'll just read the key parts to you it says building work to existing dwellings must satisfy all the technical requirements set out and then it
00:12:45 requirements set out and then it explains which regulations of the building regulations and then it says this when considering the incorporation of energy efficiency measures in dwellings attention should also be paid in
00:12:56 attention should also be paid in particular to the need to comply with and we've got part b fire safety part c site preparation and then other approved documents are also mentioned in that list do you see that
00:13:08 mentioned in that list do you see that there i do yes and again at the time of the grenfell project were you aware that approved document
00:13:14 document l made this link back to for example part b fire safety making clear that attention also needed to be paid
00:13:25 to be paid to those parts of the approved documents i don't recall um reading that part yeah i think i think any i think i would have held that assumption yes but without
00:13:40 held that assumption yes but without yeah being aware of that paragraph yeah yeah and just to be clear we see this paragraph in other parts of a pre-document l whether it's dwellings or
00:13:47 or non-dwellings it has a similar
00:13:52 statement about attention being paid to other parts of the approved documents but i think what you just said is although you weren't aware of this specific paragraph you did have a general awareness that you needed to be
00:14:03 general awareness that you needed to be aware of other parts of approved documents is that right absolutely thank you i mean i guess if i put that in the context for a building services engineer
00:14:12 engineer we would need to we design pipes and duct work
00:14:15 duct work that travels through and around buildings yes and we often we often have to take a piece of dot work through a compartment wall for example so we would refer to part b
00:14:26 refer to part b because part b would give us the rules that we needed to know yes for for those elements so yes i was aware of
00:14:34 aware of part b in that context and exactly and picking up on that you also might with those pipe work and duct work
00:14:43 duct work locations have to think about insulation in those areas might new as well the insulation off of pipe work and duct work in compartments you might have to think about insulation
00:14:55 you might have to think about insulation around the pipe work is that correct um yes yes yes not necessarily in relation to part b i think if i was thinking of insulation around pipe work i would be thinking
00:15:06 thinking more about particle and energy conservation i see things like that okay well presumably you'd be thinking about part b and uh
00:15:17 part b and uh in relation to things like fire stopping if you were putting ducts through existing walls wouldn't you that's right yes
00:15:28 now i now want to turn to some questions about your understanding of the requirements relating to fire safety at the time you worked on the grenfell project
00:15:38 project um now were you familiar in general with schedule one to the building regulations and the fact that there were functional requirements set out therein yes and were you aware that there was
00:15:50 yes and were you aware that there was part b
00:15:50 part b fire safety within schedule one of the building regulations yes
00:15:58 were you familiar with approved document b had you ever had to look at that in your work as a mechanical electrical engineer yes i think i think it's the approved
00:16:10 yes i think i think it's the approved documents that you would go to on a day-to-day basis to when you're dealing with the building regulations issues you would go to the approved document part b as your kind of first stop yeah and in practice how would you
00:16:22 yeah and in practice how would you access those approved documents did you have them
00:16:25 have them in hard copy in the office or did you look at them electronically tend to look at them electronically yeah and you would probably look at the index do a word search for the types of things that you
00:16:36 search for the types of things that you were you were thinking about at that particular time yeah so that was a common occurrence as part of your day-to-day job yes thank you and
00:16:47 yes thank you and did you have an awareness of the b4 requirements in relation to external flame spread was that something that was on your radar no no
00:16:59 and what was your understanding of the purpose
00:17:02 purpose of something like approved document b what did you understand the purpose of it to be
00:17:08 i understood that if you if you follow the guidance in the approved documents then you are then you are showing compliance with
00:17:19 compliance with the functional requirements of the building regulations so you were if you were operating within the bounds of the approved documents you were
00:17:26 were in a safe place yeah in terms of compliance yeah now
00:17:33 yeah now at any stage when you were working on the grenfell project did you come to read approved document b on fire safety or any part of it
00:17:48 i i think i
00:17:52 i would have accessed a proof document b probably when we were discussing um elements like the dry riser and about moving moving the inlet valve
00:18:03 and about moving moving the inlet valve to the dry riser i know i know i would have i would have checked to prove document because that would be my go-to place to check on the rules for that sort of thing but um i certainly didn't
00:18:14 thing but um i certainly didn't um read it cover to cover no and and i i certainly didn't ever look up
00:18:20 up um part b4 no more specifically then when you were considering what materials to be used as insulation in the tower making suggestions about those materials
00:18:32 making suggestions about those materials and we're going to come on to look at what you did in that regard in a moment when you were doing that did you
00:18:38 you ever come to consider approved document be on fire safety no i didn't who did you think within the design team would be considering the requirements of approved document b
00:18:50 the requirements of approved document b relevant to the insulation of the external wall i would have thought the architect who was designing that element would
00:19:01 who was designing that element would have been looking at that and it wouldn't have surprised me if they had seeked further guidance from other parties like the fire engineer but that would have been my interface probably on that would have
00:19:12 my interface probably on that would have been with the architect yeah thank you um
00:19:20 now if we can just briefly look at approved document b this is clg50224 and if we start at page 93
00:19:31 this is the beginning of the b4 section which you've already explained you didn't look at during the project but i just want to ask you a couple of quick questions about this on page 95
00:19:46 in the right hand column towards the bottom of that page we get a statement there in the first paragraph where it says the external envelope of a building should
00:19:57 external envelope of a building should not provide a medium for fire spread if it's likely to be a risk to health and safety the use of combustible materials in the cladding system and extensive cavities may present such a risk in tall buildings
00:20:08 risk in tall buildings now you see that there and i appreciate you you didn't come to specifically look at this on the project but were you generally aware at the time of the project that the use of combustible materials in the cladding
00:20:20 of combustible materials in the cladding system
00:20:21 system and extensive cavities might present such a risk in tall buildings no it wasn't
00:20:29 were you aware that there was specific guidance given in a proof document b about insulation materials and their combustibility no it wasn't so if we just look at one
00:20:41 no it wasn't so if we just look at one more thing in the proof document b on page 96 we get paragraph 12.7 if we can blow that up there we see it insulated materials products so it says
00:20:53 insulated materials products so it says in a building with a story 18 meters or more above ground level any insulation product
00:20:58 product filler material not including gasket sealants and similar etcetera used in the external wall construction should be of limited combustibility do you see that there yes and is it right that you weren't
00:21:10 yes and is it right that you weren't aware at the time that insulation products on buildings above 18 meters should be something called limited combustibility that's great had you ever heard the term
00:21:22 that's great had you ever heard the term limited combustibility being used about the fire performance of materials such as
00:21:27 such as insulation no had you ever heard of the term class naught or national class naught about building materials including insulating
00:21:39 building materials including insulating materials
00:21:41 materials i couldn't i can't recall with any certainty there's been so you know from between then and now there's been so much talk of things like this and it's really difficult i understand to pin that down whether i
00:21:52 understand to pin that down whether i knew about that or not um
00:21:55 sorry sorry we do specify things like cables and and cables will also have classifications like those so yeah maybe in terms of that sort of thing then perhaps yeah i
00:22:06 that sort of thing then perhaps yeah i was
00:22:07 was aware in that context okay in your time at max fordham have you ever attended any courses or other training
00:22:15 training on the building regulations and the associated guidance including an approved document b on fire safety
00:22:24 um i wouldn't say we we had a you know we never had one particular lecture that could with that heading that's that's brings to mind i guess one of the ways that we
00:22:35 guess one of the ways that we that we worked as i kind of said before the the approved documents where are you know they're our go-to document in terms of the way the way that we're trained
00:22:43 trained would be shown by our supervisors to look at these documents and to reference them
00:22:48 them and then things like often when we have cpds
00:22:52 cpds so people would come into our practice and they would maybe give us a talk on a certain subject and that subject would never be i'm coming in to do a talk on the building regulations but it'd be very common for
00:23:03 common for a manufacturer to come in and for them to have some slides on the building regulations as part of a talk so i i i would say there's throughout my career
00:23:14 i would say there's throughout my career the topic of building regulations and how products might you know if a manufacturer comes in to talk about something then they might reference the building regulations and yeah now you
00:23:26 yeah now you you were talking about cpd there and you mentioned i think a couple of times that manufacturers would come in and talk to you
00:23:32 you is it right that a lot of the cpd that was done
00:23:36 was done through max fordham was as a result of manufacturers coming in talking to you about specific project products which then might touch on compliance issues
00:23:47 issues yes i think what we sort of define as cpd
00:23:50 cpd is when someone comes in and has a talk to us yeah um but then there might be a sort of broader sense of cpd where we have our own internal lunchtime talks and graduate lectures and things like that which again but
00:24:01 and things like that which again but they would also touch on building regulations matters if they were relevant
00:24:05 relevant yeah but i think you've confirmed that it was common am i right for manufacturers to come in and give cpd type tools yeah it's one of the ways that they they use to get you thinking about their
00:24:16 they use to get you thinking about their products and their their name and so they use that as a common yeah at the time of the grenfell project were you aware of any other industry guidance documents which were
00:24:27 industry guidance documents which were relevant to external wall construction or the materials to be used for example for an insulation product
00:24:35 no so if i said and that there might have been guidance by something called the center for windows and cladding technology the cwct would you have ever come to look at that no
00:24:47 come to look at that no now just before we get into what happened on the project and your involvement in the the insulation issue i want to just explore briefly max
00:24:59 issue i want to just explore briefly max fordham's contractual responsibilities on the project and the scope of works that they were doing now we know that the initial proposal from max fordham was a fee proposal put forward by your colleague bill watts
00:25:11 put forward by your colleague bill watts were you aware of that at the time you were working on the project
00:25:22 i can honestly remember don't worry so let's just look at that feed proposal this is max6075
00:25:35 and this is the initial fee proposal i think there was a subsequent one that was very similar and this one was dated the 21st of june 2012.
