RBKC housing department evidence on budget scrutiny for Grenfell refurbishment, fire risk assessment competency standards, and responsible person confusion under fire safety regulations.
00:00:24 [Music] good morning everyone welcome to today's hearing
00:00:28 hearing today we're going to continue hearing evidence from this laura johnson formerly of the of our vkc
00:00:36 our vkc housing department so would you ask ms johnson to come back in please [Music]
00:00:54 [Music]
00:01:02 good morning ms johnson good morning all ready to carry on yes well take a moment to get yourself organized that's right
00:01:14 yes just a minute when you're ready good morning mr chairman good morning members of the panel good morning ms johnson uh yesterday i was asking you about the increase in the budget for the grenfell tower
00:01:25 the budget for the grenfell tower project
00:01:26 project up to 9.7 million in the summer early summer of 2013. can i show you please a pair of documents
00:01:37 documents i showed you the email that peter madison had sent you about the extra 200 000
00:01:42 000 which took it up to 10.3 and we've been through that um can i ask you to go to rbk403688
00:01:52 please
00:01:57 this is the minute of the housing and economic development policy board meeting on the 5th of june 2014.
00:02:08 meeting on the 5th of june 2014. at 11 30 and you can see that council of fielding mellon was there and the other officers who were present are listed mr madison doesn't appear to have been
00:02:20 mr madison doesn't appear to have been there do you know whether he was um if he's not listed on the attendees then i should not imagine he was there did he normally attend the policy board meetings
00:02:31 meetings only when invited anyone invited can i ask you please to go to page two of this document
00:02:41 under paragraph six grenfell tower policy board discussed the draft report councillor fielding mellon stated that the report needed to explain the increased budget allocation and justify
00:02:53 increased budget allocation and justify the difference policy board discussed the contingency not currently provided for increasing the budget from 9.7 to 10.3 million pounds
00:03:04 to 10.3 million pounds uh do you recall that discussion um i yes
00:03:12 um i yes and although i put it to you yesterday i think that there was no query about the increase this increase being up to the 10.3 million in 2014
00:03:24 up to the 10.3 million in 2014 i think in fact it's right isn't it by way of correction that this was an occasion
00:03:29 occasion on which scrutiny was applied by certainly councillor fielding mellon to that increase yes um i i would have expected on taking
00:03:40 yes um i i would have expected on taking a draft report to councillor fielding mellon
00:03:43 mellon to be presented to the cabinet regarding the budget increase to discuss that with him and then him to go through about to say exactly what he has said here which was to ask the reasons why the
00:03:54 which was to ask the reasons why the budget had increased and in the next paragraph you can see that he asked that officers outlined the list of
00:03:59 list of items that would be lost from the scheme should approval to award the increased budget not be given by cabinet who were the officers there were they are bkc officers or tmo officers
00:04:11 they are bkc officers or tmo officers as it was rbkc drafting the report he would be asking our bkc officers to set out in the report
00:04:18 report the list of items that will be lost was that done
00:04:21 that done i don't remember i haven't got the cabinet report in front of me to be honest
00:04:25 honest it certainly looks from that that at least so far as councillor fielding mellon was concerned he perceived that there was a risk uh that the increase wouldn't be approved yes can you give us yourself any idea of
00:04:37 yes can you give us yourself any idea of the the degree of risk uh that was discussed
00:04:41 discussed um in other words was this a real was this a real risk um i think uh cancer fielding melon was aware that his colleagues would uh question the reason for the budget increase
00:04:52 budget increase and then would want to be aware of the facts
00:04:56 facts of what it would mean if they weren't going to increase the weren't going to agree to the budget increase so i couldn't give you a percentage about what the risk was um but it was a you know it was a factor
00:05:09 um but it was a you know it was a factor because
00:05:09 because it is a decision to be taken by cabinet and therefore you have to be prepared if cabinet decide not to agree to that budget increase can we then next go please to rbk
00:05:21 can we then next go please to rbk four zeroes three three one six
00:05:27 now this is the year before in 2013 and this is the policy board meeting of that year of july 4th of july that year 2013
00:05:40 of july 4th of july that year 2013 and you can see that councillor fielding mellon
00:05:43 mellon attended together with councillor james husband
00:05:46 husband you were present and you could see the list of other people in attendance below um can you go please to page three of that document
00:06:04 uh and it's the last paragraph under the heading the pre on the previous page entitled quarterly monitoring monitoring report but you can see in the first full paragraph on page three there it says counselor
00:06:17 on page three there it says counselor fielding melon queried increasing the budget provision from improving grenfell tower to 9.7 million pounds laura johnson said the council has not spent any money on maintaining the building in over 30 years and the
00:06:29 building in over 30 years and the capital receipt from elm park gardens has been set aside to undertake the works now this is the the the the first increase as it were
00:06:40 the first increase as it were above the originally set amount um in as we see 2013 do you recall any reluctance on the part of councillor fielding melon or indeed any other councillor
00:06:52 or indeed any other councillor um to the budget increase then being discussed
00:06:56 discussed um i don't recall there being a reluctance i don't remember this specific meeting if i'm honest with you but
00:07:02 but it would be entirely appropriate for the cabinet member in this position to query with me
00:07:07 with me why the budget had increased but i think there was a general acceptance by uh councillor fielding mullen that the prop
00:07:14 the prop the uh portfolio in some instances was in a poor state of repair and therefore money needed to be found in order to be able to meet those uh budget requirements and you could see the answer that you gave him there yeah
00:07:26 the answer that you gave him there yeah it was a bit of a broad brush answer wasn't it it may have been a more detailed
00:07:30 detailed answer than that but the minutes by uh were
00:07:33 were necessarily short let's then uh go to where we were yesterday uh and i'm afraid we seem to be going backwards in time this morning already um we go to 17th of july 2012
00:07:45 um we go to 17th of july 2012 and an email exchange of that date at rbk3045642
00:07:55 now um this is an email uh um well there's an exchange between celia chaliscan and amanda johnson that's the exchange uh it starts on page
00:08:06 that's the exchange uh it starts on page seven please if we go there with a letter
00:08:08 letter from the grenfell tower leaseholders association to paul duncan of the tmo about the appointment of studio e and there it is and i think we looked at that yesterday
00:08:22 and the letter complains about among other things the lack of communication from the tmo about the appointment of studio e and on page five we can see that mark anderson if you go up to page five
00:08:35 anderson if you go up to page five mark anderson responds saying good morning mr mott you see that at the foot of the page i shall review your observations and reply to you separately on these issues
00:08:46 reply to you separately on these issues i know we haven't received any dates from you would be grateful if you would provide me with these as i feel it would be beneficial for us to meet to discuss the proposals and jane trethewey is copied in on
00:09:00 and jane trethewey is copied in on that email indeed as others and if you look up
00:09:03 look up the page she writes to mark anderson and says dear all i'd like to meet with you to understand the communication strategy you have in place with the grenfell tower residents over the coming weeks and months
00:09:14 weeks and months evidently they are still not feeling informed and i'm sure this can be corrected
00:09:20 corrected and then if if you go up to page three
00:09:27 uh it's an email that starts at on page two
00:09:31 two let's just go to that the foot of page two she writes to uh amanda johnson uh
00:09:43 amanda johnson uh and uh celia chaliskan uh also competing to ruth angel and over the page she
00:09:54 over the page she uh says in this first main paragraph that she hasn't had an update on grenfell
00:10:00 grenfell and in the next paragraph she says i wonder if the tma believe i should take it on trust that they will do a good job and not be questioning them in this kind of detail but when faced with these kinds of
00:10:11 but when faced with these kinds of complaints i would not be doing my job if i did not require an answer as were councillor c as councillor coleridge to ask me to tell him what was going on
00:10:20 going on i would not know what to say i'm going to wait
00:10:23 to wait to the end of the week for an update from mark in response to my email below i for him to confirm that they've already written out all that they plan to if i didn't hear anything i've drafted an email to escalator to sasha i would hate the grenfell project to end
00:10:35 i would hate the grenfell project to end up with the appearance of a bad news story for residents simply through poor communication after the council had pulled out six million pounds of funding to invest in the improvement of their homes and then she makes a similar or rather
00:10:47 and then she makes a similar or rather an observation about the silchester project and then in the last paragraph she says this all of this rather adds to the impression of mark being overloaded and perhaps promising things that the tmo are not currently structured
00:10:59 tmo are not currently structured to deliver when it comes to comms work like this why would it be mark as a senior asset manager setting them up where is the help from the housing management leasehold management and resident engagement teams
00:11:10 resident engagement teams these are things we've previously discussed but i thought these examples were illustrative i'm not seeking your intervention at this stage we'll let you know how things progress
00:11:18 progress and wanted to keep you in the loop now just to be clear we'll see how this email chain ends up if you go to page two where we started as i said it went
00:11:29 two where we started as i said it went to amanda johnson and amanda johnson then sends it on essentially to to celia a chalice cam with a with a uh a comment
00:11:44 in on that uh and then uh it it is a discussion between the two of them celia chaliska and amanda johnson i don't believe you actually get this exchange
00:11:56 exchange um just to be clear it's right that jane trethewey was the head of the regeneration team at that point wasn't it yes she was and you were her um line manager that's correct did she share any of these
00:12:08 share any of these ideas or sentiments with you even if you didn't see these emails i think she did was it your impression that mark anderson of the tma was overloaded uh i don't remember to be honest with you in 2012 whether i thought mark
00:12:20 you in 2012 whether i thought mark anderson was overloaded with work was it what was your impression of whether it was appropriate for him to be dealing with matters of this nature as we've seen reflected in the email
00:12:32 as we've seen reflected in the email um mark anderson as head of assets would have been taking a lead on the improvements to the grenfell tower project and then it was up to mark to discuss with his colleagues in the tmo
00:12:43 tmo about the division of work that undertake and was to be undertaken from there
00:12:48 there it's quite difficult for me to answer that because obviously i didn't work for the tmo
00:12:52 the tmo now was there a review among our bkc officers within your group at least that the tmo were not structured to deliver projects such as grenfell tower i thought this was a new project for the
00:13:04 i thought this was a new project for the tmo to deliver in terms of the silent size and scale of it but it doesn't mean that they couldn't get structured in order to be able to deal with it so i think perhaps in these early days it was a matter of the tmo
00:13:15 was a matter of the tmo working out how they were going to do it at this point was there a sense that although it might be capable of being structured as you've just said to deliver the grenfell tower project it hadn't yet been said
00:13:26 hadn't yet been said um based on what jane says i would say that's definitely jane's impression um but i can't comment because it's uh it's 11 years ago now and i don't remember to be honest with you it was jane's impression yeah did she
00:13:39 it was jane's impression yeah did she share that impression with you she would have done yes she would have done right did you see did you have that impression for yourself or were you just receiving what she was telling you i was
00:13:50 receiving what she was telling you i was receiving what she was telling me at that time
00:13:52 that time but to be fair i don't remember now let's go back into the body of the email chain if we can at page two
00:14:06 uh at the um towards the foot of the page
00:14:10 page just below halfway down your screen uh celia chaliskan says to amanda johnson 17th july hi amanda i think we need to be having a word with yvonne and sasha on this as there needs to be the joint working
00:14:21 there needs to be the joint working between the teams how shall we handle should i draft something to them both now you're not copied into that as we've seen but you were were you aware that there were discussions about joint working between
00:14:32 discussions about joint working between the teams
00:14:33 the teams um there was joint there was discussions about joint working with the teams on a number of issues um i'm not aware of this particular issue i'm not aware of i don't remember this particular email if i'm honest with you
00:14:44 if i'm honest with you or having a discussion in uh july 2012 with amanda about here contacting avon and sasha were the team is working effectively before this issue arose as a result of
00:14:56 before this issue arose as a result of gtla raising it um i think this was a uh jane raising that there needed to be greater joint working so
00:15:07 greater joint working so from the email it would indicate that there wasn't perhaps enough joint working on this issue and that they were seeking to get better working relationships on grenfell tower on these issues if we scroll up to the bottom of page
00:15:18 if we scroll up to the bottom of page one we can see that amanda johnson responds
00:15:22 responds and says celia reading jane's email again this is at the foot of the screen she does not want us to intervene as yet so hold the draft let's still look at the mma and set up the meeting with yvonne to take forward
00:15:33 the meeting with yvonne to take forward the resident engagement issues in general
00:15:35 general as we were intending to we'll chat tomorrow uh and and there's a response i'll show you the rest of this um at the top of the page um
00:15:48 um at the top of the page um or the top of your screen sorry now the bottom of the page response back okay the mma wasn't just wasn't designed for this sort of thing
00:15:56 thing when we start looking at the new arrangements then we'll need to do quite a bit of work about getting the new agreement right speak to you tomorrow and then amanda johnson responds that's what i've been thinking you would have a much more specific contract after the epg
00:16:08 contract after the epg matter we need to be careful now first of all do you agree with what was said by celia chaliscan that the mma was not designed to deal with projects such as the refurbishment of grenfell
00:16:20 such as the refurbishment of grenfell yes in general i would did in what respects did you think that the mma was deficient
00:16:26 deficient in that respect the mma was set up to be a general
00:16:30 a general uh document that set out the relationship between the council and the tmo
00:16:34 tmo because it's a standard document drafted by government that set out how you would work with them on a range of very quite standard housing management issues from rent collection to
00:16:45 to to housing management to asbs as we saw yesterday
00:16:49 yesterday but perhaps didn't have any kind of specific chapters in it relating to very detailed pieces of work around our building refurbishment did did you take part or did anybody to
00:17:00 did did you take part or did anybody to your knowledge take part in any kind of discussion about actually having a specific contract between rbkc and the tmo to deal with or cover the grenfell tower
00:17:12 to deal with or cover the grenfell tower refurbishment project i did not have a conversation about a specific contract on working with the tmo on the uh on the ground for tower refurbishment did did the point that was being made here
00:17:23 here uh about the mma just not being designed for this sort of thing go any further than celia chaliscan's email that we've seen here i don't remember it being raised with me but it may have been that amanda and celia
00:17:34 amanda and celia discussed it further
00:17:38 did when it came to the amendment or revision of the mma in 2015 december i think to that 2015 was this point taken in then i don't believe it was
00:17:53 um looking at the top of the email as i've shown you there's a reference to the epg matter presumably that's elm park gardens yes did you agree uh with amanda johnson
00:18:04 did you agree uh with amanda johnson that a more specific contract with the tma was
00:18:06 tma was required as a result of the learning on that project the experience on that project
00:18:13 project on the experience of elm park gardens um to be honest with you i don't remember
00:18:21 what was it about the elm park gardens project that's just what i'm trying to think about because there was two uh pieces of work undertaken at elm park gardens
00:18:31 gardens one that took place before i joined the tmo
00:18:34 tmo which joined rbkc sorry which was a refurbishment of elm park gardens by the major works team and i very much picked that up after
00:18:47 and i very much picked that up after the work had by and large completed but there was a sig in terms of the section 20 consultation at empire gardens for that piece of work there was a significant difference
00:18:58 there was a significant difference between
00:18:58 between what the estimated bills for the leaseholders were there and what the actual bills were based on the fact that the building works had been far more extensive at elm park gardens than originally envisaged
00:19:09 gardens than originally envisaged elm park gardens is an estate off the kings road and it is made up of a variety of blocks from edwardian mansion blocks this block block built in the 1960s [Music]
00:19:21 [Music] and the other project at empire gardens was of course the conversion of the basements there um and the basements um i to be honest with you i'm struggling to remember how the struct how it was structured in
00:19:32 how the struct how it was structured in terms of the basement conversion work because
00:19:35 because uh the basements had would had always been there but had fallen into disuse and disrepair the council has identified that they uh was an opportunity uh to refurbish
00:19:46 uh was an opportunity uh to refurbish the
00:19:47 the basements and then sell them in order to generate the receipt that could be invested
00:19:52 invested in other areas uh of the council um and some of the um garden basements were kept for social housing and for key worker housing um can we then move forward to later in
00:20:03 um can we then move forward to later in the year this is rbk three zero four five six
00:20:05 five six seven seven
00:20:09 this is an email chain between you amanda johnson and james jane trethuy in september 2012. can we start on page two with an email of the third of
00:20:20 two with an email of the third of september 2012 from mark anderson to keith uh keith mott who is gtla essentially copied to a wide range of people
00:20:30 people including you as you can see there good afternoon thank you for your email and over the page
00:20:39 uh he says it appears i've not been able to resolve matters to your satisfaction and apologize for this to assist me in doing so i'd be grateful if you would identify which which aspects of your original email i have not addressed or provided guidance
00:20:51 have not addressed or provided guidance upon and i shall then focus on these i welcome the input of the leaseholder group and the majority of the leaseholders have done so individually my offer of meeting with you collectively remains and i suggest we do
00:21:02 collectively remains and i suggest we do so
00:21:03 so in the near future even though there appear to be issues that remain unclear do you recall receiving this email particularly um i don't particularly recall receiving this email but i would have done if i was in the
00:21:14 but i would have done if i was in the email chain do you remember why mark anderson had said that he had not been able to resolve matters to your that's the gtla's satisfaction no now let's go back to page two
00:21:27 no now let's go back to page two in this email run and here's an email uh from jane trithue to amanda johnson and to you
00:21:34 to you and um she exp in a nutshell expresses her dissatisfaction with mr anderson's response
00:21:41 response she says regarding the below i just don't think this is a good enough answer to the leaseholders queries essentially as they make clear in their emails and most recently on fifth august we request you to be more direct to our
00:21:52 we request you to be more direct to our questions so say yes in caps and bold it will be an improvement underlined in cats so therefore there will be no in caps and bold recharges to the leaseholders
00:22:03 leaseholders close quote i feel as though these repeated rebuffs to them and a claim not to understand what it is that they are asking for risks damaging the relationship between the tmo the leaseholders and makes the delivery of this project more difficult
00:22:16 delivery of this project more difficult efforts to get the tmo to consider a more open approach fell on deaf ears see attached
00:22:22 attached i understand the tmo has been seeking a final position before clarifying it to leaseholders but there is no reason to avoid clarifying the process and likely timetable in writing to them as i'm not receiving updates on grenfell
00:22:34 as i'm not receiving updates on grenfell directly i'm now unsure how or whether to take this matter further and would welcome any views that's what she set out then and amanda johnson responds on page one
00:22:48 johnson responds on page one and says this and you're copied in jane i think we need to develop a formal protocol with the tmo on how they manage any development stroke regeneration straight major capital projects
00:22:59 straight major capital projects this would include a specific section in managing communication celia has suggested that the work done on car parks could form a useful basis for developing the communication element once we have this and we will prioritize
00:23:11 once we have this and we will prioritize this then we should develop formal reporting arrangements with which highlight what i think that's should say with highlight reports that link to the hra meeting stroke regen board as
00:23:22 meeting stroke regen board as appropriate i suggest we also include terms of reference which set out the councils and the tmo's respective roles and responsibilities we can then also link any performance measures into the capital business plan
00:23:34 measures into the capital business plan and overall tma performance plan whilst this may
00:23:37 this may not resolve all ongoing issues it will provide us with a formal framework for overseeing these more complex areas of work that cannot be effectively picked up under the current mma any framework once developed
00:23:48 current mma any framework once developed can be a variation to the mma i was going to arrange to meet with sasha and talk through some of these issues and then bring a draft paper straight framework for an internal discussion question mark
00:23:59 for an internal discussion question mark and over the page she says thanks amanda uh first why was there no such protocol in existence before this time september 2012 um i should imagine
00:24:11 september 2012 um i should imagine because we uh there hadn't been any uh significant uh projects of this type undertaken before or if they had been undertaken as i
00:24:22 or if they had been undertaken as i alluded to in terms of the refurbishment of elm park gardens they just they were done prior to myself and amanda being in these particular posts or they were undertaken under just the banner of the major works programme
00:24:34 banner of the major works programme well i was going to ask you what had happened on the tma's previous first major developmental regeneration projects but i think the answer is there weren't any and grenfell was the first they they undertook
00:24:44 undertook specific areas of work under the major works program as in the capital works program kitchens bathrooms windows etc but i um since 2009 since i had been in
00:24:56 but i um since 2009 since i had been in post
00:24:57 post i wasn't aware of them having done a project of this type no and does that does it follow from that that so far as the people at the tma were concerned in place in 2012
00:25:08 tma were concerned in place in 2012 and indeed from 2011 when grenfell beck evolved those people had not done a major regeneration project at the tmo
00:25:20 a major regeneration project at the tmo the management team at the tmo would have been entirely new in 2012 and so they would not they may have had previous experience in previous employment of undertaking regeneration
00:25:31 employment of undertaking regeneration schemes
00:25:32 schemes but they wouldn't have done a regeneration scheme of this type at the tmo
00:25:35 tmo no thank you did you agree with amanda johnson that a protocol was necessary i don't remember to be honest with you what did you take any steps to ensure that a protocol was put in place or at least explore that possibility i really
00:25:47 least explore that possibility i really don't remember this conversation and i don't remember the outcome of it if i'm honest
00:25:50 honest right did this email with amanda johnson do you remember lead you to think that a greater degree of scrutiny over the tmo and its refurbishment was required
00:26:01 and its refurbishment was required particularly in respect of communications with the residents of grenfell tower um i should imagine it did yes and what did uh
00:26:09 did uh do you remember what you did about that no to be honest right let's um let's go to 2014 uh rbk3046081 please
00:26:29 now this is an email of the 30th of july 2014
00:26:35 2014 from celia chaliscan to amanda johnson uh not to you you're not copied in on it it's subject is asset management
00:26:46 it's subject is asset management projects process and there's an attachment and she says hi this is the first draft of a process for projects like grenfell it isn't very detailed so i'm hoping you can add a bit more to
00:26:57 so i'm hoping you can add a bit more to it
00:26:58 it now we've seen that amanda johnson had first suggested a protocol in september 2012 do you know why the first draft wasn't produced until july 2014
00:27:10 july 2014 no just to be clear um perhaps we can have up on on the screen what it is she's sending rbk rbk3046082
00:27:23 it is she's sending rbk rbk3046082 it says draft in red letters uh and uh an asset management projects process as you can see it is a a short document it's only two pages but if you go to page two
00:27:36 pages but if you go to page two it has a section on resident communication as you can see
00:27:43 and in the third paragraph there's a suggestion there in draft that the tma staff would be responsible for leading on resident consultation consultation with input from the council's lead officer
00:27:54 council's lead officer the community the communications and consultation plan will be drafted as part of the tma standard processes and then as read prior to the commissioning of the feasibility study but this will be brought to the hra asset management and business planning meeting to be signed off
00:28:07 meeting to be signed off etc and the rest of it is all relevant as well
00:28:12 as well do you know why um [Music]
00:28:15 [Music] well brother did did you do anything to pursue
00:28:18 pursue the production of a draft such as this between the september of 2012 when we first saw it mentioned by amanda johnson in their in her discussion with cydia chaliskan and uh
00:28:29 and uh and at this point i don't remember doing anything to progress that no why is that uh because it would have been something undertaken by amanda and celia within their team were you you were overseeing their team
00:28:40 were you you were overseeing their team there weren't you i was yes but i don't always get involved in all of the detail that teams undertake in terms of their work so i would have uh trusted a very experienced officer such as amanda office
00:28:51 office amanda johnson and celia chelsea uh to take those matters forward i i got the impression from your evidence earlier that this was at the very least on your radar if i could put it that way in september 2012 is that