00:25:44 2012. did you ever see any documents like this or any other contractual terms relevant to max fordham's appointment to the grenfell project
00:25:55 it it's very yeah again it's very difficult to say within absolute certainty that i saw this but all i can say is it is it's quite normal working on a project to
00:26:06 to have a look at the offer to check it to make sure
00:26:09 make sure you're doing the right things yeah so you may well have seen this i mean sorry carry on no i saw i may well have seen this yeah okay just looking at this we can see in the
00:26:21 just looking at this we can see in the first part under the heading scope um three paragraphs down there's a a sentence that begins we understand that the priorities of the gram of the refurbishment of grenfell tower
00:26:33 of the refurbishment of grenfell tower are as follows and then there's a list of priorities and the third one there is improving the thermal efficiency and visual appearance of the facade possibly complementary to calc now just
00:26:46 possibly complementary to calc now just breaking that down did you understand that one of max fordham's roles was to help improve the thermal efficiency and visual appearance of the facade sorry thermal efficiency of the facade
00:26:58 sorry thermal efficiency of the facade yes yeah and were you aware that it was one of the key priorities of the refurbishment of grenfell tower yes i recall my very first visit to the tower getting off
00:27:09 tower getting off the the train station looking up at the tower
00:27:12 tower with bill and bill talking me through the
00:27:16 the what the job was and what we were going to do and he very clearly we're looking at it
00:27:21 at it over cladding that was that was going to happen that was part of it so it was very much embedded in my mind that that was going to be part of this job thank you yeah and was it also your understanding that visual
00:27:32 understanding that visual appearance was a priority for the refurbishment
00:27:39 um i can't see why it wouldn't have been you know you're making such a huge intervention to this this tower you're obviously going to change its appearance by installation you were going to change
00:27:50 by installation you were going to change its appearance in a really major way yeah and and so yeah yeah but bringing and i think we've said here um with the calc project and you've got the new academy and leisure centers next door so
00:28:02 academy and leisure centers next door so they want i think they wanted to help tie all together yeah thank you now if we look at the bottom of this page um
00:28:13 for a moment if we can just see them in the bottom yes so what's proposed here is that the offer for mechanical and electrical services is based upon max ford and providing a design in accordance with and then
00:28:25 design in accordance with and then there's reference to the ace schedule of services part gb mechanical and electrical engineering detailed design and building so this is a standard form document that was produced
00:28:36 standard form document that was produced by the association for consultancy and engineering ace and again were you aware that the terms of max fordham's appointment were pursuant to that type of agreement
00:28:50 that type of agreement i believe i believe i would i am aware of the
00:28:53 of the ac arguments and that's a common thing for us to use and in terms of referencing it i wouldn't have gone to it
00:29:03 it and as my role then i wouldn't have gone to that on a regular basis i would have allowed my supervisor to kind of understand the finer details of the ac agreement and make sure i was on the
00:29:14 make sure i was on the on the right track i understand yeah and we see there that what in the next line at the end of that first paragraph under m e services it says we have
00:29:25 under m e services it says we have included for all services described in part g2
00:29:28 part g2 and the following other services in part g3
00:29:31 g3 and then we get two services that are particularly relevant to the work that max fordham did in relation to the um thermal efficiency of the tower it's g311 develop energy efficient
00:29:43 it's g311 develop energy efficient strategies for the fabric and engineering services and then g317 work in connection with assisting the architect
00:29:52 architect in obtaining building regulation compliance part l you see those two things there yes at the time of the project did you understand that those were two of the
00:30:03 understand that those were two of the key services that max fordham was providing on the job i i believe i would have done um i think these additional services are something that we quite commonly
00:30:16 that we quite commonly would put into yeah and one of these because it's it's a place where we can add we can add value to our our offers so that's quite common things i believe i would have been aware of
00:30:27 i would have been aware of yes understood and i think um and those do appear in the final version of the the the signed ac agreement with the tmo between the tmo and max ford and we we've got that document and did you
00:30:40 we've got that document and did you understand that max fordham was responsible on the project for the provision of consultancy services and advice
00:30:46 advice in relation to energy strategy and sustainability pursuant to the the contract with the tmo brexit yes yeah
00:30:58 now the contract that was subsequently signed in fact incorporated the ac schedule of services part gc not part gb did you have any involvement in that
00:31:09 involvement in that no i didn't no fine
00:31:13 now in terms of others that were appointed on the project when did you become aware that studio e had been appointed as architect on the project
00:31:24 for me as soon as i started on the project
00:31:27 project they were they were already the architects and i was i was introduced so bill had already laid the groundwork for setting the project up and so by the time i came on to the project i was very much being introduced
00:31:38 project i was very much being introduced to
00:31:40 to this is the team this is what's going to happen yeah run with the start start on the design work essentially yeah were you also aware that x over had been engaged by the tmo
00:31:52 engaged by the tmo to provide some fire safety engineering services
00:31:56 services yes i think i think it was yeah because i did
00:32:01 i did ask them some questions on on the smoke vent system so yeah i knew that they were involved now if we can look now at an email um this is sca403568
00:32:13 email um this is sca403568 i want the second email down on that page
00:32:17 page um sent at twenty one twenty now this is not an email that you were involved in it's a chain between mr coshell
00:32:26 coshell of studio e and mr soons at studio e but i just want to ask you something about it so um i want to look in particular at the
00:32:37 um i want to look in particular at the last paragraph um he says there i feel first i need to acknowledge receipt ask to meet then walk the site with him to understand the scope described
00:32:48 to understand the scope described probably with neil and then he says this we are a little green on process and technicality so i proposed some rapid
00:32:57 rapid cdp i think that should read cpd mf being my first port of call and then he said i'll hold off circulating this until we understand their thinking on
00:33:08 until we understand their thinking on consultants can you see that there yes again great now this is a very early email that mr soon sends to mr kushal about the prospect of studio e being involved in the grenfell
00:33:21 studio e being involved in the grenfell project
00:33:22 project and when mr soon gave evidence he confirmed that mf there mf being my first port of call was max fordham
00:33:30 fordham yeah um now can you help us as to whether studio e did ever in fact approach max fordham for some
00:33:39 some rapid cpd on the project
00:33:44 so yeah as we've said this is a long time before the start of my involvement in the project and all i could add to that would be i know from looking at our email records
00:33:56 i know from looking at our email records that
00:33:57 that um there was other people at max fordham who
00:34:00 who who seemed to have conversations whose did i think i think one person did go to site with with bruce possibly before before i was involved i was i only recently became aware of
00:34:11 was i only recently became aware of this yeah when i started on the project i i'd assumed i was the first max photo engineer to be shown around the building but only recently i discovered that that's not necessarily the case maybe
00:34:22 that's not necessarily the case maybe some other people had done earlier on sort of
00:34:24 sort of in perhaps in february time yeah but i i couldn't add anything else to to what they might have said or yeah okay in his evidence mr soon when asked about this said he thought
00:34:36 when asked about this said he thought that involved a consultation which took place by phone can we just be clear that that wasn't a consultation with you it wasn't with me
00:34:48 consultation with you it wasn't with me was it your understanding when you were working on the project and when you were involved
00:34:53 involved that studioe were looking to max fordham to provide guidance generally in respect of process and technicality
00:35:08 i think what i could answer that by seeing i think what studio we were looking
00:35:15 looking to us to do yeah were to help them work out whether it was even possible to replace a heating system
00:35:23 system and a hot water system in a tower while it was occupied without interrupting the supply of water or heat to any of you know to those flats
00:35:32 flats it was a complex complex problem and i would clearly that's the the why we why we are there as sub-consultants to help student with
00:35:43 sub-consultants to help student with areas that they are unable to deal with and then obviously that's why they wanted us in to help them work out whether the heating system could be replaced and these challenges could be met
00:35:54 could be met yeah so i think in terms of what studio e were leaning on us it would have been in quite rightly in the areas that we were employed to
00:36:05 the areas that we were employed to give advice on like the heating and hot water system and in relation specifically to the insulation of the tower and improving the thermal efficiency with the overcladding did you ever get the impression that studio e
00:36:16 ever get the impression that studio e were relying heavily on max fordham helping them understand how to go about that kind of project
00:36:31 i don't i don't think so i think if obviously we'll come on to the emails and the emails focus heavily on installation but if you if you don't take the insulation into account just yet
00:36:41 just yet there wasn't a there wasn't emails asking us how how we should do other elements of the of the
00:36:48 of the cladding system right you know so i know i i didn't i didn't feel like we were being asked really at those early stages to comment on the on the technicalities
00:36:59 to comment on the on the technicalities of the
00:36:59 of the of the facade in your dealings with studio e on the project did those dealings ever suggest to you that they might be inexperienced with regards to technical issues
00:37:10 with regards to technical issues connected with the refurbishment
00:37:15 i knew that they i knew that the project engineer that i was working with and adrian i knew he hadn't also hadn't done a high-rise when we're working because when when we
00:37:27 when we're working because when when we were walking around the tower he told me as such um but i just i i it was my experience that
00:37:38 people often do everyone has everyone does something for the first time and so that didn't really ring alarm bells for me that was just the architect i was working with and who sat below bruce so i wasn't
00:37:50 sat below bruce so i wasn't viewing it as a i wasn't assessing studio e
00:37:53 studio e as a practice it was just between between the two of us as two people working on a job and and i i knew um i knew i felt supported
00:38:04 and i i knew um i knew i felt supported but i couldn't comment on yeah on how they felt thank you and and you mentioned adrian there was that adrian jess at studio yes thank you let's just look at mr
00:38:15 yes thank you let's just look at mr soon's witness statement for a moment this is sca 3014273 at page 32 and i want to look at paragraph 64
00:38:27 and i want to look at paragraph 64 and he says this in the internal email i expressed my view that i felt studio e was a little green on process and technicality because studio as a practice had not previously been involved in high-rise residential
00:38:38 residential heating renewal nor the overcladding of occupied buildings i said i would speak to max fordham to develop my understanding of the process and then he says i learned that they had had indeed been involved in similar
00:38:49 had indeed been involved in similar projects before and despite my initial uncertainty i was comfortable that studioe had the experience and expertise to take on the work being discussed at this stage
00:38:59 stage do you see that there yes now who was it do you think that max max fordham that mister students might have spoken to about similar projects before
00:39:08 before would that have been your immediate line manager
00:39:12 manager it must it certainly wasn't me it would have had to have been bill watts or mark um mark palmer who was actually my my line manager but i would believe it probably bill
00:39:24 but i would believe it probably bill watts because he was setting the project up yeah now at this point i just want to look at an email relating to xover this is
00:39:35 sea405686
00:39:39 and again this is not an email you were involved in but but what we see here is in august 2012. mr soon gives kate cooney a x over he he gives us some contact details
00:39:51 he he gives us some contact details including your contact details he says the contact at max fordham services engineers is and my question for you is did you ever have any communications with over
00:40:02 ever have any communications with over in relation to the choice of insulation for the rain screen cladding system on the tower
00:40:07 the tower no i didn't great
00:40:12 now prior to putting forward the fee proposal
00:40:16 proposal max fordham were present at several early design team meetings and i just want to look at a few of the minutes of those meetings if we can go to art 6037
00:40:30 now these are design this is a design team meeting on thursday the 24th of may 2012
00:40:36 2012 and this was attended by your colleague bill watts he's there in the present list
00:40:41 list you're not there either in the present list or in the distribution list for this
00:40:45 this for this one um on page two of that document under services i just want to look at what the minutes record so it's in the middle of the page and i want to look at the second
00:40:56 and i want to look at the second paragraph down and it says design team need environmental design criteria
00:41:02 criteria u-values ventilation openings etc to progress cladding design options discussed over cladding internal lining fixed windows with
00:41:13 internal lining fixed windows with acoustic
00:41:13 acoustic louvres do you see that there i do yes [Applause] now with reference to internal lining can you help us as to what that reference might be referring to
00:41:27 so that would be talking about whether well i i assume because i wasn't at this meeting but yeah we might have had a similar conversation at a meeting i was at just so when we told my
00:41:38 i was at just so when we told my internal lighting it would be let's not put the insulation on the outside of the building let's put it on the ends on the on the inside on the on the flat side of the and were you ever involved in a discussion about that on the project
00:41:51 discussion about that on the project only very briefly and it was very quickly discounted as there was a far too much disruption you know these were people's
00:42:02 know these were people's people's homes and the idea of going into