00:29:02 2012 is that is that fair i think that's fair yes it therefore being on your radar at that time
00:29:07 time why didn't you keep it on your radar in the
00:29:10 the 17 or 18 months that followed i really can't answer that question because i don't remember okay um
00:29:19 is it some people might think that that that was um it could be explained by you not thinking or caring very much about resident consultation
00:29:30 about resident consultation i think that would be entirely erroneous conclusion to draw right
00:29:37 so what explanation can you give
00:29:42 not being able to remember this particular piece of work but in retrospect i would imagine that i have two experienced officers who are managing the relationship with the the tmo and i would have it on trust
00:29:55 the tmo and i would have it on trust that they would take forward pieces of work in this nature we discussed a lot of matters amanda johnson's team didn't just undertake commissioning with the tmo also with housing
00:30:06 with the tmo also with housing associations and supporting people projects
00:30:09 projects and there was a range of issues i would have talked to her about on any day or any month
00:30:13 any month do you remember who had prompted or what had prompted this first draft to be produced at the end of july 2014 as we've seen no i don't you'd need to ask amanda johnson or celie chelsea right
00:30:24 johnson or celie chelsea right uh in fact do you know that this draft protocol was never taken any further forward i don't know i don't know
00:30:32 know to be honest with you right
00:30:41 so do i take it from that that you knew nothing of the existence of this draft or or its creation by amanda johnson i haven't seen a dr i don't remember seeing a draft of this
00:30:52 i don't remember seeing a draft of this i may have may have done but i don't remember right let's turn then um back to the question we were on yesterday afternoon which is kpis and specifically project kpis
00:31:04 kpis and specifically project kpis do you agree that kpis were used by the tmo to monitor key aspects of the refurbishment program for grenfell tower yes they would have been uh did you ever see those kpis i don't believe i did did you contribute
00:31:16 i don't believe i did did you contribute to the setting of those kpis uh not for grenfell town can we look at rbk3029431 please
00:31:28 that is a project dashboard report for the grenfell tower project at four as you can see in the top right hand corner february 2016 and the date
00:31:39 hand corner february 2016 and the date of the programme meeting just above it is march 2016. do you remember when those started being prepared
00:31:46 prepared these project dashboard reports for the grenfell tower project no i don't it looks as if just on the face of the document that they were produced monthly is that right um i suspect they will yeah did you
00:31:58 um i suspect they will yeah did you receive these reports reports such as these
00:32:00 these um i don't remember i don't remember receiving them i knew of their existence um and on occasion i may have uh received a copy of them but i don't believe
00:32:09 believe on a standard basis i received these on monthly amanda johnson would have received them right now if we go to the very top left hand corner under the heading project dashboard report you'll see that there's a report author
00:32:20 a report author claire williams and has in contact is roger keane uh the general needs housing commissioner he he was rbkc he was yes and we've seen that from some of the documents
00:32:32 of the documents uh did he regularly update you or even irregularly update you on the contents
00:32:39 contents of these documents um amanda johnson would have regularly updated me on it rather than uh roger keane would she have sat down with you and gone through the document uh she may well have done or she may
00:32:50 uh she may well have done or she may have just given me a brief pre-see of how it was progressing right did you ask amanda johnson um about the contents of these reports or what she was telling you about them did she
00:33:01 did she did you scrutinize what she was saying to you i don't remember on specific occasions sitting down with these particular documents i did know they existed
00:33:10 existed but i did receive regular updates from amanda or
00:33:13 amanda or about the progress of various projects that her team have oversight of very well
00:33:18 well um could you just explain what was the um
00:33:21 um structural relationship between roger keane who's the housing contact on this document and amanda johnson she would have been his uh line manager i believe right i see
00:33:32 i believe right i see so so far as you knew he was receiving these documents monthly i suppose from claire williams and then discussing those and showing them to amanda johnson yes right
00:33:47 and if we look at this document and it's a particular one you can see that there is a box um which we can have that blown up please bottom left hand corner of page one
00:33:59 one it's not on the screen at the moment um says communications overview and it says scheme been under consultation since 2012 a newsletter goes out to all flats and
00:34:10 a newsletter goes out to all flats and is posted to non-resident leaseholders notice is posted as need the use of bulk texting has been useful when communal working e.g lifts etc has been undertaken
00:34:22 undertaken was that an accurate and adequate record of communications to the residents so far as you understood it at the time no i think that's a uh a very brief precis
00:34:32 precis of the communications that the tmo undertook to with the residents of grenfell tower over the course of 2012 to 20 probably 2016 when the refurbishment project completed
00:34:44 refurbishment project completed uh and i want to ask you some questions about the housing and property scrutiny committee or hpsc can we start by looking at paragraph 17 of your first witness statement please at page four
00:34:59 and you say there that uh part of the agenda for hpsc housing property scrutiny committee was a regular update which was a report from the cabinet
00:35:10 which was a report from the cabinet member for housing property and regeneration or the housing director you see that in practice
00:35:16 practice did you draft those reports uh in practice
00:35:19 practice no i did not draft those reports they were drafted for me by a member of my team
00:35:23 team i read them and then i agreed them and i signed them off i see so again same as before you don't have the
00:35:29 the granular input you read them you approve them you sign them off and then you take responsibility for their contents that's correct what in general were the sources of information
00:35:40 information relied upon for preparing those reports so i would put together a report which was
00:35:49 was a mix of what was happening in the housing department updates on areas of my responsibility so homelessness housing advice changes in legislation updates that i
00:36:00 changes in legislation updates that i thought that the members of cabinet the members of the scrutiny committee would find helpful in helping them to understand how the housing department worked the legislative context
00:36:12 legislative context that it sat within who we worked with what the pressures were in order to help them to better scrutinize the work of the department
00:36:22 yeah those are certainly um cat topics my question was a slightly different one what was the source of the information that the person drafting the report which you then read and
00:36:34 the report which you then read and approved
00:36:35 approved so there would have been a number of sources from uh uh policy updates that they got from the website whether a department of communities and local government at the time
00:36:44 time or they would have gone and spoken to colleagues within the department about progress that was being made against key areas and asked them to draft a paragraph
00:36:53 paragraph or in the case of updates perhaps on the tmo asked the tmo for updates on how they were progressing on key areas i see um who attended housing and property scrutiny committee meetings
00:37:04 property scrutiny committee meetings um i attended uh well obviously the members have specially committed from the members uh i attended uh as i was invited uh the cabinet member for housing and property and regeneration
00:37:15 property and regeneration attended he wasn't a member he intended because he was invited and then if officers in my department had a particular report going discretionary committee they would attend in order to present that report
00:37:27 attend in order to present that report or answer questions on that report if it came up
00:37:30 came up and were these meetings always held in advance of cabinet meetings um gosh i've forgotten what the timetable was now uh but they should have been held in advance of cabinet meetings
00:37:42 held in advance of cabinet meetings um in order for them if a paper was going to go to cabinet of particular interest
00:37:48 interest they should have gone to scrutiny committee first in order to give scrutiny committee members the opportunity to review the report add any comments to it and then it went to cabinet right um in fact the question i've asked you is a little ambiguous
00:37:59 little ambiguous let me break it up a bit um whenever there was a cabinet meeting was it inevitable that there would be a a prior hspc meeting uh there was a there was a timetable set
00:38:10 uh there was a there was a timetable set for scrutiny committee a year in advance so um it was up to the committee clerks in the governance team to set the timetable for scrutiny committee and cabinet
00:38:17 cabinet but were they my question is really was it inevitable that there would be a scrutiny committee meeting if there was going to be a cabinet meeting um it didn't always flow exactly because sometimes cabinet
00:38:29 exactly because sometimes cabinet meetings or scrutiny committee meetings got changed so in most cases i would say yes but not always and similarly the other way around did there have to be a cabinet
00:38:40 have to be a cabinet meeting on the horizon for there to be a scrutiny committee meeting or were scrutiny committee meetings held independently of whether there was a scheduled cabinet meeting scrutiny committee
00:38:51 cabinet meeting scrutiny committee meetings were held independently of whether there was a scheduled cabinet meeting
00:38:55 meeting um how well well did you decide and if not who did decide who would um well what issues would be put before the scrutiny committee uh i would agree the agenda with uh
00:39:08 uh i would agree the agenda with uh councillor marshall who was the chair of scrutiny committee for that for a period of time before it changed to councillor mackover and councillor marshall would ask me what items we wanted to put forward
00:39:20 what items we wanted to put forward i would also discuss the agenda items with councillor fielding mellon or his predecessor councillor coleridge in terms of what items we thought would be useful to put before scrutiny how would you decide
00:39:31 how would you decide if an issue is important enough to be discussed at scrutiny um so there were some items that were fairly standard items that we took before
00:39:40 before scrutiny committee every year so the budget
00:39:43 budget the paper on heating and hot water the tmo
00:39:47 tmo performance report six monthly and then yearly
00:39:50 yearly and then there were other items that came up
00:39:54 came up and i would meet with councillor marshall to run through what the department was doing at the time um and whether uh it was worthy of a report coming forward and you try not to get exclusionary
00:40:05 you try not to get exclusionary committee into just giving papers that are
00:40:08 are uh just sort of general or for information and trying to aid scrutiny committees to be able to scrutinize the work of their housing or property teams and then be able to add value in order
00:40:21 and then be able to add value in order to be able to feed that back into the workings of the of the department or would be able to feed that up into cabinet but i would discuss with councillor marshall what the department were working on um and what merited a report being taken
00:40:34 um and what merited a report being taken forward in practice and in general terms did the members of the scrutiny committee accept your reports at face value or were you often challenged on their
00:40:45 were you often challenged on their contents
00:40:47 contents it was a mix depending on the topic so is the answer to my question that you were often challenged on the substance of your reports yes because that was the nature of scrutiny committee that they were there
00:40:58 scrutiny committee that they were there to read the reports and to um ask me questions on the content and what about the recommended actions in them were you often challenged on those uh not necessarily on the recommended action more about the uh
00:41:09 action more about the uh the content perhaps now let me ask you some questions about meetings with robert black you mentioned earlier that you would have regular meetings
00:41:19 meetings which is part of your role with robert black the chief executive of the tmo can we look at your first witness statement at page seven paragraph 31 please
00:41:30 at page seven paragraph 31 please you say there the director of housing a chief executive of the tmo mr robert black met monthly these meetings did not have an agenda and they were not minuted now the
00:41:42 and they were not minuted now the director of housing is of course you yes yes uh apart from you and robert black would anybody else be present at those meetings
00:41:52 meetings no what was the purpose of those meetings
00:41:56 meetings uh to provide each other with an update on what was taking place in our respective organizations and if there are areas of particular concern then we could raise them there and discuss them
00:42:08 discuss them now we've seen no minutes or rather record of those meetings is that that's correct isn't it that's correct do you know why those minutes weren't minuted or recorded in some way um it was custom and practice that we
00:42:19 um it was custom and practice that we just met and had a meeting for around an hour once a month and just went through general items and uh i can't i cannot now sort of explain to you why they weren't minuted
00:42:30 explain to you why they weren't minuted um it was just uh it was a general meeting and a catch-up between between us both right i i i may be wrong about this but i don't think we've seen any
00:42:39 any record of those meetings in your day books uh
00:42:42 books uh no i don't wouldn't necessarily have taken notes at those meetings i may have gone in with a list of topics that i wanted to discuss with mr black but i wouldn't necessarily have taken detailed notes
00:42:53 taken detailed notes what would happen if in the event that there was a dispute about what was said at one of these meetings between you and mr black what would you what would you look at to resolve that dispute um i don't
00:43:06 to resolve that dispute um i don't believe there was an instance where there was a dispute but you wouldn't know that in advance of any particular meeting for all you know there may have been a dispute on a matter what would you have how would you have sought to resolve
00:43:17 how would you have sought to resolve that dispute without a formal or even informal
00:43:20 informal contemporaneous record of who said what um it never came up so i didn't uh i didn't see the need to uh uh there wasn't a dispute between me mr black there were general catch-up
00:43:31 mr black there were general catch-up sessions about both of us about our respective organizations so um if i raised a particular issue with him that i had concern about then mr black would say i'll go away and take that up with the team and i'll come
00:43:42 take that up with the team and i'll come back to you or if he raised something that he had a particular concern about again it would be a reasonable discussion where i would say i'll come back to you mr black and we'll talk about that some further or i'll raise that with sasha or i'll ask amanda
00:43:54 raise that with sasha or i'll ask amanda to pick that up right they weren't uh adversarial meetings no i'm not suggesting that they were adversarial meetings what i'm really suggesting to you is
00:44:05 suggesting to you is why neither of you took any steps to protect yourselves in the event of a potential dispute should one arise about what was said at a meeting i don't think we felt the need to at the time um leaving aside the questions of
00:44:17 um leaving aside the questions of disputes
00:44:19 disputes it sounds from what you've said that you would agree that things would have to be done in other words actions would have to to
00:44:26 to to happen as a result of these meetings would you not even keep a shopping list of things that mr black wanted you to do yes i would have done it might not necessarily have been in my day book sometimes i had
00:44:37 been in my day book sometimes i had other bits of paper um i know i felt that i can remember as well you know actions i don't always necessarily need to take them down i'm fairly good at keeping notes on what's taking place at the time but
00:44:49 what's taking place at the time but in terms of those meetings if there were particular actions i'm quite sure i also could have remembered them and then taken action as a result of them afterwards right i mean some might say that the absence of any
00:45:01 absence of any record of a meeting between rbkc as the client
00:45:05 client and tmo as the service provider for one of the better expression might be evidence of what has been called lax clienting is that something you can comment on do you think
00:45:16 you can comment on do you think i don't think it was evidence of likes client was fire safety ever a topic of discussion at those meetings do you remember uh the meetings were quite broad ranging so there may well have been discussion about fire safety at one
00:45:27 been discussion about fire safety at one of those meetings can you remember any specific instance when the question of fire safety or fire risk assessments ever came up i don't remember a specific instance right
00:45:40 even very much in general terms doing the best you can without any record do you remember how frequently the question of fire safety or far risk assessments ever arose
00:45:51 assessments ever arose no uh if we uh go back a page in your statement please the paragraph 26
00:46:08 you under the heading monitoring of the tmo
00:46:12 tmo you refer to monthly meetings i'm summarizing there um with the tmo to review performance and updates on projects that were taking place
00:46:20 place would you be present at those meetings uh no they were undertaken by amanda johnson
00:46:26 johnson did you ever attend uh no no
00:46:31 if we move on in your statement to page eight
00:46:34 eight paragraph 34
00:46:38 you say there the rbkc housing had strategic oversight of the tma performance of maintenance and during building works but it was not part of the council's remit to undertake spot checks of work
00:46:51 remit to undertake spot checks of work and what do you mean there by strategic oversight
00:46:54 oversight um i the tmo uh came into existence because the tenants had enacted the right to manage um so it was uh quite unusual in an organization in terms of being a
00:47:05 organization in terms of being a borough-wide tmo where the tenants had taken that decision
00:47:11 decision which meant that the tmo had a board made up of uh councillors rbkc nominees independents and attendance and leaseholders so it had a it had a board that
00:47:24 so it had a it had a board that monitored its performance in much the same way
00:47:26 same way as a housing association would who was undertaking the management and maintenance of its stock um and the role of the council was to
00:47:37 um and the role of the council was to ensure was to just that have a strategic oversight of the activities of the tmo rather than to go into the granular detail of what the tmo was doing on a day-to-day basis on particular
00:47:48 on a day-to-day basis on particular activities i see this topic came up yesterday in the context of kpis about fire safety uh is is is what you're telling us that in
00:47:59 is is what you're telling us that in fact the way you saw it was that rbkc housing oversaw the overseers
00:48:05 overseers if you see what i mean in other words the tmo had a board and you could trust the board to oversee the business of tmo and you and rbk sees roles to oversee the activities of the board
00:48:16 the activities of the board it wasn't our uh we had nominees to the board
00:48:20 board so um rbkc had four nominees on the board
00:48:23 board so it actively participated in the board who then undertook scrutiny of the tmos activities which is entirely in keeping in a organization of this type
00:48:34 in a organization of this type so we did have oversight through that mechanism
00:48:37 mechanism but in terms of the housing department um
00:48:40 um i understood what the functioning of the board was
00:48:43 board was but our day-to-day activity was not worn as i can only repeat it wasn't one of a granular examination of what the tmo did day to day it was one of more of receiving performance information and an
00:48:54 performance information and an understanding of what they were doing in general yes did you view fire safety as being part of providing that strategic oversight uh fire safety was uh listed in terms of
00:49:07 uh fire safety was uh listed in terms of the
00:49:07 the six monthly and annual reviews that the tmo
00:49:11 tmo provided on their performance and it would have arisen i should imagine in conversations between amanda and uh and the team but as in the same way that fire safety was
00:49:23 in the same way that fire safety was raised it would have been uh in the same way that it would have been raised on other compliance areas and although you say it wasn't the council's remit to undertake spot checks of work did did you ever visit building works to um
00:49:37 did you ever visit building works to um when they were ongoing to satisfy yourself about what you were being told on progress and on quality uh no i'm i'm not a qualified quantity
00:49:48 uh no i'm i'm not a qualified quantity surveyor nor am i a clerk of works now if we go on please to page 9 in your statement and look at paragraph 40 you say there that
00:49:59 you say there that should just get to it you say there in the fourth line down oversight and liaison with the tmo regarding the grenfell tower refurbishment was initially undertaken by the strategic regeneration and development team
00:50:10 team but that moved you say a little later you say
00:50:13 you say around june straight july 2014 the responsibility for oversight of tma performance on the refurbishment moved to the housing commissioning team why was the responsibility
00:50:25 why was the responsibility for oversight of tma's performance in relation to the grenfell tower project moved to the housing commissioning team
00:50:35 at that time i remember that because the housing
00:50:38 housing commissioning team were doing uh generally doing uh work well it was their responsibility to undertake works to undertake a strategic oversight of the tmo it seemed to fit better with that
00:50:50 tmo it seemed to fit better with that team at that time
00:50:56 who decided that there should be that move me
00:50:59 move me and was there any particular event uh or thing that had arisen which prompted that decision um i don't remember a particular event it may have been that the housing because there was a
00:51:10 the housing because there was a crossover in activity in terms of monitoring the tmo and the particular activities of grenfell tower it made sense at that time
00:51:19 time in order to consolidate that in the work of the housing commissioning team and i believe around that time the work of the housing regeneration team and development team
00:51:30 regeneration team and development team probably around that time started to become
00:51:33 become more deep they started to become more projects for that team to take on and from that time uh first it i think it remained the case that you
00:51:44 that you had overall supervision of the grenfell tower project via the housing commissioning team that's correct because it sat as one of your four areas it did us does strategic regeneration and development
00:51:55 strategic regeneration and development in indeed
00:51:56 in indeed um so so far as you were concerned it was a horizontal move that's correct um to which individuals in the housing commissioning team did responsibility for oversight of tma
00:52:07 responsibility for oversight of tma performance on the grenfell tower project pass um i don't remember exactly but judging from that previous document roger keane would seem to have been involved amanda johnson will be able to
00:52:18 involved amanda johnson will be able to answer that question for you in more detail
00:52:20 detail right well yes did you take any steps to satisfy yourself that on the transfer of this responsibility uh the responsibility was moving to the
00:52:31 uh the responsibility was moving to the to the right people uh there was only two people in the team um so it would have been undertaken by uh uh seeley chalice gun uh roger keem was in the team at the time although
00:52:42 was in the team at the time although subsequently left so it would have been undertaken by amanda or celia or roger what steps did you take to satisfy yourself that they were qualified and experienced to take on that role um i did not take
00:52:54 to take on that role um i did not take uh did not take a view at that time as to whether they had experience of undertaking a review of works undertaken but they were experienced at
00:53:05 were experienced at commissioning so amanda johnson particularly is a very experienced commissioning manager who had worked for some years in commissioning supported housing projects and had now for some years been managing
00:53:17 and had now for some years been managing the tmo's wider commissioning responsibilities yes the commissioning isn't quite the same as overseeing a construction project
00:53:24 project no it isn't but it is nevertheless uh oversight of how the project management is being undertaken and understanding about time scales budgets and they don't necessarily in that role
00:53:35 and they don't necessarily in that role need to be qualified in don't necessarily need to have a risk qualification in order to be able to have oversight of somebody undertaking works on time and on budget and whether they are undertaking the
00:53:47 and whether they are undertaking the council's expectations in terms of communicating with tenants which is what the housing commissioning team's
00:53:53 team's function would have been in having oversight of grenfell tower
00:53:58 was the light of that last answer was the um uh experience expertise and role of cedar chalice and amanda johnson and
00:54:09 cedar chalice and amanda johnson and roger keane in in the area of resident communication um celia chelsea had worked for the local authority for a number of years
00:54:20 local authority for a number of years in a variety of roles and i don't know whether she had actually undertaken a role in
00:54:23 role in resident consultation previously amanda johnson i say was a very experienced housing professional and still is having done
00:54:32 done a number of jobs in the housing world and again roger keane was an experienced housing professional but i don't know whether any of them had undertaken extensive resident consultation in the past
00:54:43 consultation in the past right as part of their jobs the reason i ask is because the timing of the decision is similar to the timing of the production of the draft document we saw about
00:54:55 of the draft document we saw about resident consultation
00:54:58 was one of the reasons that you decided to move responsibility for oversight of the tma's performance in relation to grenfell
00:55:05 grenfell to do with resident consultation i don't believe it was but i don't to be honest with you i really don't remember the exact rationale for why i moved it
00:55:14 moved it i think it was due to the work being undertaken the growth in work are being undertaken in terms of the strategic regeneration and development team it was the crossover between that team and amanda johnson's team in
00:55:26 that team and amanda johnson's team in terms of monitoring the activities of the
00:55:29 the housing commissioning team and it was their ability to be able to provide uh sufficient resources and due diligence in order to be able to monitor that project whether it was specifically related to
00:55:40 whether it was specifically related to resident consultation i can't remember following the transfer of that responsibility was there any substantive change in the degree of scrutiny exercised by the housing commissioning team
00:55:51 commissioning team i think it became more formalized the strategic regeneration and development team it was a project for an officer within that team who would have met regularly
00:56:02 that team who would have met regularly with
00:56:02 with the tmo to go through what was happening but i think it probably became more formalized in terms of the report that we saw previously so there was a more structured reporting system i think perhaps there was but i don't remember
00:56:14 perhaps there was but i don't remember exactly to be honest with you can we turn to the topic of performance reviews and you've covered this at paragraphs 84 to 100 of your first statement of page 21. i don't need to go back to that i just
00:56:25 i don't need to go back to that i just note it
00:56:26 note it there you summarize the tmo performance reviews that referred specifically to the grenfell tower refurbishment starting with the review of 2013 to 14 and ending with the review of 2015 to
00:56:39 and ending with the review of 2015 to 16.