00:42:06 into people's homes and ripping out the entire wall finish was just like unimaginable amount of disruption so it was very quickly discounted thank you now if we turn to a another
00:42:19 thank you now if we turn to a another set of design team meetings this time further forward in time and on the 25th of june 2012 this is a rt6096 and i want to look at page sorry
00:42:30 and i want to look at page sorry before we i beg your pardon before you go on to page two uh what we see here is that you're not in the present list but you're in the distribution as present list do you see that three three
00:42:42 present list do you see that three three people up from the bottom can you see your name um does that mean that you would have received the minutes of this design team meeting
00:42:52 meeting yes and any other design team meetings that you were on the project for yes i believe you can see bill watts and matt smith were both present yes i think but at that point i added i had started to attend meetings
00:43:04 had started to attend meetings with matt smith and and this particular occasion was because i was on holiday so yeah so bill was basically stepping in for me with matt in this meeting and i would have i would have received
00:43:15 and i would have i would have received these great thank you that's very helpful
00:43:18 helpful um and then if we go to page two of this and it's at the bottom of the page immediately above the heading acoustics
00:43:26 acoustics we see this it says mf indicate target u values for walls as 0.15 watts per meter squared kelvin and 0.22 watts per meter square kelvin for
00:43:37 watts per meter square kelvin for windows
00:43:38 windows subsequently corrected to 1.6 i think that's the windows corrected to 1.6 is that right yes yeah yes there was i think it was originally 0.16 for the windows in the
00:43:49 originally 0.16 for the windows in the original
00:43:50 original minutes and and we had to see that's impossible to achieve yeah it was just the decimal the typo yeah and then in brackets we see it says limiting u values given in part
00:44:01 limiting u values given in part l one b are 0.30 and 1.8 respectively do you see that there i do yes now so we've looked at approved document l1b already this morning and
00:44:13 already this morning and we've we've seen where the 0.30 comes from in table 3 of adl that's correct isn't it yes yeah but in terms of the first part of that minute and this the initial part max fordham
00:44:26 and this the initial part max fordham indicate target u values for walls as 0.15 can you explain to us the rationale
00:44:34 rationale behind indicating a target u-value of 0.15
00:44:38 0.15 at that time
00:44:42 i cancel what i'll say is i i didn't i'll explain first where that number came from and then maybe yeah about rationale behind it and so i
00:44:53 yeah about rationale behind it and so i mean
00:44:54 mean when i was looking back at this i knew the 0.15 figure wasn't say something that initially came out of my mouth because you can see the number being written down here for the first time in a meeting that i
00:45:05 for the first time in a meeting that i wasn't
00:45:05 wasn't actually present at and but returning looking back at the emails that i received i see that the very first email that i received from bill watts introducing me to the grenfell tower project he had a it attached a word
00:45:18 project he had a it attached a word document
00:45:18 document and in there one of the things one of the
00:45:21 the start one of the paragraphs was about you values and it said i can't remember the exact wording but it was along the lines of we should go for new build you've new build targets
00:45:33 build targets and i didn't see any any more than that and then from from that point on possibly when i when i met bill on site and we were looking at the tower again i think that that we should be
00:45:44 again i think that that we should be going
00:45:46 going for new build targets here was it was repeated and i think from
00:45:53 i think it's if you were to build a tower from scratch and you were to build a concrete tower apply insulation to that to that concrete frame and a prior apply rain
00:46:05 concrete frame and a prior apply rain screen
00:46:05 screen that didn't seem any different from doing the renovation it seemed like the perfect place to start and it was very similar to how you would construct a new build so because it was so similar
00:46:16 a new build so because it was so similar to how you might construct a new build those
00:46:18 those new build targets didn't seem
00:46:23 crazy why why they seem like they would be not that difficult to achieve and so it was just something that was accepted as a good idea and then i think as soon as we expressed that at these
00:46:35 as soon as we expressed that at these design team meetings there was just a general acceptance that it was the good right thing to be trying to do right thing why the right thing because
00:46:47 right thing why the right thing because um we might want to i know the in my in the planning statement that we helped to write i i kind of expressed my feelings in the initial in the introduction to that planning statement and i
00:46:56 and i and i say my words were something like
00:47:03 you will only get a chance to do a renovation like this once in a building's lifetime and we were trying to look to the future and trying to look to making this a building that was that was
00:47:15 building that was that was would still stand up in 30 years time and so we wanted to we wanted to do something now that would you know would
00:47:26 you know would would stand up in the future and also you have things like the london plan which um is a planning policy and it very clearly states out states a hierarchy
00:47:37 hierarchy of things you should try to do when when building a new building or renovating a building and it very clearly states the the top tier of that hierarchy is to reduce energy use
00:47:51 to reduce energy use by improving the fabric of a building first so that should always be the first step you take rather than just slapping on fancy gizmos and gadgets onto a building you should
00:48:03 gadgets onto a building you should and i think there was a from other projects that i'd work on worked on i think there was a general feeling in the construction industry that people recognized the importance of
00:48:14 people recognized the importance of improving the fabric of a building as the first
00:48:17 the first step that you should do is it fair to say that environmental considerations energy efficiency were at the heart of
00:48:28 energy efficiency were at the heart of why that u value was selected abs absolutely and were you conscious at the time that that was because it was the target for a new build
00:48:37 new build were you conscious at the time that that was a very ambitious target
00:48:46 i i didn't ever think of it as an overly ambitious target i thought thought of as as a sensible target again we were working on other projects other new build projects in london which
00:48:57 in london which might have had even would be common to come across even lower u-value targets in order to meet the co2 targets of the london plan and the buildings that i could see that were being constructed a lot of them
00:49:09 were being constructed a lot of them were being constructed of concrete with insulation and rain screen and and so nothing seemed out of the ordinary
00:49:17 ordinary and what we were trying to do here now we know you haven't done a high-rise residential before and over cladding before
00:49:25 before when maxwell were proposing that target were any checks done with anybody within max fordham who had been involved in an overcladding project before
00:49:36 before i certainly not that i'm aware of but i think that would you know that would have to be i couldn't answer that is i'd you know bill put forward the 0.15
00:49:47 i'd you know bill put forward the 0.15 what's a meter squared and that's something he would have to he would have to answer i can't i just all i can say is i wasn't i wasn't aware of a wider discussion about it i was just
00:49:58 it i was just kind of okay you know bill was a very very senior person in our practice and he'd won this job and i i'm receiving a set of meeting
00:50:09 and i i'm receiving a set of meeting minutes that tell me that this is this is a new value and and i was
00:50:14 was although totally on board with with it um
00:50:18 um i never came up with it in the first instance so i i struggled to really dig deep into the rationale of where it came from would it be fair to say as far as your thinking went that you were very much
00:50:30 you were very much comparing it and having in mind new build targets when you were selecting it
00:50:38 yes yeah was it any part of your thinking at the time that because that figure of 0.15 was significantly below the guidance in approved document l that
00:50:49 the guidance in approved document l that there was room for adjustment if that became necessary was that any part of your thinking i i think it was i think we knew and as well i was as you said i was
00:51:01 and as well i was as you said i was aware of the clause in part l that basically says here's the targets but if you find any of these things too hard to do then you can just relax your target i
00:51:13 then you can just relax your target i was aware of that and i was that that would have been absolutely an acceptable thing to do did you expect that when that was proposed that others
00:51:24 that when that was proposed that others on the project might push back and say now that's that's just too ambitious did you have that expectation when it was proposed by max fordham
00:51:41 i don't think i had an expectation but the it
00:51:44 the it seems to just be widely widely accepted and
00:51:48 and widely sort of accepted by the other members of the design team so and that wasn't surprising to you um
00:52:06 i think i found it quite quite positive that here was an aspirational target being proposed and there was a people who who were
00:52:17 and there was a people who who were willing to go with it because they believed in it and i felt that was quite positive experience so if i was surprised i was only surprised
00:52:28 in a good way because often often targets are reduced because of money because well let's not let's reduce that target because we can't afford it so the fact that the client
00:52:38 client um and everyone was behind it and willing to pay for it it was a it was a positive experience for me that that here we're going to build a building of really high quality and
00:52:49 building of really high quality and we're going to do a really good thing and it's it sort of it backed up that feeling that i had i see
00:52:55 had i see was any consideration ever given during your time of working on the project to making an adjustment to the u-value and increasing it
00:53:13 the only time i think that it would it would have come into our minds is when we were when we were looking at the thickness and we were trying to work out whether the thickness could be accommodated
00:53:24 the thickness could be accommodated within the build up that the architecture deemed to be the maximum build up that could be accommodated and so i think as we look through those issues
00:53:35 i think as we look through those issues if there had been a point in time when we when we if we couldn't have achieved the 0.15 within the thickness that the architect had drawn then would then i i think we would have changed it but it
00:53:46 i think we would have changed it but it wasn't uh we never got to the point whether
00:53:48 whether we didn't think there was a reasonable technical solution to make what we were trying to achieve so we didn't ever have that push back yeah does it follow
00:54:00 have that push back yeah does it follow from your answer therefore that there was never any serious discussion about raising the you value target i don't think no there wasn't a serious discussion about it
00:54:11 discussion about it and just to be absolutely clear these minutes suggest that it was max fordham suggesting this target u value of 0.15 do you agree with that that came from
00:54:22 do you agree with that that came from max fordham and not from any other party the client or the architect it came from max fordham i agree with that yes
00:54:32 now if we can turn then to an email sca40473
00:54:47 and this is an email from your colleague matt smith
00:54:53 um i beg your pardon it's the third email down sorry at 1642 sorry yes it's from matt smith to
00:55:04 yes it's from matt smith to um bruce soon so it's your colleague to bruce sims and this is just before that meeting on the 25th of june 2012 that we were just looking at um and he says afternoon bruce do you
00:55:15 um and he says afternoon bruce do you have an idea on the likely wall cladding build up yet what you value are you targeting the early indications from the acoustic survey are that and it goes on um to say that they're around 300
00:55:28 um to say that they're around 300 millimeters deep so it'd be useful to know what depth of wall we'll be working with
00:55:32 with you see that there now that suggests that max fordham were looking to to studio e saying what view value are you
00:55:43 studio e saying what view value are you targeting yes but just to be clear is it your understanding that it was um max fordham who actually then came up with the target of 0.15
00:55:57 with the target of 0.15 yes i i think what what we did what we did here
00:56:05 we were looking for details from the architect and really the architect's designing the whole wall system and so we were asking them you know
00:56:17 and so we were asking them you know where have you got to with this what you value do you think you can achieve and i'll say subsequently we we suggested you value and i think it's not
00:56:29 we were we were trying to
00:56:32 i guess we were trying to push it on without suggesting something ourselves because it's always it's always better if someone's come up with the target themselves in order so that we're not too heavily involved with it you know you
00:56:44 heavily involved with it you know you see a lot of things where the people say your insulation or your you value and and it's
00:56:49 and it's sometimes it can be quite difficult because you're being put in a position where people are saying this is your target but you don't actually have any power to specify any of the elements they're talking about so so
00:57:00 talking about so so for us i was trying to and i believe i had a conversation with matt before he sent his email and i think the intention of this email was to try and trigger trigger that notion that this
00:57:12 trigger trigger that notion that this these aren't our walls these are these are your walls can you please show us the details please yeah um and i suspect what happened after this was
00:57:21 this was they said but we just don't know what we just don't we're just not sure what a good target would be can you help and and i think that's what we've said yeah i mean you just said and i suspect what happened after this yeah
00:57:32 what happened after this yeah do you have any clear recollection of any
00:57:35 any you value target actually then being suggested by studio we can't see it in any of the documents um
00:57:43 um sorry no i don't i don't think studio we suggested a document okay i suggested to you
00:57:47 you thank you we were we did
00:57:52 and was it your understanding that you were proposing a u-value but that studio e was ultimately responsible and therefore could overrule that and say no to too ambitious we're going to go for
00:58:06 to too ambitious we're going to go for 0.3 or something like that absolutely yeah
00:58:09 yeah that is the the general life of a of a building services engineer you know you're you're there to give advice it's the best but the architect is the lead and they and and they will say well thank you very much for that advice but
00:58:22 thank you very much for that advice but it's not possible in this instance that's a common common thing to happen yeah and just to pick up in your witness statement you make a similar point if we go to paragraph 101 of your statement on page
00:58:34 paragraph 101 of your statement on page 24.