00:56:41 16. in relation to the grenfell tower project is it fair to say that the tma performance reviews provided a very brief overview of the works completed to date
00:56:53 yes did any member of the scrutiny committee ever asked for further details of the project after reading the tma performance reviews um if they did
00:57:04 did then they may have that it would be recorded in the scrutiny committee minute
00:57:08 minute i see do you know why you didn't include or why there was not included in these performance reviews any of the discontent expressed by residents of the tower relating to
00:57:19 by residents of the tower relating to the works
00:57:21 the works um
00:57:25 i'm sure all of the members of scrutiny committee had been copied into the various emails that members of grenfell tower leasehold association or the compact sent so they would have been aware of it
00:57:36 would have been aware of it and it wasn't routine there was in terms of that report there was a general overview about complaints and about responses to complaints and time scales for complaints but there
00:57:48 and time scales for complaints but there wasn't anything that set out specifically particularly complaints about particular issues
00:57:54 issues no it's fair to say as we've seen in on a number of occasions that for example the gtla would send their communications very widely
00:58:05 send their communications very widely and you've seen examples of every counselor being copied in matters of that nature but was that a an adequate
00:58:13 adequate substitute for channeling those complaints summarizing them and reporting on them in your performance reviews uh i if i had been asked by the councillors
00:58:24 i if i had been asked by the councillors at scrutiny committee to provide them with a more detailed report on the complaints that had been that were coming forward from the grenfell tower members of the
00:58:35 the grenfell tower members of the grenfell tower leaseholder association then i would have provided that in in terms of health and safety is it fair to say that none of the performance reviews revealed any underperformance by the tmo
00:58:47 um i think the early the earlier performance reviews were did provide some information about areas particularly that were underperforming and then
00:58:58 and then required some significant improvement because as we discussed yesterday the tmo in 2009 10 was experiencing a significant amount of
00:59:09 was experiencing a significant amount of change
00:59:10 change and would therefore acknowledge the fact that its performance had been poor in some areas and needed to improve but as we progressed through
00:59:19 2013-14-15 that the performance definitely improved right um
00:59:24 right um let's go to art402255 i'm going to ask you about a series of minutes of the contractors meeting starting with the this meeting on the 1st of april 2014
00:59:36 this meeting on the 1st of april 2014 the contractors induction meeting
00:59:40 and you could see from this minute who was present a number of people from the tma
00:59:44 tma artelia and ryden
00:59:48 there were regular meetings i should tell you such as this throughout 2014 down at least to october and beyond did you ever see minutes such as these no
00:59:58 no did you ever ask to see minutes such as these
01:00:01 these no why is that uh because the tmo were managing the project and i'm the director of housing and i didn't get involved in that level of granular detail of pieces of work that the tmo were
01:00:13 of pieces of work that the tmo were undertaking so i'm sure they uh tmo also had similar meetings about kitchens and bathroom programs uh window replacement programs roofing programs that they undertake
01:00:25 roofing programs that they undertake that they undertook as part of the capital programme to say so in the light of that does it tell us that you didn't actually see what the contractors were telling the tmo
01:00:35 the tmo or ensuring that the tmo could make sure that they did what they said they would no i didn't see them can we look at let's just look at one thing page four please in this document and look at
01:00:48 please in this document and look at paragraph 5.3 at 5.3 um you can see under the heading novation of designers it says x over completed the fire strategy at tender stage they have not been debated
01:00:59 tender stage they have not been debated but sl
01:01:00 but sl at simon lawrence of ryden will contact them with the view of using them going forward
01:01:05 forward were you ever told that ryden told and indeed repeatedly told the tmo that they were looking to use ryden as the fire safety consultant for the grenfell tower project
01:01:15 project but never in fact retained them no did you ever get to the bottom of who was contracted to do what
01:01:22 do what on this project um it was my understanding that ryden were the contractors for the refurbishment of grenfell tower and i did not inquire with the tmo as to who were the subsequent subcontractors
01:01:33 who were the subsequent subcontractors on that project did you inquire as to the role of studio e after innovation no so to speak where's that um because i uh because the tmo had been commissioned
01:01:44 uh because the tmo had been commissioned to undertake this project they'd undertaken the procurement and they were managing it and we had oversight of what they were doing but again i did not get into the granular detail of how they were project managing
01:01:55 managing this particular scheme right if you didn't know who the subcontractors were or the role of studio e post
01:02:06 studio e post novation in quotation marks how could you properly scrutinize the tmo's performance as client on the project uh
01:02:17 as client on the project uh it was the nature of this the scrutiny of the tmo in terms of this project as i said is not one of going into the detail it's not the way the relationship between the council and the tmo worked
01:02:28 between the council and the tmo worked that we went through in detail line by line about their performance on all areas of major capital works programmes it was one of asking them about how they were performing against project time scales and budgets did you
01:02:41 project time scales and budgets did you ever
01:02:42 ever seek to understand or did anybody at wkc to your knowledge seek to understand how xover who had been the fire consultants on the calc project were being used on the grenfell tower project
01:02:53 project no i want to ask you about planning different topic can we please start by looking at tmo208
01:03:05 this is an email of the 6th of may 2014 from claire williams to david gibson copy to peter madison with the subject line grenfell tower
01:03:16 with the subject line grenfell tower planners meeting thursday and if you look at the last paragraph
01:03:22 uh it says i think we will have to take a view based on our response on thursday and perhaps get laura to bring pressure to bear
01:03:30 to bear to see if we can get some reassurance prior to the final approval otherwise our contract some will be hanging out until the early july potentially is this likely stroke possible claire williams
01:03:41 williams and now i should just give you the context of this this is early may at a time when
01:03:45 time when cladding is being discussed as between the tmo
01:03:48 the tmo and uh and the contractors ryden with the need for planners to approve it because of the change in color and because also of the
01:03:59 in color and because also of the discussion about whether it should be face fixed in other words riveted or cassette
01:04:04 cassette so that was the context um i've just read you a passage from this uh
01:04:11 uh email um let me just show you next what claire williams um said in her evidence day 55
01:04:20 this is the 19th of october 2020 module 1 day 55 page 36 please
01:04:29 uh and she is asked the question at line six where you refer to laura is that laura johnson answer yes question of our bkc
01:04:40 answer yes question of our bkc answer yes was she in the planning department answer no question would laura johnson be able to bring pressure your words to rbkc planning department answer
01:04:51 answer i don't know my question to you is were you ever approached by claire williams or by anybody else at the tmo to bring pressure to bear on the planets to get
01:05:02 pressure to bear on the planets to get final approval on the cladding um i don't think i was i don't remember a particular conversation about that but if i was asked to discuss with the
01:05:13 but if i was asked to discuss with the planning department generally about this scheme or achieving planning i would have spoken to my colleague
01:05:19 colleague jonathan bohr about it but i don't particularly i don't remember to be honest being asked to talk to the planning department about cladding or fixatives right were you actually in a position de facto
01:05:30 were you actually in a position de facto in a position to bring pressure to bear put it use another word use influence over planning decisions no would it have been inappropriate for you to
01:05:41 you to bring pressure to bear or use influence on a decision to be made by the planning department um i would never be able to bring uh pressure to bear on the planning department
01:05:52 department uh because they have a very uh you know uh a set of legislation which governs what they
01:05:58 what they uh what they do um i can talk to my colleague jonathan bore about at the time about the progress or if it was jonathan who was still there or whether it was graeme stallwood was there at the time
01:06:09 graeme stallwood was there at the time about the progress or what was happening or just understanding something in more detail to help furnish my knowledge about what the planning department was saying to the tmo but um uh i have uh i had no role
01:06:22 but um uh i have uh i had no role in terms of planning um and anything i could do would be rather one of gaining information or discussing what was happening with colleagues right my question was would it have been inappropriate for you to have sought to bring pressure
01:06:33 for you to have sought to bring pressure to bear on the planning department yes i mean i i wouldn't ever think of bringing pressure to bear on the planning department i can express the view to the planning department but um they wouldn't have been receptive to
01:06:44 um they wouldn't have been receptive to me anyway
01:06:46 me anyway what's that because they're the planning department and they're as and they sit within a local authority in order to be able to undertake the functions of their town and country planning act
01:06:57 planning act not to undertake the you know what the uh director of housing may or may not want them to do right can you do you understand or can you give us any
01:07:08 do you understand or can you give us any insights
01:07:08 insights as to why claire williams might have thought it appropriate to ask you to bring pressure to bear to get some reassurance from the planning department um i think it's
01:07:19 planning department um i think it's it's a phraseology where she's asking she's making a statement that she would may ask me if i could go and discuss with the planning department about what was happening or why they were arriving at that camp
01:07:31 why they were arriving at that camp while they were arriving at that conclusion because i worked in rbkc uh and they were colleagues and i could go and discuss the matter with them but uh pressure to bear is a an incorrect
01:07:42 uh pressure to bear is a an incorrect statement
01:07:44 statement can i then turn to the topic of fire risk assessments uh before i get into the detail of that i just want to explore with you what you understood rbkc's role to be in relation
01:07:55 understood rbkc's role to be in relation to
01:07:55 to fire safety we touched on it yesterday i want now to come back to it in a slightly different aspect and start with the question of the responsible person
01:08:05 person from the time of your recruitment in 2008
01:08:09 2008 an arrival in february 2009 were you aware of the basic requirements of the regulatory reform fire safety order 2005 or the fso as we've referred to it um i don't think i was
01:08:20 referred to it um i don't think i was particularly aware of it in 2008 2009 i probably came became more aware of it over the course of my employment at the council right and what was your understanding of
01:08:32 right and what was your understanding of the role of the responsible person from 2011 my understanding was that it was the tmo's responsibility to be the responsible person under the regulatory reform fire safety order
01:08:43 reform fire safety order what was the basis of that understanding um i
01:08:46 um i i think it's set out in the mma if i'm honest with you um but um i can't remember what the basis of my
01:08:54 of my belief for that was but um i was always under the impression that it was the tmo's responsibility right did anybody tell you
01:09:00 tell you or advise you that it was the tma's responsibility to be the responsible person
01:09:04 person i don't remember coming up in conversation but 2011 is quite a long time ago right so to be clear your understanding was that it was the tmo who was the responsible person yes not our bkc
01:09:15 person yes not our bkc that's correct right
01:09:19 now can we look at janice ray's statement please this is a tmo 50890 page page 37 and i want to show you paragraph
01:09:30 page 37 and i want to show you paragraph 166 there
01:09:35 166 there uh she says this
01:09:39 uh my understanding is that under the mma the tmo was responsible for all major works sorry that's paragraph 165 then 166 she says since 2005 the relevant fire
01:09:52 she says since 2005 the relevant fire safety legislation has been the regulatory reform fire safety order 2005 rro
01:09:58 rro and then in the last sentence she says my understanding has always been that the responsible person for the rbkc's tenanted stock is defined in that order was both our bkc and the tmo now it looks
01:10:10 and the tmo now it looks from what you've just told us that that was not your understanding no my understanding was that it was the tmo can you account for why you had one view and as appears from this
01:10:20 this janice ray had another no
01:10:25 see it looks from this is that she thought you were both responsible but you thought the tmo was responsible that's quite a significant misunderstanding isn't it yes
01:10:36 yes can you account for how that arose no well mr miller you say it's a significant misunderstanding it may just be a difference quite right i rephrase the question but
01:10:47 quite right i rephrase the question but the same answer i suspect exactly um can i ask you to look the next piece tmo double zero eight three zero five nine eight
01:10:59 nine eight this is the tmo's uh november 2013 fire safety strategy written by uh or at least signed by janice ray um that's page one i'll just show you page
01:11:11 that's page one i'll just show you page 15 which has her her name at the bottom and the date just so you're clear that it is janice ray tmo health and safety and facilities manager november 2013.
01:11:22 manager november 2013. um if we go back to page one
01:11:28 um it's entitled tmo fire safety strategy have you ever seen this document before no is today the first time you've ever seen it yes
01:11:37 yes right um then i think we might be able to take it a little bit more quickly can i ask you to look at the bottom of page one
01:11:45 page one and look at paragraph 2.2 this is under the heading legislation and it says this for the purposes of fire safety legislation specifically the regulatory reform fire safety order 2005 fso rbkc and the tmo
01:11:58 2005 fso rbkc and the tmo are considered to be responsible persons and as such must ensure that suitable and sufficient fire risk assessments are carried out in the communal areas of all the residential blocks
01:12:09 the residential blocks are you able to explain why janice ray thought that both rbkc and tmo are considered to be responsible persons
01:12:21 responsible persons no given
01:12:24 no given your answer that you were never of the view
01:12:28 view that rbkc was the responsible person
01:12:33 does it tell us that no arrangements were in place at our bkc for discharging any obligations uh as responsible person under the fsa
01:12:44 uh as responsible person under the fsa yes
01:12:46 yes was your view that rbkc was not the responsible person one to your knowledge that was generally held
01:12:53 held throughout the uh throughout our bkc yes mr chairman i i was just before 11 15 but we're going to come to a new topic or
01:13:02 or sub uh perhaps you better take the opportunity then well i think so for a break but it's a minute before 11 15 but never mind all right we're going to take a break now
01:13:13 a break now mrs johnson and we'll resume it how fast it loves you please and again don't talk to anyone about your evidence or anything relating to it while you're out of the room please thank you
01:13:34 thank you how fast
01:30:49 would you ask ms johnson to come back in
01:31:00 please
01:31:08 right ready to carry on yes good thank you very much thank you yes mr miller thank you mr chairman ms johnson can i correct a question i asked earlier this morning i asked you whether you were ever told
01:31:20 that ryden told and repeatedly told the tmo that they were looking to use ryden as the fire safety consultant for the grenfell tower project i meant to ask you
01:31:31 ask you whether you were told that ryden had told the tmo that they were looking to use x
01:31:35 use x over as the fire safety consultant but never in fact retained them either way the answer is still no thank you um i also asked you about whether there
01:31:46 um i also asked you about whether there were any records in your day books of your monthly meetings with mr black um in fact i think there were one or two
01:31:56 or two uh uh for example let me just show you an example um rbk3059573 please at page six
01:32:15 uh this is a part of your notebook or day book which bears the date 15th of january 2013. and it says one to one with robert can
01:32:28 and it says one to one with robert can you see that yes uh is that an example of you noting these meetings in your day books yes uh and in fact this one actually expressly refers to grenfell tower
01:32:39 expressly refers to grenfell tower if you look at the second arrow uh mike nestor dealing with hidden homes timetable for grand some well is that grenfell tower looks like grenfell tower greaves tower and grenfell tower i think those are
01:32:50 grenfell tower i think those are that's correct right uh and in fact just um one more uh and i'm not representing to you that these are the only ones
01:33:03 rbk3059557 please page 69.
01:33:14 on the right hand side you can see underneath adair tower fire 17th november 2015 there's a little red arrow there robert black and you can see there's an entry uh
01:33:25 and you can see there's an entry uh there
01:33:27 there and this discussion about the fire which had taken place at the end of the previous month at the adair tower building
01:33:38 at the adair tower building and you appear to be discussing uh in the middle of that page risk assessments based on this approach door closes question is that an is that an example of an occasion when you discussed fire
01:33:50 of an occasion when you discussed fire safety in the tma's stock with robert black in these monthly meetings
01:33:56 meetings yes or was this a specific meeting with robert black do you remember i don't know i don't remember whether this was a specific meeting or whether this was a one of our monthly meetings right and now you could see a little bit
01:34:07 right and now you could see a little bit lower down that page coincidentally it says uh underneath door closes prosecute rbkc and tmo legal do you remember having a
01:34:19 and tmo legal do you remember having a discussion about the pros the possibility of being prosecuted alongside the tmo uh by the lfb in relation to the tower fire
01:34:27 fire no i don't right well we may come back to that document uh later on in that context can i then return
01:34:34 return to uh where we were we were which was oversight and i want to ask you about the oversight of janice ray specifically can we start with her witness statement please
01:34:46 witness statement please tmo 50890 page 41 paragraph 183
01:34:57 and she says there the health and safety performance of the tmo was monitored primarily by rbkc we welcomed the scrutiny and we were always looking to improve health and safety for the sake of the residents and
01:35:09 safety for the sake of the residents and the staff
01:35:10 the staff first do you agree with what janice ray says that the health and safety performance of the tmo was monitored primarily by lbkc um actually i think health and safety
01:35:21 um actually i think health and safety performance of the tma was monitored primarily by the board of the tmo
01:35:25 the tmo in terms of who officers reported into regarding the performance and then i don't know because uh i don't know the detail of what janet
01:35:36 i don't know the detail of what janet ray has said whether amanda johnston and celie chaliskaan regularly discussed health and safety with the tmo i can't account for that because i wasn't in those meetings but health and safety performance was in
01:35:48 but health and safety performance was in the six monthly and annual reports to scrutiny committee can we go back to page 37 of janice ray's statement please and look at paragraph 164 she says there in the second half of the
01:36:00 she says there in the second half of the paragraph it was always my understanding that the rbkc retained a monitoring obligation under the mma which was exercised by its corporate health and safety advisor and his main health and safety coordinating committee
01:36:12 health and safety coordinating committee which was succeeded by the baibara health and safety committee do you agree with that
01:36:26 i'm not aware of the corporate health and safety committee or the bioboro health and safety committee ever having any particular role in terms of monitoring the performance of the tmo
01:36:37 monitoring the performance of the tmo with regard to health and safety i'm not saying it didn't happen but i am not aware of it
01:36:44 right what did you understand the role of the housing department to be in monitoring health and safety within tma managed stock uh my understanding was uh it if
01:36:57 uh my understanding was uh it if that we would uh there wasn't a specific role for the housing department in managing specifically health and safety i understood the tmo managed health and safety in uh
01:37:08 safety in uh for the stock um and that we received a report on it as i said twice yearly but i i was never of the understanding that there was a role for our own health
01:37:19 that there was a role for our own health and safety team within the council in relationship to the tmo
01:37:27 there may have been prior to me arriving it may have been something that disappeared over the course of time or it may have been something that happened and i wasn't aware of right
01:37:40 can we look please at rbk3054404
01:37:56 this is a note by authored by somebody called samaya yakub and it's of a meeting which seems to have been with robert black
01:38:08 have been with robert black on the 26th of may 2016. if you look at the third bullet point down it says tmo update cc laura johnson uh when arrow j ray
01:38:22 uh when arrow j ray um are you aware of any uh update being copied to laura johnson about uh or by
01:38:33 about uh or by samaya yakub about this meeting um i don't know who that person is i'm afraid you don't know um did you know that in fact according to janice ray at least monitoring was carried out by the corporate health and safety advisors
01:38:46 the corporate health and safety advisors gary
01:38:46 gary mann until 2015 and after that his successor samaya kub i wasn't aware that there was a specific role for corporate health and safety in liaising
01:38:58 corporate health and safety in liaising with the tmo are those names familiar to you at all uh the name of gary mann is familiar to me but not uh the second name right what was his role i don't know right i'm aware of the name i remember the name from working in
01:39:09 i remember the name from working in rbkc but i i don't know you don't have any you can't make a connection is that right between the name no i don't right is it right then that nobody through your knowledge nobody within rbkc oversaw health and safety uh
01:39:22 within rbkc oversaw health and safety uh within the tmo i don't believe they did know beyond the reports that you've discussed yes right uh
01:39:29 right uh right can you enlighten us as to why at least according to this you were meant to be copied into correspondence or communications with janice ray
01:39:40 janice ray um without seeing what i was being copied into about what this is about no because i don't remember uh from uh what's five years ago now um it may well have been in relation to
01:39:51 um it may well have been in relation to a
01:39:52 a an audit an audit of health and safety undertaken and then in which case it would have gone to the audit committee to provide them with an update but i am guessing there i don't know can i ask
01:40:04 guessing there i don't know can i ask you to look at a statement by nick austin who was the byboro director for environmental health uh that's at rbk3029910
01:40:15 uh that's at rbk3029910 i'll show you the first page of that uh here's his statement
01:40:26 and he says in paragraph four that until the end of august 2018 he was the director of resident services at the london borough of hammersmith and fulham
01:40:37 fulham um before that well before march 18 he was the bibara director for environmental health for rbkc and for the london borough of hammersmith and fulham and he'd held that post from april 2012
01:40:50 and he'd held that post from april 2012 until it formally ended on the 1st of august 2018. that's his role can we look at paragraph 10 on page 3 please
01:41:00 he says there i sat on the same management committee as the senior managers within housing so there was some liaison between the departments but the departments are not hugely interlinked the housing department had a number of
01:41:11 the housing department had a number of its own staff who carried out environmental health functions relating to their properties do you agree
01:41:17 agree that the corporate health and safety team and the housing department were not hugely interlinked yes he says now if we go on to page four paragraph 15 mr austin says this
01:41:30 15 mr austin says this if there were follow-up actions required in terms of housing then this would be the responsibility of the tmo who has its own health and safety functions overseen by the housing department at rbkc
01:41:41 department at rbkc my team would rarely if ever be involved our remit in terms of housing standards was the
01:41:46 was the was the private housing sector does that accord with your understanding yes do you agree that the tmo's health and safety functions were overseen by the housing department as he says there
01:41:57 the housing department as he says there um in the context that uh the housing department oversaw uh the functioning of the tmo um then uh i i don't disagree with what mr
01:42:08 uh i i don't disagree with what mr austin has written here but we had no specific health and safety qualifications within the housing department so whatever we would have been seen would have been uh broad updates on how they were
01:42:19 broad updates on how they were performing i see can we then go back to janus ray's witness statement please tm050890 at page 40.
01:42:27 page 40. and i want to show you paragraph 180 there
01:42:34 she she says i also produced an annual health and safety report and action plan which outlined the current strategy for the tmo its performance over the last year
01:42:43 year and its initiatives for managing and improving safety this plan was discussed with the health and safety committee the executive team and the tmo board before the full report and an executive summary was presented to the rbkc
01:42:55 summary was presented to the rbkc corporate health and safety manager the feedback we received from rbkc's advisor
01:43:01 advisor was then used to help identify any additional priorities for the upcoming year
01:43:07 year just just help us who was the rbkc corporate health and safety manager um to be honest with you i don't remember right it would have changed over time
01:43:18 over time um and i don't remember the name which department would that person or did that person sit
01:43:27 uh i to be honest with you i cannot remember which team the corporate health and safety manager sit but if i was to take a good guess i would say it sat within the kind of
01:43:38 sat within the kind of corporate uh corporate governance and kind of
01:43:41 kind of it sat there so i think it may have sat and uh
01:43:45 and uh tony redpath's remit but i can't remember i would hate to say that as their as a as the truth right
01:43:53 did you have liaison with the rbkc corporate health and safety manager in respect of oversight of the tmo in its health and safety functions uh no i did not no
01:44:06 uh no i did not no did that strike you at the time as a weakness in the governance arrangements well because i didn't know it was taking place um it didn't strike me as a weakness but now that i can see that this has taken
01:44:17 now that i can see that this has taken place then yes right um she also refers to the um the advisor rbkc's advisor do you know who that was no who was
01:44:28 do you know who that was no who was giving feedback then to her do you know no you yourself receive tma's annual health and safety report um i would have received it as part of
01:44:40 um i would have received it as part of the
01:44:40 the uh i had uh if it was a part of the board papers then i would have seen it as a copy that was sent to board right we've seen no evidence ourselves that
01:44:51 we've seen no evidence ourselves that you did ever receive any such report no well i didn't i didn't receive it as a particular report that was sent to me as a separate item if it was sent to board then i would have read it as part
01:45:02 board then i would have read it as part of the broad papers when you say board the tmo board papers i see and you were you sent tma wallpapers regularly um i was uh as i said yesterday i was
01:45:14 um i was uh as i said yesterday i was routinely used to be sent tmo board papers
01:45:16 papers in a paper copy up to a certain date and then after that date i no longer receive paper copies but we made aware of the board meetings and uh receive a link or be guided to a link where i could access the board
01:45:28 link where i could access the board papers
01:45:30 papers do you remember receiving any any feedback at any time from rbkc corporate health and and safety on reports such as the annual health and safety report no i do not can i then turn to the topic
01:45:44 no i do not can i then turn to the topic of
01:45:44 of oversight of fras again we touched on that yesterday in the context of kpis and i want to look a little bit more specifically at fras if we stick with janice ray's witness statement please
01:45:55 janice ray's witness statement please and go to page 35 back five pages let's look together at paragraph 157 and what she says there she says the fras themselves were shared as required within the organization
01:46:06 as required within the organization the rbkc did not receive copies as routine although the minutes of the health and safety committee meetings were copied to the corporate health and safety manager furthermore progress in relation to outstanding fras and fra actions
01:46:19 to outstanding fras and fra actions was included in the media and year-end reports on the tma's performance which were presented to the rbkc scrutiny committee and in the annual tmo health and safety report which was shared
01:46:29 shared with the corporate health and safety manager extracts were als were also included in his annual report which was sent
01:46:35 sent to the rbkc's health and safety committee
01:46:38 committee is it right that you didn't receive the fire risk assessments themselves in relation to any building within tma's housing stock that's correct did nobody at rbkc
01:46:51 that's correct did nobody at rbkc ever read the fire risk assessments themselves not in the housing department did anywhere else i don't know right
01:47:01 did nobody to your knowledge even spot check them unless they were checked by the audit that was undertaken not from the uh rbkc
01:47:13 not from the uh rbkc now we've already established that rbkc in your view was not a responsible person
01:47:23 person is that does that explain maybe you can't answer this does that explain why nobody within rbkc ever looked to see the fras
01:47:31 the fras i don't believe it does i think it explains that we didn't view documents in that level of granular detail from the tmo and it wouldn't be our expectation to receive very detailed fire assist risk
01:47:43 receive very detailed fire assist risk assessments from them and there wasn't anybody within the housing department who would have
01:47:49 have the qualifications in order to be able to analyze them and challenge the tmo appropriately about the content assuming for the moment that it is right as we've seen from some of the documents that janice ray was of the view
01:48:01 janice ray was of the view rightly or wrongly as a matter of law that rbkc
01:48:05 that rbkc was a responsible person did she to your knowledge did she ever proffer any fras to you so that you could spot check these in order to assist you with your
01:48:16 these in order to assist you with your scrutiny function uh i don't believe she did now let's look at enforcement uh can we go back in time to 2009 just after you started at rbkc
01:48:29 to 2009 just after you started at rbkc do you remember that on the 17th of june and
01:48:32 and mid-june for the better the best of your recollection 2009 you were sent an email by janice ray to tell you that the lfb had told the fbo that they intended to serve an enforcement notice
01:48:44 enforcement notice remember that no um rbk three zeros five two five six eight
01:48:54 this is an email of the 17th of june which i've just referred to from janice ray uh the foot of page one uh and it goes to gene danith and to you
01:49:05 uh and it goes to gene danith and to you copy to robert black as well as um adrian bowman and if you look at the subject it says forward enforcement notice from fire brigade jean laura robert has asked me to advise
01:49:17 jean laura robert has asked me to advise you that the fire brigade informed us this morning that they intend to serve an enforcement notice jointly on the council and the tmo chief executives the email below advises of the background to this we've made repeated efforts to clarify the fire