00:58:36 24. in the first two lines um we see this is where you said it in your statement nothing was being fixed at this stage the u values were no more than targets and were always capable of amendment or
00:58:48 and were always capable of amendment or change depending on the circumstances or any input from others responsible for specifying the cladding requirements now do you recall ever making clear to
00:58:59 now do you recall ever making clear to others on the project including the architect that as far as you were concerned
00:59:03 concerned that target could be changed if it was problematic was that was there ever that discussion that went on i don't recall having that discussion explicitly
00:59:15 prior to proposing the target you value just to be clear to your knowledge did you or anyone else within max fordham check whether there was anything in a pre-document be on fire safety which might affect
00:59:26 on fire safety which might affect whether that you value could be achieved
00:59:31 i i certainly didn't and i'm aware of i'm not aware of anything
00:59:38 and so there was no check of section 12 of adb and what it might have said in there about insulation
00:59:51 yeah if you shake your head that doesn't appear on the transcript so thank you whose responsibility did you think it was on the project to check the provisions in adb on fire safety in respect of
01:00:03 in adb on fire safety in respect of insulation products using the external wall
01:00:10 i don't i don't think i would have thought of it in that explicit terms but i think i would have thought the architect's designing the walls
01:00:18 walls therefore they'll take care of compliance
01:00:25 now if we can turn to sca40
01:00:36 this is an email of the 5th of july 2012 from
01:00:39 from mr soon to you and matt smith and bill watts also max fordham
01:00:46 fordham and the subject grenfell tower and uh we want to just pick up on the final paragraph of this email that he's talking about being disappointed that a meeting didn't happen in the first paragraph and then he says this in the
01:00:58 paragraph and then he says this in the final paragraph we've sent off inquiries to rockwool and kingspan on the insulation and await their reply the 0.15 you value you've asked for looks
01:01:07 looks looks at to me a bit inspira aspirational c attached which suggests approximately 450 millimeter meter plus of insulation do you see that there i do yes
01:01:20 there i do yes now we'll look and do you calls it the attachment that he sent but just at this point was there any consideration given or any discussions held
01:01:32 discussions held to changing the u-value given what he says there about looks to me a bit aspirational
01:01:46 when i read this email
01:01:50 i there was certainly a hint of of the fact that we might have to change the u value because clearly the the rock will thicknesses
01:02:01 thicknesses were thicker than than the architect felt could be accommodated in the build-up see but of course the email says um we've sent off inquiries to rockwell
01:02:13 sent off inquiries to rockwell and kingspan yeah so when i read that i didn't worry too much because i thought i i knew that a kingspan solid insulation board would have a
01:02:26 solid insulation board would have a better land of value than the rockwell a lower lambda value than the rockwell so i knew that the kingspan would come back with
01:02:34 back with thinner thicknesses of insulation and so i didn't feel the need to jump on this email because i thought well
01:02:42 well we're we're waiting and as the email says and we await their reply so at the time i i looked at that and i thought
01:02:50 thought well okay it might need to change but we'll we'll overridingly we will wait their reply so i think i just looked at that and thought
01:02:58 thought well let's see what kingspan have to say yeah so there was no separate discussion within the design team with you in studio e at this point about changing the value no and you say there that you knew that
01:03:11 no and you say there that you knew that kingspan had a solid intellation board that would have a better lambda value how did you know that what was that what was that based on that knowledge of the kingspan product
01:03:23 the kingspan product i think probably one of the first jobs i ever did at max forum was to sit and do a u-value calculation in order to do a heating calculation so it's it's kind of a thing you would commonly do designing a heating system
01:03:35 commonly do designing a heating system the first thing you'd do is you would look at a wall buildup and if the architect hasn't provided you with the u-value which you would need to know to measure the heat loss of the building you would do a quick calculation
01:03:47 you would do a quick calculation yourself just to get yourself in the right in the right ballpark um so i was at that point i was i was used to seeing
01:03:57 buildings coming in been asked to do a heat loss calculation i would i would see the installation was a kingspan i would be aware of where to go to get what documentation to go to
01:04:08 to go to to get the right lambda value to plug into my calculation so i think there was a kind of awareness there of different insulation types and was there a particular type of insulation um
01:04:19 insulation um produced by kingspan that you had in mind at this point
01:04:25 i think the the only the only thing i i knew about king's band was it was a it was a solid it was a solid boat
01:04:32 boat rather than a a mineral wool or or a softer kind of insulation so i think that's really as far as my my knowledge went yeah if we can look at another email on
01:04:43 yeah if we can look at another email on this topic this is sca405818
01:04:51 so this is an email of the 15th of august 2012 so a bit later in time from mr soon's to you
01:04:59 you copying in matt smith on the grenfell project
01:05:04 project um and i want to look at the the paragraph right at the bottom of this email
01:05:08 email after the numbers and the list and he says this we need to discuss u-value
01:05:16 u-value stroke insulation spec i found a u-value calculator here and he gives the link and made a stab at insulation thickness to achieve the 0.15 u value
01:05:26 u value attach this from the website i'm not sure how to make allowances for the brackets
01:05:30 brackets remember we have an issue with the insulation around the columns and i don't want you advertising something we a
01:05:35 a aren't showing and b we can't achieve can we discuss do you see that there i do yes just picking up on a few things in this what was the issue with the insulation
01:05:47 what was the issue with the insulation around the columns that he's referring to expressly there
01:05:54 what the bruce had expressed to me um the issue was that the columns were very close to the windows and the diamond shape colony at the kitchen window right next to it if if we started adding
01:06:07 right next to it if if we started adding thicker and thicker insulation to that that column expands in size
01:06:12 in size and and the edge of that column then starts to move in and encroach on the kitchen window and so
01:06:19 so i i understood that we didn't want that to happen
01:06:23 to happen and so we we may have already had a phone call about this but i had an understanding that the desire was to keep
01:06:29 keep the installation on the columns thinner than the rest of the yeah the rest of the facade elements yeah and he says can we discuss did you have
01:06:40 and he says can we discuss did you have a discussion with mr soones around this time about the u-value and whether or not that was achievable whether it should be amended was there any such discussion
01:06:59 i think this these these documents were leading up to the planning report where we were going to make we were going to tell planners what the value target was and so we needed to make sure
01:07:11 make sure it was buildable and it was right and i believe
01:07:14 believe i believe bruce's uncertainties were he there wasn't a calculation that covered all the different elements so the spandrel panels the window info panels and the column there wasn't a
01:07:26 panels and the column there wasn't a there wasn't an overall average calculation being done at that point and i think i think what bruce was worried about was um when we actually looked at the columns and it would be a bit thinner
01:07:37 and it would be a bit thinner that would impact our ability to meet the
01:07:41 the overall 0.15 and therefore we shouldn't be advertising the 0.15 we should be we should be seeing what we can actually achieve and i think he was looking looking for help from from me to
01:07:54 understand that that could be achieved yeah
01:07:57 yeah and just to be clear was there any serious discussion at this point about changing the u value
01:08:05 i don't i don't recall but i think i think it
01:08:08 think it it was implied in the
01:08:15 the sections were becoming more firm you know the the the space allowed for insulation was starting to become more and more fixed on the drawings and and so i think from from my point of view by the time we got to this stage
01:08:27 we got to this stage it had become a little bit like you've got to
01:08:31 got to you've got 200 ml millimeters for insulation in this wall and now now we're going to check to see what we get and and we hope that it achieves a 0.15 but i think if it didn't i think it would
01:08:43 i think if it didn't i think it would have been
01:08:44 have been back to the drawing board on the 0.15 yeah rather than changing the sections at that point because i think we're balancing so many different
01:08:52 different aspects and you know with with the window depths and i think though the archive is quite happy with with that build up the drawing so i think at this point it became less about conversation of
01:09:04 about conversation of well the facade can just infinitely change
01:09:08 change to accommodate the u-value i think i think at this point it starts to get a little bit like well we don't want to be changing these sections so
01:09:17 okay can i just look there's another two emails on the same theme about whether any consideration was given to amending that u-value target let's go to another email this is
01:09:28 let's go to another email this is sca408181
01:09:30 sca408181 and i want to start by looking at halfway down page two there's an email date of the second of september 2013 from this mr von turch keith von turch
01:09:43 from this mr von turch keith von turch at british gas and it's an email to the tmo
01:09:49 tmo but what what subsequently happens and we can trace this through in a moment is it gets forwarded to studio e and then it gets forwarded to duncan campbell at max fordham eventually
01:10:01 campbell at max fordham eventually um and what we can see in this email is that mr von tersch is saying in the second paragraph um
01:10:12 he says this as discussed at the meeting there are a number of areas that we need to confirm so that we can price up a funding offer accurately for you
01:10:20 for you we have the report from max fordham that gives some of the information but a few gaps still remain we need you to send through
01:10:26 through and then he asks in the first bullet point for information on the insulating material for the walls we mentioned that previous projects have not reached a u-value of 0.15 do you see that there yes so he's saying
01:10:40 do you see that there yes so he's saying that he's mentioned with someone in discussion with the tmo that previous projects have not reached the 0.15
01:10:49 the 0.15 were you ever made aware of this email during the time you worked on the project
01:10:53 project no no as long after my involvement ended and just if we go right to the very top of the page page one we can see that eventually this
01:11:04 page one we can see that eventually this does get
01:11:04 does get forwarded to i beg your pardon duncan campbell is copied in here um to this email chain including the british gas email but you didn't see it
01:11:16 british gas email but you didn't see it no no um
01:11:20 no no um can we look at another studio eml this is sea three zeros one four three four six and
01:11:29 six and if we start on page one
01:11:35 there's an email here from thomas wreck to bruce soon so this is an internal email
01:11:42 email within studio e copying in others and he then sets out we can see at the very bottom of this page some brienne
01:11:54 of this page some brienne potential scoring assessment comments can you help us as to what briem is it's the um the building research establishment environmental assessment method yeah and
01:12:05 environmental assessment method yeah and it's a
01:12:06 it's a a commonly is is a way of measuring the kind of
01:12:09 kind of um sustainability credentials of a project and often funders will have a minimum requirement that they they would say well we would like you to get a certain score
01:12:20 get a certain score in order for us to give you money towards this project yeah it's one of the ways it can be used now i appreciate this is an internal email within studio e which you wouldn't have seen at the time but if you go on if we go onto page two
01:12:32 go onto page two and there's a heading environmental impact of materials it's matte one yeah so third item down it says mat01 environmental impact of
01:12:43 it says mat01 environmental impact of materials do you see that there i do yes and then there's some black text in the last paragraph there that says it also seems mf went for ottu values to achieve maximum
01:12:55 for ottu values to achieve maximum credits available for thermal performance criteria which come to force if green guide rating credits do not manage achieve the top 25 credits available
01:13:06 achieve the top 25 credits available now we understand and this was confirmed by the studio witnesses that ottu values went over the top u values yeah when they refer to ott
01:13:18 yeah when they refer to ott now did anyone ever suggest to you from studio e
01:13:21 studio e or indeed anyone else on the project that the u values were over the top no i think i think as i said earlier i think i felt really comfortable in
01:13:32 really comfortable in a positive way that there was there was a good buy-in for this strategy so no no one was ever no one referred to them in that way
01:13:42 now if we can look next at an email from july 2012. this is
01:13:49 sea405276 is it is it sorry is it worth to point out that the this comment couldn't be right because you know as we've seen the
01:14:00 you know as we've seen the the 0.15 was discussed at a very very early stage yes and it wasn't it wasn't the project was running for several months with everyone with that understanding yeah until the
01:14:12 with that understanding yeah until the briem actually we didn't realize at the start of the project that we needed a brienne score so that came in slightly later so all the decisions about 0.15s were done
01:14:21 done before this so to suggest that the 0.15 was being done to get some credits in a scoring scheme that we didn't actually know we're going
01:14:32 that we didn't actually know we're going to have to comply with it couldn't have it just couldn't have been right i understand thank you that's helpful
01:14:39 so if we can go to sea sea405276
01:14:46 this is an email of the 24th of july 2012
01:14:50 2012 from bruce soon to you and and matt smith
01:14:55 smith and i just want to read the whole of this email with you he says um andrew matt i asked rockwall about achieving 0.15 u values and this is their response below we have
01:15:07 and this is their response below we have been working on a maximum of 250 millimeter build up to the spandrel zones
01:15:11 zones the decision on the final system is pending but assume a 50 millimeter panel vent zone leaving you 200 millimeters for insulation the geometry at the columns results in a reduced buildup of approximately 200
01:15:23 reduced buildup of approximately 200 millimeters 150 millimeter insulation at high level at low level we're thinking of cladding the columns in brick and then he talks about that and then he says pushing the cladding line out any further will probably have
01:15:35 line out any further will probably have build ability below and aesthetic issues we are proposing extensive areas of curtain wall to the lower stories which could receive
01:15:44 receive augmented insulation behind the solid panels
01:15:47 panels please keep this in mind when preparing your calculations so he's forwarding an email from rockwool setting out their response to the 0.15 you value i'm going
01:15:59 response to the 0.15 you value i'm going to come back to that rockwool response later and in the second paragraph of this email mr sims is identifying that the build-up would probably only leave
01:16:10 would probably only leave between 100 and 200 millimeters for insulation 200 millimeters for the spangles and 100 millimeters on the columns
01:16:17 columns and he's also saying that there are potential build-ability and aesthetic issues
01:16:22 issues can you just explain to us what you understood him to mean when you got this email about those build-ability and aesthetic issues if you push the cladding line out any further
01:16:34 further i took this email to mean that the 200 ml zone
01:16:40 ml zone is all that it's ever going to be and we're not changing it now for good reasons um and
01:16:51 i think
01:16:54 how i took this was that bruce was worried about not being able to achieve the 0.15 and this is why his last line about extra insulation at lower stories i
01:17:05 extra insulation at lower stories i think he was i think he was had a suspicion that we weren't going to be able to achieve the 0.15 because he's saying well but we could we could put more insulation on the lower levels if that helps balance out
01:17:15 out the overall calculation so we could still achieve the target without actually changing the build up that we've that we're now working working with which is this 200 millimeters of insulation at the
01:17:28 200 millimeters of insulation at the the in the main areas of wall and then a reduced amount around the columns yeah did you understand mr soon's to be providing maximum thicknesses for the insulation
01:17:39 maximum thicknesses for the insulation in this email is that how you read it at but at this point yes that's how i read this yeah did you ever discuss with mr soon or anyone else at studio e whether the design could be altered to allow for
01:17:51 design could be altered to allow for thicker insulation to allow a bigger gap between
01:17:55 between the concrete and the the outer cladding
01:18:02 was the two points that would make is is one that
01:18:05 one that in the design team meetings there'd be lots of discussion about these issues so i would i would feel um i would have understood a lot of the issues that bruce was dealing with in terms of
01:18:14 terms of the daylight the thickness of hangers you know i i realized that this number is part of a bigger picture and so so i didn't push that because i
01:18:25 and so so i didn't push that because i felt i understood that this was this was the compromise this was the solution that we'd honed in on was
01:18:32 was the best thickness for a whole range of reasons
01:18:35 reasons um so i think that um and i've completely forgotten my second point
01:18:44 so i asked you did you ever discuss with this designs or anyone else whether to allow for thicker insulation i.e a bigger gap between the concrete and the outer cladding did you ever actually have that
01:18:55 actually have that discussion with mr sue no and and that was my second point was from the very very earliest emails that that we had from from studio e there was always
01:19:07 from from studio e there was always rockwell and kingspan rocco and you know and so so just embedded in my mind was this this thing that
01:19:18 this this thing that kingspan was was was okay there was nothing nothing wrong with using kingspan
01:19:22 kingspan bruce had suggested in his first email he had used it in the online calculator in the email that we looked at previously he said i've given a stab at a u-value calculation and there was a link yeah email if you
01:19:34 and there was a link yeah email if you follow that link yes that was bruce doing his own calculation using kingspan and so at this point there was nothing to suggest to me that it needed to be
01:19:45 to suggest to me that it needed to be relaxed in any way we had a we had something that was going to be acceptable i thought it worked within the 200 millimeter zone that we were all talking about
01:19:54 about so it all just seemed to be fit slotting into place yeah so that was so i guess that's my rationale for saying we weren't having these conversations
01:20:05 we weren't having these conversations because
01:20:06 because yeah thought it was working yeah mr chairman i think that would be a good moment for a break i'm about to turn some more detailed questions about the specific materials seems like a good idea mr mccott we going to have a short break
01:20:17 going to have a short break now and we'll come back and resume at 25 to 12 please and i have to ask you while you're out of the room please don't talk to anyone about your evidence or anything to do with it all right if
01:20:30 or anything to do with it all right if you'd like to go to the archer she'll now look after you thank you
01:20:41 all right 25 to 12 please thank you
01:35:47 would you ask mr mccott to come back in please thank you
01:36:00 all right mr mcquad happy to carry on yes
01:36:04 yes good thank you yes thank you so i'm now going to ask you some more detailed questions about the consideration given to particular insulation materials on the project and if we can go back to an email we looked at earlier this is sea404973
01:36:21 and we can see that we looked at it earlier that as at that point fifth of july 2012 mr soon says they've he sent off inquiries to rockwool and kingspan
01:36:31 kingspan you see that there and we'll go we'll come back to each of those in a moment there's no reference here to celetex can you help us were the celetex products being considered at
01:36:42 the celetex products being considered at this stage or any celetex products
01:36:48 not by name um in in my mind i think kingspan i mean these are these are all brand names that that we're looking at by by rockwell i mean mineral will yeah by kingspan we
01:36:59 mean mineral will yeah by kingspan we made
01:37:00 made i mean to me a solid installation board and so kingspan celtx were kind of interchangeable
01:37:12 celtx were kind of interchangeable yeah and then what i took that to to mean
01:37:15 mean i'd say yeah and then we see that mr soon
01:37:18 soon had uh gave an attachment to that email and he says um c attached which suggests approximately 450 millimeter plus of insulation and if we can open up that attachment
01:37:29 and if we can open up that attachment this is max 50101 now did you look at this attachment when you were sent it
01:37:40 i can't honestly remember if i if i if i saw this attachment at the time now mr soon's told us in his evidence that this was an extrapolation from the rock wall
01:37:50 rock wall website and were you aware of that at the time that mr soon had looked at the rockwool project extrapolated in terms of thicknesses and that's where
01:38:03 in terms of thicknesses and that's where he got his 450 millimeter plus from
01:38:10 i can't honestly remember yeah so you can't remember looking at this at the time no i think i've i knew that bruce had
01:38:17 bruce had gone to the rockwell website and yeah made an assessment yeah but i can't remember the details what he told us he'd done is is basically extrapolate in the dotted line with the
01:38:29 extrapolate in the dotted line with the u value
01:38:30 u value so he's got certain thicknesses off the website but then he's carried it on to get to the 0.15 u value on the the left-hand side and then extrapolated that that might mean
01:38:43 extrapolated that that might mean millimeters approximately of rockwool thickness do you see that there i do yes
01:38:49 i do yes can you help us as to whether max fordham ever sought to clarify where that calculation had come from or was asked to do a formal calculation for the rock wall at this stage
01:39:05 i i i don't think we were asked to do a formal calculation on the rock wheel yeah
01:39:12 yeah [Applause] and then um if we can go to sca404978 this is max fordham's response to mr soon's email
01:39:24 soon's email dated the 5th of july it's from your colleague matt smith but you are copied into it
01:39:30 into it and as we can see from the first paragraph
01:39:35 paragraph in the second line he says those thicknesses of rock wool seem a bit high does that also include the thermal bridging from the fastenings frame etcetera and a ventilated cavity
01:39:47 ventilated cavity for a glass fiber slab excluding fastenings etcetera we'd expect to be able to achieve 0.15 u value with approximately 180 millimeters material only now
01:40:03 can you explain what steps you or others at max fordham took before saying those thicknesses of rock will seem a bit high are you aware of that i appreciate
01:40:15 high are you aware of that i appreciate this as your colleague mr smith this i'm i think we discussed the reply so i think i have a good idea of what he would have would have done yeah like i described
01:40:26 like i described initially doing new value calculations for
01:40:29 for yeah for heating systems is a thing we would commonly do so i think what what matt did was he did a quick calculation of his own and putin a rock will land the value at
01:40:40 and putin a rock will land the value at that thickness and he he must have played around with the thickness of the isolation he came to 180 which is um which is what he came to and that's a
01:40:51 which is what he came to and that's a lot less than the 450. so i think yeah that's what's fed into his statement off this seems a bit high his own calculation he says that one eight sorry can i just
01:41:02 he says that one eight sorry can i just ask i mean this suggests that glass fiber was one potential form of insulin um but nobody seems to discuss the use of glass fiber there's a particular reason for that i
01:41:15 i don't know and i suspect that we've just got slightly confused terminology in email rather than meaning a particular well in what respect
01:41:26 what respect and perhaps perhaps my i perhaps my main mineral will i think i think he probably just wasn't being
01:41:36 being very accurate on on that on that term though right i think because it's still it's still a flexible insulation type so it has similar it has a similar sort of look to it and i imagine that's where the
01:41:49 to it and i imagine that's where the yeah come from thank you if he was in fact meaning glass fiber slab is what you're saying that
01:41:55 that that might give you some indication of what thickness a rock wool would be because they're not dissimilar is that yours they have similar lambda values i think his calculation was yeah in that
01:42:07 i think his calculation was yeah in that respect but just to be clear did anybody actually do a calculation to work out what thickness of rockwool of mineral wool would be required to
01:42:18 of mineral wool would be required to achieve the 0.15 did anyone within max fordham do that at this time
01:42:23 this time no i believe that's what matt was trying to do there
01:42:29 now mr smith queries in the email whether the thickness of rockwool the 450 millimeter includes the thermal bridging from fastenings frame etc and a ventilated cavity
01:42:40 cavity can you help us as to how those factors might affect the calculation of the thickness of insulation and the u-value that could have been achieved yes if you were to do a calculation
01:42:52 yes if you were to do a calculation um and you were to you to factor in the metal brackets that must go from the concrete face of the structure travel through the insulation to able to