01:49:28 repeated efforts to clarify the fire brigade requirements and resolve this issue
01:49:31 issue but today the fire safety officers advised that they were anxious that this issue was dragging on and so they feel it is now appropriate to escalate this with the enforcement notice on both ces uh please let me know if i can be a
01:49:42 uh please let me know if i can be a further assistance and that's from janice ray uh and you can see if you look at page two what it was that janice ray was forwarding on to you
01:49:53 that janice ray was forwarding on to you and to gene daintith it's a long email to robert black informing him of the intention by the lfb to serve an enforcement notice
01:50:04 lfb to serve an enforcement notice jointly on us the tmo and the council uh and she says i'm not sure exactly how this will be worded but it will relate
01:50:16 this will be worded but it will relate to our lack of progress with fire risk assessments in the communal areas of our blocks
01:50:20 blocks as required by the regulatory reform first safety order 2005. and then she sets out the background which i don't think i need to trouble you
01:50:27 you with um first of all do you remember receiving that email now i've shown it to you
01:50:33 to you no you'll notice now that i have shown it to you that uh enforcement notice was intended to be served by the nfb
01:50:44 was intended to be served by the nfb both
01:50:44 both on the tmo and on rbkc as you can see there do you remember you even though you don't remember specifically this email
01:50:56 specifically this email do you remember the art that rbkc was the
01:51:01 the subject of threatened enforcement no
01:51:08 it didn't strike you as strange at the time given the view you told us you had about rbkc not being the responsible person it's really hard to answer what i did or didn't think back in 2009 because it's
01:51:20 didn't think back in 2009 because it's now
01:51:21 now some time ago right do you remember being in the light of that answer i i think i know what you'll say but but d do you not remember being concerned
01:51:32 d do you not remember being concerned about receiving news of the enforcement notice
01:51:35 notice in light of the the governance issues over the tmo that we discussed yesterday um i don't remember this particular incident if i had been as i was informed that there was an enforcement notice to be saved
01:51:46 enforcement notice to be saved then of course i would have been concerned about it right do you do you remember what you did about it no because i don't remember this incident at all in fact the enforcement notice that was
01:51:58 in fact the enforcement notice that was threatened was never actually served do i take it from your lack of memory about any of this that you can't remember or help us about why that was no i don't i'm afraid i can't
01:52:08 um it sounds to me as if asking you any further questions about this topic at that time would be fruitless because you simply remember nothing about it i'm afraid i don't it's some time ago and i don't remember it
01:52:19 some time ago and i don't remember it right nonetheless note though that this is um something that janice ray sends to you at the time
01:52:30 that janice ray sends to you at the time we haven't seen any document either from you or anybody else at rbkc complaining that the council should not be joined into an enforcement
01:52:41 should not be joined into an enforcement notice
01:52:42 notice because it is not the responsible person and i'm assuming you haven't seen anything either to that effect
01:52:50 can we look then at rbk3053546
01:53:02 this is an email from judith blakeman to you and robert black with the subject line
01:53:06 line tower blocks which was sent on the 4th of july
01:53:10 of july 2009
01:53:16 so only a few weeks after the enforcement or the threat of the enforcement notice and she says this at the foot of the page
01:53:28 and will lead to yes that's it um and it's an email addressed to robert black and to you dear mr black and miss johnson in light of the tragic fire yesterday in camberwell i'd be grateful if we can have
01:53:39 if we can have a risk assessment and report on the means of escape in the event of fire covering all the tower blocks in tma's ownership within the borough at grenfell tower for example because of the council offices and emb offices on
01:53:50 the council offices and emb offices on the lower floors getting out of this building by the stairs is extremely difficult and one can end up at a dead end i would invite you to accompany me up to the top floor to see how difficult
01:54:02 up to the top floor to see how difficult it would be to get out of this block in the event of an emergency i look forward to an early response do you remember receiving this email i'm afraid i don't uh by the reference to the fire in camberwell that was a
01:54:14 to the fire in camberwell that was a reference to the lack of house fire wasn't it i don't know i presume so because uh lucknow house is in uh campbell well right but i can't remember the date of the lack of house fire to be honest third of july 2009. okay so this is the
01:54:27 third of july 2009. okay so this is the day after
01:54:28 day after well then it's uh more than likely to be related to that particular fire uh we see you there's a response from you on page one can we go to that please top of page one uh you respond to councillor blatant the following day
01:54:40 councillor blatant the following day fifth july copied to uh in fact sent to robert black
01:54:46 black as a primary recipient councillor blakeman the royal bar is at present in discussion with the tmo on commissioning consultants to undertake a review of the relevant fire risk assessments of the communal areas of the council
01:54:57 of the communal areas of the council blocks as this is legally required by the regulatory reform fire safety order this process to date has been managed by the tma but it has been brought
01:55:05 brought to our attention by the fire brigade that this will need to be more rigorous therefore officers from the tmo and rbkc are in the process of setting up a working party to look at and then there are four bullet points
01:55:16 and then there are four bullet points complying with the proposed arrangements to set up the contract promptly with a competent fire safety company straight consultant to carry out a suitable and sufficient fire risk assessment in each of the tma managed properties and set an agreed time scale
01:55:27 properties and set an agreed time scale to achieve this review challenge and support the consultant's recommendations as they are completed and sign off with the fire brigade
01:55:34 brigade review the considerable cost implications of both the reviews and any recommended works which flow from the inspections agree how they will be funded i hope this answers your question in the short term and when we
01:55:45 term and when we have more information as a result of the review work we will be able to brief counsellors fully uh
01:55:53 fully uh in light of uh the council of blakeman's email
01:55:57 email did you specifically direct anyone at the tma to undertake a risk assessment of the means of escape in tma-managed tower blocks um i don't remember if i did but uh i'm
01:56:08 i don't remember if i did but uh i'm afraid i don't remember did you take up councillor blakeman's invitation to accompany her to the top floor of grenfell tower i don't believe i did why is that um
01:56:20 i don't believe i did why is that um i don't know i mean a serious and fatal fire had happened two days beforehand she that she's identified a specific risky building yes and even without the benefit of
01:56:31 yes and even without the benefit of hindsight
01:56:34 why would you not have thought to yourself well here's a a counsellor with a building in her ward she's concerned about i better have a look at it myself i'm afraid i really don't remember this email from 2009
01:56:46 email from 2009 and i don't remember my thought process on how i responded to counselor blatant all i can see is what is what is written here i would have no doubt spoken to
01:56:57 doubt spoken to robert black about it and janice ray but clearly here i haven't taken up her offer of a trip to the top floor of grenfell tower is it fair to say that from the time of the latino house fire
01:57:10 the latino house fire you were personally aware that there was a serious concern or at least a serious concern that had been expressed about the adequacy of the means of escape from from grenfell tower
01:57:21 escape from from grenfell tower i'm aware of it that it was raised in this particular email but i don't remember being continually aware of it throughout my time as director of housing at rbkc
01:57:33 were you aware that from this time an fra program was implemented as a result of the threat of the enforcement action by the lfb
01:57:44 the lfb um i was aware that the tmo undertook fire risk assessments um and they didn't just do that because of threat of enforcement from the lfb they did that because
01:57:53 because they were required to do so um i believe the
01:57:56 the only judging by what i've seen today is that it's the uh it's the rigorousness of those fire risk assessments which the uh lfb are coming being questioned
01:58:07 the uh lfb are coming being questioned and the tmo and rbkc are looking at how to make them meet the requirements of the lfb uh well were you aware that the tmo
01:58:18 well were you aware that the tmo started monitoring their own fire risk assessment and closeouts as a result of actions indicated by the fire risk assessor from 2009 with a five-year program
01:58:29 2009 with a five-year program um that would be in a fairly standard procedure i can't say in any any detail that i was aware that the tmo specifically said to me but that is uh when was on receipt of a fire risk assessment
01:58:41 receipt of a fire risk assessment it retained it has a number of actions within it um and it would have been best practice for the tmo to have someone to audit the fire risk assessments and to keep a log of how you undertook those actions those
01:58:53 of how you undertook those actions those actions are generally graded either high medium or low or one month two months six months twelve months depending on the seriousness of the action highlighted because it can ever be everything from
01:59:04 because it can ever be everything from removing a doormat in the corridor to serious compartmentalization issues so i would have been aware that the the fire risk assessments were graded in that manner and the tmo would be
01:59:15 that manner and the tmo would be monitoring them in accordance with being able to undertake the requirements of those action plans
01:59:27 can we go to rbk301 please
01:59:37 this is an email from angus sangster of lsd to janice ray copied among other people to you
01:59:48 ray copied among other people to you can you see that yes uh subject fire risk assessments for tmo properties and um he says dear janice thank you for your email i must emphasize that time is
02:00:00 your email i must emphasize that time is against you bearing in mind the discussions regarding the provision of adequate fire safety measures in the tma building stock have been taking place with members of my team for over a year now can i suggest that we have a meeting
02:00:11 now can i suggest that we have a meeting with mr robert black and gene danteth sometime over the next week to discuss the type of undertaking that the lfb would accept while i accept that you have started on this work i'm still not happy
02:00:23 this work i'm still not happy that what has been supplied is sufficient to justify my team not undertaking enforcement action can i suggest monday 13th july at 10 a.m or friday
02:00:32 or friday 17th july amo pm and he's the team leader at kensington and chelsea uh now you are copied in on this
02:00:43 uh now you are copied in on this were you concerned by this email um i would have been but i don't remember the email to be honest with you because it is now um some 11 years since that email was sent
02:00:54 sent do you remember doing anything in response um i don't remember can we go to lfb401529 please
02:01:09 can we go to lfb401529 please this is the note of a meeting on the 6th of august
02:01:13 of august 2009 on the subject of fire risk assessments and you can see that gene dainted and you were present as was angus sangster of the lfb together with a number of
02:01:26 of the lfb together with a number of other lfb
02:01:27 other lfb colleagues
02:01:31 keith holloway from tma was also there if you look at item two you can see that under enforcement notice it says
02:01:42 that under enforcement notice it says jean dainty's expressed her concern that the london fire brigade had considered serving an enforcement notice on the council angus thanks to lfb advised her that the decision to potentially do this
02:01:54 decision to potentially do this had not been a simple one the nfb have been in discussion with tmo since mid 2008
02:02:00 2008 however the tmo officers or offices in place
02:02:03 place lacks the competence to carry out adequate risk assessment now first do you remember this meeting no
02:02:16 are you able to confirm that this was a discussion about the enforcement notice that we'd seen in the email which you had received from janice ray on the 17th of june that year um only because uh it would seem uh
02:02:27 um only because uh it would seem uh obvious that that was the case based on the information that you provided to me today are you able to help us about what had happened between the date of that email 17th of june 2009
02:02:38 june 2009 and the date of this meeting no because i don't remember it
02:02:43 before this meeting were you aware that the london fire brigade had been in discussions with the tmos since mid-2008 uh no not unless it was stated in
02:02:54 uh no not unless it was stated in previous email correspondence and that it would have been brought to my attention do you remember what you understood anger sanctity mean by a lack of competence in the tmo
02:03:05 competence in the tmo no because i don't remember this meeting right
02:03:09 i i mean i appreciate i've got no memory at all i'm just trying to really fill in the blanks do you remember nothing of this i really don't i've got absolutely as i
02:03:21 i really don't i've got absolutely as i say it's 11 years ago now and i have never seen this documentation until today although undoubtedly i did see it after the after the time at the time and i
02:03:33 after the time at the time and i undoubtedly did attend the meeting but really there is a complete blank for me drawn on attending this meeting um and the conversation during this meeting yes i mean you've been in post now some
02:03:46 yes i mean you've been in post now some seven months at rbkc you tell us that you didn't think at the time that rbkc was the responsible person under the rro does this not strike a chord with you
02:03:59 does this not strike a chord with you that
02:03:59 that having a memory of of being shocked surprised
02:04:02 surprised or perhaps understanding it at the time that um the tm that there had been at the service of an enforcement notice on rbkc
02:04:14 notice on rbkc in respect of incompetence of carrying up adequate risk assessments for tma stock
02:04:21 because i can't remember this meeting and i can't remember the train of events that relate to it i really can't fill in the i really can't adequately answer your question unfortunately no and i appreciate being asked about why your memory is no good on this but
02:04:33 why your memory is no good on this but my point is really was it not a big enough deal for you to remember it um clearly not otherwise i would remember it but then
02:04:44 otherwise i would remember it but then there was a huge amount going on as there is in my job at any one time and mata is relating to the tmo and fire risk assessments were a a very small proportion of my job
02:04:58 were a a very small proportion of my job so there are any number of items that i would be dealing with in your words which were a very big deal and