01:43:03 travel through the insulation to able to be able to fix the rain screen yeah and those those connections are a weaker link in terms of um more heat will travel through those connections and so
01:43:15 connections and so matt is saying i think we don't we don't know
01:43:18 know what the rock will what rocco have assumed perhaps they've been a bit perhaps they've been a bit heavy-handed in their assumption i don't know the difficulty i have with this with
01:43:30 the difficulty i have with this with this email is is clearly we haven't included for any thermal um bridging in our calculation which i think we should have done so i think
01:43:41 i think we should have done so i think the 180 figure that that's there is is very only looking at a very idealized cross-section through the set through through the through the material and it's not looking at other things
01:43:52 looking at other things so in reality i would expect the answer to be somewhere between 450 and 180 depending on the the other elements that were in play but but clearly i mean at this point we didn't know
01:44:04 i mean at this point we didn't know the specific details of the cladding and let's see you talk there about what rock will have assumed but it's right isn't it that this was mr sonza's extrapolation of some
01:44:16 sonza's extrapolation of some information on rockwool's website to come to the 450 millimeters so this wasn't rockwool's calculation was it at this stage
01:44:26 and that's correct and i i couldn't comment maybe we've misinterpreted that at the time and just to be absolutely clear i think what you're saying is if you use thermally broken brackets that interrupt the thermal transfer
01:44:38 that interrupt the thermal transfer through the brackets that can help you into in terms of achieving a lower u-value is that correct yes that would be part yeah
01:44:48 yeah and mr smith um is querying whether mr suns in his calculation had taken account of that thermal bridging from fastening's frame etcetera do you agree
01:45:00 agree sorry could you repeat that what mr smith seems to be doing is questioning whether mr sones's calculation had taken account of the thermal bridging from the fastenings and frame
01:45:12 fastenings and frame i think what matt's suggesting is that it's not that the rock will calculation hasn't taken it into account but the rockwool calculation might be a bit pessimistic in its
01:45:25 might be a bit pessimistic in its assumptions therefore coming up with a really
01:45:27 really thick insulation thing i think that the rock wall might be pessimistic in its calculations or soon's calculations might look pessimistic if you haven't taken into account thermally broken brackets is that correct
01:45:38 brackets is that correct yes yeah
01:45:42 now let's look at the response we see from rockwool this is
01:45:48 sca405276 on page two and it's an email from mr ian pritchard to mr soon's
01:45:57 and we know that you were sent this email on that same day again i'll make good that point in a moment but just sticking with this email from mr pritchard we can see
01:46:09 email from mr pritchard we can see that his response says dear sir he said apologies for the delay and getting back to you further to your email we would normally recommend the use of our rainscreen duo slab for these types
01:46:20 our rainscreen duo slab for these types of construction however due to the low specified u-value the thickness needed would be exceptionally high probably beyond the point of sensible building practice
01:46:31 point of sensible building practice and then he says he's unsure of the exact construction for the roof that needs insulating so that's what rock will say now can you help us did anyone ever respond
01:46:42 help us did anyone ever respond and seek an actual calculation from rockwool of what thickness would be required we can see he's saying he thinks it's going to be exceptionally high
01:46:50 high but did anyone ever get a specific calculation from rockwell about what it would be
01:46:56 would be not to my knowledge this was something that the bruce was doing can you help us as to why that wasn't something that max fordham ever did
01:47:09 something that max fordham ever did we had set the target and it wasn't it wasn't necessarily if bruce was designing this element and he was lasing with the specialists then
01:47:20 then that was that seemed like the right way to be going about it rather than us trying to get involved it seemed it seemed like a reasonable thing that bruce was lazing with the
01:47:31 thing that bruce was lazing with the manufacturers directly to try and get some calculations done so i think i think i would have read that email and um
01:47:39 and taking the probably beyond the point of sensible building practice to mean all the things that i understood with bruce in terms of length of brackets and all the other
01:47:51 length of brackets and all the other implications that might have on a building did you expect we know you afforded this email and do you call did you expect that there would be a further follow-up with rockwool
01:48:02 rockwool to say well can we actually understand from you precisely what the thickness needed would be i don't think i ever expected that now no because
01:48:13 i in my mind the kingspan thicknesses were much closer to what we wanted and so in my mind receiving this email i thought okay
01:48:26 receiving this email i thought okay that's what it is we won't be using rainscreen geoslab then we'll be using kingspan and that or something like it that was what i read from this to your knowledge
01:48:37 what i read from this to your knowledge was any effort ever made at any stage of the project to determine precisely what thickness of rockwool
01:48:44 rockwool would actually be required to achieve the 0.515 u value i don't think it was would you agree that rockwool was effectively discounted
01:48:55 that rockwool was effectively discounted as an option on the basis of thickness yes can we just look at mr hyatt's report he's the inquiries expert in architectural matters this is at
01:49:06 in architectural matters this is at phyr603
01:49:07 phyr603 page 19 and i want to look at the bottom of page
01:49:11 of page at paragraph 3.58 3.5.8
01:49:18 now what mr hyatt does is he does do the calculations using mineral rule to see what u value and thickness you could get
01:49:29 could get and effectively what he says and he summarizes it there in that paragraph is that with mineral well it's possible for the spandrel slab condition to produce a 0.142 u
01:49:40 slab condition to produce a 0.142 u value against a 250 millimeter mineral wool insulation and for the columns to produce a 0.170 u value so slightly above your u value target
01:49:53 so slightly above your u value target against millimeters of mineral wool insulation do you see that there i do yes and mr hyatt's calculations appear on the
01:50:04 mr hyatt's calculations appear on the following pages we can just briefly look at them at pages 20 and 21 we can see he's done the calculations for us
01:50:13 for us and this shows how he's come up with here this is on the column location he's come up with the 0.17 u value and if we go on to the next page he's come up with the 0.142 u value
01:50:25 he's come up with the 0.142 u value with 250 millimeters of rockwool um now
01:50:32 um now do you agree that mr hyatt's calculations indicate that an insulating material using rock wool could have been accommodated without undue technical
01:50:43 accommodated without undue technical difficulty
01:50:47 i don't think i can that's not for you to competency i see well can i just ask for a bit more help on that have you actually examined mr hyatt's calculations i have i have
01:50:58 mr hyatt's calculations i have i have looked to them yes you've been through them to see whether there are errors or holes in them should we say have you found any errors
01:51:08 not not errors i i see the calculation that matt
01:51:12 that matt smith sent in his email where he came up he came up with the 180 millimeter thickness and you can see that that's actually exactly the same calculations mr hyatt's done for the
01:51:23 calculations mr hyatt's done for the column and he comes up with a he comes to the answer not of a u value of 1.5 but he comes to the higher of one 1.17 i think he comes to and i think that that discrepancy between
01:51:35 think that that discrepancy between what what we've done and what mr hatt's done is
01:51:38 done is is the um the thermal breaks that the bracketry we didn't include the bracketry in our simple calculation mr hyatt has and i think that explains
01:51:49 think that explains the difference and to that extent one could regard mr hyatt's calculation as likely to be a bit more accurate is that a bit more accurate yes right and i don't know also caveat am i saying
01:52:00 saying there's some the assumption that he's made for
01:52:03 made for the bracketry i i i've not looked at that number anyway to say that i would i would have just been accurate in terms of the construction okay thank you that's helpful what about the spandrel
01:52:15 helpful what about the spandrel uh calculation again that's um that's the same his calculation includes
01:52:22 includes four thermal bridging through the bracketry hours does not so again it's more likely to be slightly more accurate but i mean these are the sort of calculations with which you're
01:52:33 calculations with which you're presumably very familiar are they yes yeah and we would and i ask you that because i think you said you haven't found anything to criticize
01:52:43 criticize in the calculations
01:52:47 it's just very helpful thank you yes that's really helpful that was exactly my next question is whether the difference between no no good um whether the difference
01:52:58 no no good um whether the difference between us to how high its calculations and anything you'd done at the time was because of the use of thermally broken brackets which can make that difference so you've clarified that sorry because you
01:53:09 you've clarified that sorry because you you keep
01:53:09 you keep you keep seeing thermally broken brackets and i think my point is we didn't make any assumption for any brackets
01:53:16 brackets family broken or not i understand and the other thing i would i would sort of say as well is clearly there is a discrepancy between the the 450 that the that the rockwell website might suggest and and
01:53:29 rockwell website might suggest and and these calculations and it's quite a big difference and actually when i probed that myself i could see that the rockwool website does make quite a large allowance for heat transfer through bracketry
01:53:40 heat transfer through bracketry but i'm in no way um i i don't know the details of those two yeah i just know that there is a large difference between the two but do you agree
01:53:48 agree that these are relatively straightforward calculations that can be done
01:53:51 done the ones mr hyatt's done yes and can you help us
01:53:56 help us as to why such calculations weren't ever done on the grenfell project for mineral rule rockwool
01:54:08 for mineral rule rockwool um i i
01:54:11 um i i i can't other than
01:54:16 the the 250 mm even even with this calculation coming out 250 millimeters it was it was still more than the 200 that we were working to as yeah as the maximum
01:54:26 maximum so well then it would be an assessment wouldn't it for the architect about whether that increased thickness could be accommodated within the design satisfactorily yeah let's turn just
01:54:38 satisfactorily yeah let's turn just now and just have a quick look at the kingspan products um if we look at sca404986
01:54:51 um if we look at sca404986 we can see that on the 6th of july 2012 this is from you to matt smith but you're copied in here and we can see that what bruce is saying
01:55:02 and we can see that what bruce is saying is that kingspan have come back with 200 millimeter phenolic to achieve 0.15 u value c attached and there's an attachment to it
01:55:13 um and then he says i've attached a data sheet for glass fibre product i'm rusty on calculations but i interpret this product as having twice the thermal conductivity of phenolic and therefore needing twice the thickness
01:55:26 now given mr soon's comments in this email
01:55:30 email um that 200 millimeters of insulation could be accommodated on the spandrels do you know why the king's band product wasn't pursued any further
01:55:49 i can only i think it's um kingspan is referring to a trade name or solid phenolic foam pir solid insulation and so i think it
01:56:02 pir solid insulation and so i think it was
01:56:03 was developed further in in a and i can come on to explain i think i could explain now where where i where i know i know exactly where kingspan
01:56:14 exactly where kingspan came from and why it appeared and okay but we wouldn't make let's take this one state at a time just first of all are you saying that in your mind at the time there was little difference between
01:56:25 time there was little difference between a phenolic insulation material any other foam insulation board that's right such as a pir board did you actually know there was a difference at the time i don't think i did
01:56:36 the time i don't think i did no i think i i took i took celtics and kings band to be two manufacturers that yeah that had installation boards with similar lambda values yeah and then that's as far as a
01:56:49 values yeah and then that's as far as a now we're coming on to the celetex in just a moment but help us then you say you can tell us exactly where the kingspan came from what's your evidence on that pattern of dates came from
01:57:00 dates came from sorry you said where the king's banking from yes i thought you said earlier that you could tell us exactly where the kingspan
01:57:05 kingspan came from but maybe you misspoke no sorry i meant to see i could tell you where the
01:57:09 where the cell takes great let if we can just hold fire on that for a moment and just let me keep going um at the time of your work on the grenfell project did you have any understanding of the fire performance characteristic
01:57:20 performance characteristic characteristics of these foam boards including phenolic or pir insulation
01:57:29 the only exposure we would have had i think to kingspan is when they would they would come in to talk to us about pipe insulation because they make they make solid pipe insulation as well as
01:57:40 make solid pipe insulation as well as this building and so okay um and it's very difficult now to un unpick what i've heard and i know i know bruce made a lot of comments about this
01:57:51 made a lot of comments about this material charring and it's very difficult
01:57:53 difficult i'm trying to that could have been something that i had the opinion off that could have been something that i thought well these these these pipe insulations will sort of char and but not go on fire but i i
01:58:06 char and but not go on fire but i i i couldn't say with 100 certainty now mr mr we don't want you to speculate um i think what we're interested in is whether you do have a recollection of knowing something about the fire performance of these
01:58:17 about the fire performance of these phenolic or pir insulation boards at the time of the grenfell project i couldn't see no i did and we saw we see in this and it picks up on the chairman's
01:58:29 and it picks up on the chairman's question a moment ago that there's a data sheet for a glass fibre product
01:58:34 now when we look at that glass fibre product data sheet it's got an a1 fire performance do you know whether any further consideration was ever given to the glass fibre product on this project
01:58:48 glass fibre product on this project i don't think it was i think i think and the reason for that is it would have twice the thick it would have twice the thickness i think it was excluded at that point of this email i
01:58:59 excluded at that point of this email i think it was attached for information but to me
01:59:02 but to me the line about it being twice the thickness was just yeah the point to stop so you wouldn't have
01:59:09 have looked at the data sheet and considered the fire performance of that product at the time
01:59:13 the time no so fr 5000 let's move to that the celetex product if we can go to sea405840
01:59:26 so this is an email from you to mr soon's date of the 16th of august 2012. and you say bruce i've done the following calculations to work out how
01:59:37 following calculations to work out how much insulation that we would need to achieve
01:59:39 achieve 0.15 overall the celetex fr 5000 is a solid pir board data sheet attached i think this is the only type of product that will give us the required performance
01:59:51 the required performance kingspan also i should say do a version of this
01:59:55 of this and then could you comment um on the spongebob panel now far as we can see this is the first mention of celetex's fr 5000 product in this email
02:00:09 5000 product in this email is it right to say that it was you that introduced that celetex fr 5000 as a potential insulation product for the project yes it was
02:00:22 what led you to put forward the fr 5000 product at this stage
02:00:29 the so i was carrying out uh calculating so the
02:00:32 so the some of these emails have come i think slightly out of sequence with with how that how they how they happened um
02:00:40 um bruce i had a telephone conversation with bruce and we were discussing how he was unsure whether the fact that we couldn't put as much insulation on the columns he didn't he was unsure whether that
02:00:52 he didn't he was unsure whether that that would mean that the overall u value wouldn't be enough so i told them that well i could do an area weighted calculation so i would calculate the u values of the column the spandrel and the window
02:01:05 the column the spandrel and the window infill
02:01:06 infill and i would i would area await them based on
02:01:10 based on the areas of facade they make up and that would give us an average and and and that was something at that point that i think hadn't been done and was was kind of worrying bruce that that was going to be
02:01:21 bruce that that was going to be that was going to mean we couldn't meet the target so so i said well i'll perform that calculation so i i went off to do that and i think the spreadsheet was attached i think to
02:01:32 the spreadsheet was attached i think to this this email and i went off and did the calculation and one of the numbers that i needed for the calculation was the lambda value of of kingspan board
02:01:44 board and i went to the i went to the kingspan website to to download a data sheet so that i could get an accurate number for that lambda value
02:01:54 value and you needed to you needed to log in and
02:01:57 and fill out and register as a user
02:02:02 in my head there was very little difference between celtex and kingspan i knew i had a login for kingspan uh for celtic sorry so i thought i'll just speed this up a
02:02:15 so i thought i'll just speed this up a little bit go to the celtex website i will get a data sheet for a solid installation board just to make sure
02:02:22 make sure that the lambda value that i was putting into my calculation would be accurate it would be one it would be something that you could go and buy essentially and just
02:02:33 go and buy essentially and just basically showing you're working as is how i felt about it and so and that's how i ended up going to the celtics website clicking through i think they have a
02:02:44 through i think they have a they have a sort of cascading thing you know select installation by applying application and i think i would have gone through you know walls and and i can't remember the exact detail but i went through some sort of
02:02:55 detail but i went through some sort of process
02:02:55 process and it came out with well this would be an insulation i downloaded that i took the lambda value and put them into that calculation and then because i wanted to let bruce know
02:03:06 know where i got that number i sent him the data sheet and i think there you know my kingspan also do a version of this it's it
02:03:16 shows my kind of thinking that kingspan and celtics were very similar did you or to your knowledge max fordham have any previous experience of using the fr
02:03:27 previous experience of using the fr 5000 product no did you have a relationship with celetex at this time and you said you had the login details
02:03:38 login details again it was it was a login details from previously trying to get a lambda value yeah off an insulation type
02:03:45 now mr soon has given us some evidence about this and i want to show you what he said
02:03:51 he said if we can go to the transcript this is um on the 11th of march it's day 12 and i want to go to page 181 and just read what he says
02:04:04 and i want to pick it up at line 12 and i think it's me asking him um during your time on the grenfell project can you explain why you thought celetex
02:04:15 can you explain why you thought celetex fr 5000
02:04:16 fr 5000 was suitable to be used within the overcladding system and then he queries why did i think that was and then i say yes and then his answer is it had
02:04:27 i say yes and then his answer is it had been put forward by max fordham who i knew had who i understood had undertaken this sort of project several times
02:04:35 times or many times and i guess i made an assumption that they had used this before in similar circumstances so it was based rather on inferring its acceptability from previous experience
02:04:46 acceptability from previous experience by max fordham do you see that there i do yes now did you appreciate at the time that uh in suggesting this product studio e
02:04:59 uh in suggesting this product studio e we're taking this as a tacit endorsement of his acceptability for use on the building
02:05:08 i i didn't i didn't realize that
02:05:15 when you said in the email that you say that you think this is the only product that we're going to be able to use
02:05:23 use what considerations did you have in mind did you have fire in mind when you made that suggestion i i had to land the value in mind
02:05:34 i i had to land the value in mind and and i had the two things that i had in mind were the lambda value for the thickness and in my mind it was almost interchangeable with the king's fan and the kingspan had
02:05:45 fan and the kingspan had been on the table put forward by studio e
02:05:49 e in any emails and so there was just nothing that sparked any concern that it wasn't okay was any consideration given at this
02:06:01 was any consideration given at this stage by you to its fire performance in any way at all no
02:06:06 no and can you help us as to why not why you wouldn't have been carrying out even very basic checks to see what its fire performance was before suggesting it on a project like this
02:06:22 for one thing it was
02:06:27 i wasn't aware that i was suggesting something new into the project for one i thought i was i thought it was already there and established in terms of the use of the kingspan yeah um
02:06:38 um it you know the design of the facade isn't what we do and i
02:06:46 i thought it was you know i didn't go to i didn't go to any extra lens to make that explicitly clear i just thought it was clear in terms of my role as a building services engineer
02:06:57 services engineer so it's what yeah why what i'd be looking at and is it your evidence that um had you been able to log on to the kingspan website when you first tried and been able to get some
02:07:08 first tried and been able to get some lambda calculations for their phone board that you'd have been just as likely to put forward the kingspan product at this point exactly yeah
02:07:19 if we can look at the data sheet which you attach to the email this is sea405841
02:07:34 we can see on the top right hand side that it's
02:07:37 that it's dated january 2012 and it's for celetex fr5000 and if we look at the first list of bullets halfway down that page
02:07:49 halfway down that page we can see that it states that fr 5000 has class
02:07:52 has class naught five performance throughout the entire product in accordance with bs476 that's the fourth bullet down
02:08:02 can you see that on that page now did you give any consideration to that part of this data sheet when you were putting forward that product
02:08:13 were putting forward that product i didn't know so you didn't consider what it was saying about class naught file performance that that didn't enter your mind at all no
02:08:28 it was very very much focused on the first bullet point and they've actually they've actually put the land of value in the text that was what that's what i wanted that was the number i was after and were you aware just in general terms
02:08:40 and were you aware just in general terms at this time that this product was a combustible insulation and that there might be fire performance questions that needed to be asked of it
02:08:51 to be asked of it in due course no just it just never it sounds it sounds so silly to say this now
02:08:58 now it's all it's past but it just never occurred to me in any way that's something that i could just go onto a website and select would would be so unsafe or
02:09:10 would would be so unsafe or or or have the potential to be so unsafe you know i did i thought i was and and if you know and i know we've covered that didn't work on high-rise but it's also up until that point every
02:09:21 but it's also up until that point every building that i'd worked on pir installation boards on on on walls you know i've done it did a lot of projects i'd seen it again and again and again it was in in my mind it's just yeah
02:09:33 in my mind it's just yeah a common material that's used and had yeah
02:09:38 okay now we also see in that first bullet point that it says it has a lower thermal conductivity value 0.021 watts per meter squared kelvin compared with other
02:09:50 compared with other typical pir insulation boards providing enhanced
02:09:53 enhanced thermal performance to what extent was that
02:09:57 that 0.021 figure key to you putting forward this
02:10:01 this product on the project
02:10:08 it was the only number i was looking at but it i suppose i as an example i didn't find other installation materials and sort of think nope not good enough not good enough not good enough until i
02:10:19 not good enough not good enough until i came to this one this was just the first one i came to and i used this lambda value if that yeah helps answer had this product had a lambda value
02:10:30 had this product had a lambda value which had been higher than that let's say significantly higher would you have considered fr5000 for use on the pro
02:10:38 pro on the project it i would say that the at this point in the project the solid ford was always going to have
02:10:50 the solid ford was always going to have a better
02:10:51 a better lambda value than the rockwell than the alternatives so whether that was 0.021 or 0.024
02:11:02 so whether that was 0.021 or 0.024 as that number gets bigger so does this thickness of of insulation and at some point that thickness of insulation would have come out at large than 200
02:11:13 would have come out at large than 200 yeah if that was the case i would have done this calculation and i would have sent the email back to bruce and that would then there would have been a decision point to make do we relax the u value or do we change
02:11:25 do we relax the u value or do we change the build up yeah and and it just so happened that i took that lambda value i did the calculation and it all fell within the parameters of this 200 millimeters so it seemed like yeah an ideal solution okay
02:11:40 like yeah an ideal solution okay now can we now look at the um the max fordham sustainability and energy statement that was prepared for the project this is
02:11:50 max50412 this is dated the 17th of august 2012.
02:11:58 and just to be clear um mr mccoy every everyone on max fordham was clear wasn't that they were dealing with a tall building a building above 18 meters on this project oh yes yeah and if we go
02:12:10 oh yes yeah and if we go to page six of this document uh on the left column on the first paragraph under 2.1 it's quite it's quite small writing but what we see there under 2.1 is it says
02:12:22 what we see there under 2.1 is it says improving the insulation levels of the walls roof and windows is the top priority of this refurbishment do you see that there yes did that reflect your understanding
02:12:33 yes did that reflect your understanding of the position that it was the top priority of the refurbishment yes it reflected my understanding and but also if we think about just the context i was writing this report
02:12:46 context i was writing this report you know i may have i may have been using slightly sort of artistic license to that this is from what i believed it may not have been when i say the top
02:12:57 when i say the top priority of this refurbishment it may not have been everybody's top priority of this refurbishment but it was certainly my top priority yeah there's no reference in here to fire safety also being a
02:13:09 in here to fire safety also being a priority
02:13:10 priority is there
02:13:16 is there no but i again it's the it's it's it's the energy yeah statement to planets i don't i think that would just be taken as i i would have taken that as read you know it's so fundamental that i wouldn't
02:13:28 know it's so fundamental that i wouldn't have thought didn't need to be stated stated here yeah now on this page we can see that the document explains that the recommended u value does exceed that permitted under the
02:13:40 does exceed that permitted under the building regulations this is the fourth paragraph down in the left column under 2.1
02:13:47 under 2.1 um you can see in the second sentence second line down the proposed insulation levels far exceed those required by building regulations you see that there yes and
02:13:58 you see that there yes and is that the bit that you were explaining you drafted earlier because you go on here and
02:14:03 here and say insulation improvements may only happen once or twice in a building's lifetime
02:14:08 lifetime due to the complexity and disruption cause for this reason we're going over and above current building regulations to make sure the building continues to perform well into the future yes i wrote that you wrote that yes and
02:14:19 yes i wrote that you wrote that yes and it's entirely consistent with what you told us earlier on this morning about your
02:14:23 your aspirations for this project yes and we can see just to make just to finish this point on the bottom of this column there's a table 2.1 which um
02:14:37 2.1 which um if we can pan out and look at the bottom of this column there we have a table 2.1 which tells you
02:14:44 you the extent to which what was being achieved on this project was an improvement over the building regulations and we can see that it's a 50
02:14:51 50 improvement do you see that there i do yes
02:14:55 yes and then on the same page in tables 2.2 and 2.3 in the right hand columns if we can look at those what we see is that celetex fr 5000
02:15:06 what we see is that celetex fr 5000 is listed there as the insulation it's in both tables for sponges and columns
02:15:15 columns it's the third one down in the spandrels and the third one down in the column yes yep so at this point max ford and this is august 2012 are
02:15:26 max ford and this is august 2012 are including the celetex fr 5000 in the energy and sustainability statement yes yes and does it follow from that that nobody had suggested to you prior to putting that statement together that
02:15:37 putting that statement together that that insulation wasn't appropriate for buildings above 18 meters that's correct yeah and then if we go to the final stage c report produced by max
02:15:48 the final stage c report produced by max fordham dated september 2012. this is max401683
02:15:58 can you recall did you draft this stage c report for maxwarden would have drafted most of it yes yeah matt would have
02:16:04 have had done some sections but i did most of it i think and at page 12 is it right that what we effectively see here is the same information from that sustainability and
02:16:16 information from that sustainability and energy statement replicated in this state c reports i don't think it changed in between these two documents
02:16:26 now how would you characterize what max warner are doing here in terms of the insulation product are they specifying the use of fr 5000
02:16:37 are they specifying the use of fr 5000 in this statement or is max fordham doing something else if so what i think in in this what i'm trying to do
02:16:49 i think in in this what i'm trying to do i'm trying to show my working i'm trying to show that this thermal conductivity value of 0.021 is based on
02:16:58 based on an actual product yeah when i look back at this
02:17:02 at this i think there's there's no there's no need for me to write that in this document it wasn't import important information for this document whatsoever in fact those both of those tables you might say are
02:17:13 both of those tables you might say are probably
02:17:14 probably too much information for the the actual target audience what all they really needed to know was the table and table the information table four which said we have a target and we're you know and we're achieving it and i think just
02:17:26 we're achieving it and i think just because i
02:17:27 because i done the calculation i felt that well i'll put it in there just to just to show my working yeah by suggesting the use of that product the fr 5000
02:17:38 the fr 5000 were you seeking to influence the decision of the design team as to what material to choose
02:17:45 i don't think i was i think i was just trying to be very explicit about where i'd got that number
02:17:56 number okay because if if the project ran on and then someone did say oh
02:18:03 oh um for any reason we can't use that material
02:18:06 material it's maybe i mean remember at this point i have absolutely no idea how much celtics fr 5000 actually costs it may be 10 times the price of
02:18:16 price of its competitor i don't know for some reason it might it might have been wrong and i think i was just trying to show everyone what the assumptions were very clearly
02:18:27 very clearly at that point the point you wrote this was it your view that a final decision had been taken to use fr 5000 on the project
02:18:40 i i can't recall i wouldn't have put that in there if there was any information telling me that it wasn't going to be used but i don't recall
02:18:51 going to be used but i don't recall having that discussion saying yes we've looked at this information and it's we've looked at this and we're going to go for it i think
02:19:01 i think it was just in the planning it never got it never got corrected and it went on like that i see now in terms of this stage c document
02:19:12 document we can't find any reference to fire safety in here do you agree there's no references to fire safety um i think the stage c
02:19:25 um i think the stage c document might include an appendix on the heating options there's no there's no main section on fire safety but there is there is uh options appraisal of of how we're going to replace the heating
02:19:36 we're going to replace the heating system
02:19:36 system and i know in there we discussed firestopping around pipe work as a potential issue that might have to be managed if we're you know so i would say that from the point of view of a
02:19:48 from the point of view of a building services engineer we were thinking about fire safety issues that impacted on the work that we were that we were specifying pipe work changes but not in
02:20:01 pipe work changes but not in this wasn't intended to be the definitive and that that's kind of why i said that this detail this this section goes into too much
02:20:09 too much detail because what it's really doing is it's really just wanting to convey that there are new value targets and these are the u-value targets that we are using in the energy calculations and simulations and the
02:20:23 calculations and simulations and the detail isn't yeah actually relevant to this
02:20:26 this this report really and just to be absolutely clear is it right that fr 5000 was included in this stage c report solely because it delivered the u value at the thickness you wanted
02:20:39 um yes i mean you could pick up on you wanted and say that it was you know it was the team delivering a project rather than me slowly being the owner of
02:20:51 rather than me slowly being the owner of the thickness of that wall and in fact it wasn't
02:20:54 it wasn't um i want to put this point to you directly so you have the chance to answer it
02:21:00 answer it i want to put to you that max fordham and and you as as the project lead on this max warden project
02:21:07 project as experienced mechanical and electrical engineers should have given at least some consideration to fire performance when proposing these types of insulation
02:21:18 when proposing these types of insulation products for the external wall i think in hindsight it's difficult to it's
02:21:29 in hindsight it's difficult to it's difficult to not wanted to have reviewed all those things and clearly over the past couple of years it's a question you
02:21:40 it's a question you should i have known information more information than i knew in this different sector and it's something that i i i go round and round and
02:21:52 i guess in hindsight i i would have just stuck to the numbers i would have done that calculation without a data sheet i would have just said
02:22:02 said this is the minimum lambda value yeah that is required carry on with your carry on with your specification but but with so many things you you trip up
02:22:13 but with so many things you you trip up when you try to be helpful and yeah you you tried to you you tried to
02:22:17 to push the project on you try to muck in you yeah and and in hindsight i wouldn't have wouldn't have suggested celtic cfr or any interesting insulation material because it wasn't my job
02:22:28 it wasn't my job but what about making expressly clear to the others on the project including studio e that you hadn't considered fire safety did you ever do that at any stage on the project
02:22:39 ever do that at any stage on the project did you ever say to them i've only looked at the thermal performance to be absolutely clear with you anything to do with fire safety of this project is down to you did you ever say that no i didn't and
02:22:50 i didn't and can you help us as to why not why you wouldn't have made that clear again because i i
02:23:01 i was just receiving emails that said kingspan and rockwell um kingspan was always in the conversation so the solid pr
02:23:10 pr pir board was just always in the conversation so it was there was nothing there to to spark that level of you know if i had been in any way aware
02:23:21 you know if i had been in any way aware that there was a danger here then yes i would have absolutely i would have flagged that up and said i've only considered thermal performance yeah i just didn't think it was necessary at the time
02:23:34 necessary at the time now we know that then in late um 2012 fr 5000 celetex fr 5000 was included as the insulation in the nbs specification that's prepared by the
02:23:45 specification that's prepared by the architect studio e were you aware of that at the time that that particular product was in the nbs specification
02:23:55 i i can't say for sure because now that i've
02:23:58 i've now that i've seen it it's very difficult to work out when i saw that line in in specification did you ever have any conversations with
02:24:09 did you ever have any conversations with another a different celetex product being used say rs 5000 on the project
02:24:15 project does anyone ever discuss that with you at any stage no i just want to show you something mr soon said in his witness statement this is
02:24:25 sea3014273 at page 118. and i want to look at paragraph 287
02:24:34 and in the first sentence he says this with regard to the insulation i refer you back to paragraph 43.9 and 116.2 where i discuss how the insulation was
02:24:45 where i discuss how the insulation was selected
02:24:46 selected by max fordham do you see that there yes and i want to focus on the word the use of the word selected do you agree that the insulation was selected by max fordham
02:25:06 i i know i did i mean
02:25:14 clearly i sent an email
02:25:17 it was selected in terms of the lambda value
02:25:23 and just and to kind of expand that from out to me saying this is what should be used it's it's it's to me a quite a big jump yeah and so you know i don't
02:25:38 if you start you know if you take the word selected it's you know what exactly does it mean it's quite it's difficult if you said special you know did maxwell specify the insulation it'd be you know an equivocal knoll
02:25:50 it'd be you know an equivocal knoll yeah and but selected suggested i mean i would say suggested to me is a more yeah appropriate word okay
02:26:00 thank you mr chairman i've come to the end of my questions but it's customary at this point to just take a short break to see if there's any others that have been suggested and check mine check my notes check i
02:26:12 check mine check my notes check i haven't missed anything yes well mr mccottis you've heard ms grange think she's reached the end of the question she needs to ask you but she
02:26:20 she needs to have a little time just to check that and there are others who are not in this room who may wish to suggest questions as well so we're going to have a break i'm going to say 20 to 12 21 yes i think we'd have yeah i was
02:26:33 21 yes i think we'd have yeah i was going to suggest 25 too but that's a bit ambitious well if you think yeah i think it might yeah yeah we'll we'll
02:26:39 we'll have a break until 20 to 1 and then we'll see if there are further questions that uh
02:26:44 that uh we need to ask you okay all right thank you so and please of course don't talk to anyone about your evidence while you're out of the room and then if you'd like to go with the usher she'll look after you thank you
02:26:59 thank you 21 then please
02:39:50 [Applause] would you ask mr mccott back in please thank you
02:39:56 thank you [Applause]
02:40:04 all right mr mccott we'll see if there any more questions for you just a couple yes very well so you said to us just this morning that you went through when you went to the
02:40:15 you went through when you went to the celetex website and you said you went through a cascading process to get through to the calculations you wanted to find the u-value calculations do you recall
02:40:26 the u-value calculations do you recall whether you were presented with an option for walls over 18 meters i i don't think it was i have no recollection of that
02:40:37 and then sticking again with with that episode when you were looking for you value calculations for you said initially the kingspan product and then the celetex product
02:40:48 and then the celetex product can we just go to something which we think you had earlier this is max40104
02:40:58 sorry five is it five zeroes 104. sorry
02:41:06 yes this is it yes it's dated the 6th of july 2012 and do you remember we looked this morning at mr sohn saying he'd heard back from kingspan and it was going to be 200 millimeters
02:41:18 it was going to be 200 millimeters and he attached a kingspan document to that that that appears to be this
02:41:24 this so it was sent to you um and if we look on page two of this
02:41:32 here we've got kingspan's u-value calculations for we can see for the a k-15 product called them k-15 do you
02:41:43 a k-15 product called them k-15 do you see that there in the middle of the table so my question to you is if you had these calculations this was the 6th of july 2012. why then
02:41:54 this was the 6th of july 2012. why then on the 16th of august 2012 when you were looking at kingspan and celetex why did you not just go back to these calculations that you already had from kingspan
02:42:05 i must have forgotten that i received them
02:42:08 them i it would make perfect sense to go back to this yeah don't disagree with that at all
02:42:12 all but that's how different why didn't great
02:42:15 great thank you very much mr tim and those are all my questions thank you well mr mccarthy just remains to me to thank you very much for coming to give your evidence those are all the questions we have for you it's been very helpful to hear what
02:42:27 you it's been very helpful to hear what you have to tell us and thank you very much for doing so can i just ask have you got a long journey to make back to the north no not going back till tomorrow or so get together and say at least we've got uh through your evidence quickly enough
02:42:38 uh through your evidence quickly enough to enable you to do whatever you need to do next anyway thank you very much for coming and you're now free to go thank you very much thank you
02:42:54 go thank you very much thank you well ms grange that's probably a convenient point to break isn't it it is we've got another witness coming yes that's mr john white the clerk of works uh it's coming at
02:43:05 the clerk of works uh it's coming at um well this afternoon and miss grogan is going to be examining him could i suggest that we perhaps take the lunch break now well that's what i was going to say yes i think we'll and start at quarter to two um
02:43:17 two um do you know whether mr white's here already or he is here but he needs a bit of
02:43:21 of time to you know i just wanted to make sure he wasn't asked for two o'clock uh no he's here he's here right well in that case uh we'll break nerf uh we'll take the hour for lunch now and resume
02:43:32 lunch now and resume the course the two thank you thank you all very much quarter two please
02:44:37 you