02:05:05 and this would have been one of them and unfortunately i don't remember this one but as i demonstrated yesterday i remembered in a lot of detail about calc but i didn't remember a lot of detail about this particular meeting
02:05:17 about this particular meeting let's just look at the bottom of page one over to the top of page two bottom of page one is the start of a part of this note about risk categories and if we go to the top of page two we
02:05:29 and if we go to the top of page two we can see
02:05:30 can see that angus johnson sorry angus sangster asks keith holloway about how the tmo are going to base their risk categories of buildings
02:05:41 their risk categories of buildings and then you in the third line say well you ask about the cost implications that could arise out of the risk audits anger sanctity replied that the rro states that buildings which
02:05:52 that the rro states that buildings which fall within its remit must come up to a required standard of fire safety he stated that the lfb uses a sensible approach to work which is to be carried out however the lfp ultimately wants a safe building in quotation marks
02:06:04 building in quotation marks a point agreed by everyone present now i appreciate that you say you don't remember this meeting at all um you can't therefore i think quarrel with the accuracy of that record
02:06:15 the accuracy of that record i have no crawl with it whatsoever
02:06:20 do you have any recollection about what your particular concerns were about the costs of necessary actions identified in the fras
02:06:27 the fras it would have just been about the ability of the hra to meet the cost of the requirements of the lfb set out as a result of those audits
02:06:38 audits and then being able to budget for it
02:06:42 appropriately
02:06:48 yes uh i mean of course we know that as i've said to you that the enforcement notice wasn't actually served in the end it was threatened but not served
02:07:01 and i'm i'm assuming that this meeting took place at a time is this right do you remember when that threat was still there i know it had not been any service um i presume
02:07:12 presume uh and it is very much a presumption that
02:07:16 that because of the series of documentation that you showed me today that this meeting helped to avert the serving of the uh of the enforcement notice um and uh reading down uh the document here
02:07:30 and uh reading down uh the document here that the commitment made by keith holliday keith holloway who was a consultant who was brought in by the tmo to help meet the deficiencies in management at that time he was a consultant of considerable number of years of
02:07:42 of considerable number of years of experience and he appears to say under five explained that fire risk assessments would be carried out by consultants and that surveys had gone out to tender so i presume that keith
02:07:53 so i presume that keith making that statement to angus that there would be um an and uh fire risk assessment consultant undertaking that work that that that then satisfied the requirements of the lfb
02:08:04 requirements of the lfb but that's that's presumption on your part entirely reconstructing what happened and not a recollection that's correct yes
02:08:13 and do i take it from your answers about your lack of memory of this meeting is that you can't help us about the your attitude to whether or not
02:08:22 not uh the actions required to bring buildings up to a required standard of fire safety were affordable or not i mean if those actions were required to
02:08:34 i mean if those actions were required to be undertaken then we would have to undertake those actions you know
02:08:40 right looking further down page two fire risk assessments there's some discussion about those there you can see and then at the foot of the page it says eight lines up from the bottom
02:08:52 it says eight lines up from the bottom angus thanks to lfb asked whether the council and tmo felt that three years would be acceptable to carry out risk assessments of all the properties that they're responsible for both gene dentist and keith holloway tmo
02:09:03 both gene dentist and keith holloway tmo agreed
02:09:04 agreed angus thanks to lfb asked whether the council anti-mo felt that five years would be acceptable to carry out all the significant findings identified by the risk assessments for all the properties they're responsible for
02:09:15 properties they're responsible for both gene danith and keith holloway tmo agreed and again i take it you can't quarrel with that record of what was said at that meeting
02:09:23 meeting i have no quarrel with that because i don't remember it you don't have any thoughts at the time that you can recall about whether you thought that time scale was achievable no i'm afraid you don't
02:09:36 given that as we see from the record rbkc had agreed to that time scale do you remember whether thereafter rbkc was involved in delivery or whether that was solely the tmo's
02:09:48 whether that was solely the tmo's responsibility was solely the tmo's responsibility did you monitor at any stage after this this time august 2009 did you monitor
02:09:58 monitor uh or did did rbkc monitor the delivery or completion of these actions by the tma
02:10:04 tma um i don't remember a specific incidence um or specific reports being sent to me they may well have been uh but we would have uh we would have made an assumption that the tmo
02:10:15 made an assumption that the tmo went away and got on and undertook that particular action right going to page three please as you can see there's something called general discussion there's a topic uh keith holloway tml asked about where
02:10:27 uh keith holloway tml asked about where the problem areas may arise i think it's where the problem areas may arise in tma premises
02:10:32 premises angus thanks to lfe mentioned about flats and the one hour compartmentation he stressed that few of the tmo buildings have fire doors or some do not have dry risers coletto hara lfb
02:10:43 lfb said this was one of the key problems with the tmo risk assessment so far has been
02:10:48 been the s so far had been this the low level of the knowledge as to whether a door should stroke is a fire
02:10:55 fire to up to the correct standard
02:11:02 do you have any recollection of a discussion about there being problems with fire doors in tma stock around this time no i remember distinctly discussions
02:11:14 no i remember distinctly discussions about
02:11:16 about fire doors and doors at a later date because there was a door replacement program which is well documented in both tmo board minute
02:11:28 in both tmo board minute meetings and also in scrutiny committee minute meetings sorry minutes from scrutiny committee around the door replacement program and the difficulties of trying to do that in leaseholder stock
02:11:41 that in leaseholder stock but i don't remember it specifically in 2009. well we'll come back to that topic shortly before we leave this document can i show you page four please under the heading paragraph 10 general discussion time scales for completion of
02:11:53 discussion time scales for completion of risk assessment straight works completion and it records you at the beginning asking the lfbs
02:12:05 at the beginning asking the lfbs about the nfb's consistency in approaching social housing providers and then if you go to the second half of that
02:12:13 that section you can see that keith holloway tma reiterated that the tmo would complete their procurement program by september 2009 the risk assessments will be completed over the following 12
02:12:24 be completed over the following 12 months
02:12:25 months anger thanks to lfb replied that he feels tmo need to develop the level of competence amongst their staff he also suggested a member of staff from the council stroke tmo could be seconded
02:12:36 the council stroke tmo could be seconded into the lfb in order to gain experience of fire safety matters uh first of all i take it that nobody from rbkc was ever seconded into the lfb uh not from the housing department right
02:12:47 uh not from the housing department right well for anywhere else to your knowledge i don't not to my knowledge uh what about the tmo to your knowledge was anybody from the tmo ever seconded to the nfb i don't know
02:13:00 uh when he says
02:13:05 mr sangster says that he feels the tmo need to develop the level of competence among their staff do you remember um do you remember that being said do you remember reacting to that in any way i don't remember the meeting so i don't
02:13:16 i don't remember the meeting so i don't remember whether i reacted or not right
02:13:22 do you remember whether there was any format or system for taking these comments back to the tmo other than relying on keith holloway who
02:13:33 other than relying on keith holloway who was there to do so um i don't remember there being a particular format to do so uh keith holloway was a as i say an interim of considerable experience
02:13:45 an interim of considerable experience uh former chief exec of a housing association so we would have relied on keith's expertise in order to be able to to follow those up within the tmo um and it may well have been but i can't say
02:13:56 it may well have been but i can't say this for certain that this was then i then may have gone back to pam sedgwick who was the housing commissioning manager at the time and spoken to her about it but that is just supposition on my behalf
02:14:07 just supposition on my behalf let's look on then uh into the question of fire risk assessments how did you understand fire risk assessments conducted by the tma to have been
02:14:16 been funded um
02:14:19 funded um they would be funded from uh the hra uh well
02:14:24 well funded from uh we gave the uh that we gave
02:14:27 gave rbkc agreed with the tmo um an annual budget
02:14:31 budget uh both for uh their staffing requirements um and then it was divided up into various subsections from that so there was a element of which it was the revenue and then element which was
02:14:42 the revenue and then element which was capital programme the capital program in 2009 was uh completely dictated by central government in terms of the allowances that we received under their management a major repairs
02:14:54 under their management a major repairs allowance um and the uh and the revenue uh i believe we had more opportunity uh but the you know the rent was pooled at that time
02:15:05 that time it was a pooling system and then redistributed so as i understand it the fire risk assessments would have been paid uh from the allowance that the tmo received from their budget as agreed with the council
02:15:17 their budget as agreed with the council which would have been from the revenue fund because it's not a capital item right
02:15:22 right and that was assessed and agreed year by year was it yes it was agreed on an annual basis if more funding had been required for fire assessments would the tmo have made a proposal to
02:15:34 would the tmo have made a proposal to you as head of the housing department i have no doubt they would have done yet now we've seen some documents which show that
02:15:44 that um and much more who was rbkc's performance in contracts monitoring officer was involved in the tender process for a consultant to undertake the fras
02:15:56 for a consultant to undertake the fras do you remember that i'm afraid i don't i do remember and much more who worked in the housing department for a number of years and then retired and if she was part of that process then i have no
02:16:07 i have no reason to dispute it right were you made aware of that process or any subsequent tender process um i don't remember being made aware of it but i wasn't her line manager she reported
02:16:17 reported into palm cedric so it may well have been that um that pam was aware of it she may or may not have made me aware of it i just don't remember from 11 years ago was pam cedric was you your
02:16:29 11 years ago was pam cedric was you your predecessor no um sue daniels was mine sorry
02:16:37 much more reported to whom then uh and much more reported to pam sedgwick pam sejjic was the housing commissioning manager before amanda johnson i see and did and much more continued to
02:16:48 i see and did and much more continued to report to amanda johnson um i don't remember because uh pam cedric retired i know bam cedric left the organization um and and much more retired but i couldn't tell you the timeline upon
02:17:00 couldn't tell you the timeline upon which time that happened were you aware that an outfit called salvus consulting limited was appointed to undertake the fire risk assessments on the tma's high
02:17:11 fire risk assessments on the tma's high risk properties um i don't remember being aware of that i i may have been but i i simply don't remember after all this time
02:17:20 uh and they they were appointed to do so in september 2009. do you remember that again as i said no i don't
02:17:28 i don't uh
02:17:31 and would it follow that you can't recall
02:17:35 recall one way or the other that when salva's contract came to an end in early 2010 a tender to appoint a new fire risk assessor for the high risk properties was not actually then carried out i was
02:17:48 was not actually then carried out i was not aware of that no did you know that carl stokes who had been appointed for low and medium risk properties within the tma's stock was asked to take
02:17:59 within the tma's stock was asked to take over
02:18:00 over those properties i'm i wasn't aware of the detail of what carl stokes was commissioned to do but i was aware or made aware at some point from 2000 uh you know from at some point in
02:18:11 2000 uh you know from at some point in time
02:18:12 time that he was the tmo's uh fire risk assessor
02:18:17 assessor did you take any steps at any time to satisfy yourself that carl stokes had been through a formal tender process no i did not why is that um i didn't get
02:18:28 no i did not why is that um i didn't get into the granular detail of who the tmo procured and under what basis they procured did you ever discover that as as appears carl stokes had never actually gone
02:18:39 carl stokes had never actually gone through a formal tender process at least in respect of the high risk properties um i did not know that until you've told me that today now can we go to tmo double zero eight seven three
02:18:51 seven three three please this is a health and safety report
02:19:03 for the tma board
02:19:06 on the 8th of october 2009
02:19:11 and there's a report by the health and safety advisor further update on fire risk assessments and it's written by janice ray as a report as it appears for the board meeting of the tmo
02:19:23 meeting of the tmo on that day and the purpose of the report is you can see it set out in the shaded box for information
02:19:32 uh and it shows under paragraph 1.1 the purpose of this report is to further update the tmo on progress made with the fire risk assessments on the communal areas
02:19:43 the communal areas of council blocks a briefing note entitled fire safety and tower blocks was circulated at the july board a report for information was presented at the september board and an update was provided to the
02:19:54 and an update was provided to the september operations committee the tma board is asked to note the further progress made in the area of fire risk assessments and then if we go down please to page three
02:20:05 three you can see uh under section five ongoing liaison with the fire brigade and under paragraph 5.2 it says monthly monitoring meetings have been scheduled between tm
02:20:16 between tm the tmo the council and the consultant the fire brigade are keen to monitor ongoing progress with the assessments and with any remedial works which are required in order for buildings to comply with the fire safety legislation
02:20:27 comply with the fire safety legislation therefore we have given a commitment to invite fire safety officers to meet with us
02:20:31 us on an ongoing four monthly basis
02:20:36 do you know why it was decided that the council should be involved in those monitoring meetings no i'm afraid i don't do you have can you help us as to how it came about that rbkc agreed
02:20:50 how it came about that rbkc agreed uh to take part in the monthly monitoring um no i'm afraid i can't um if rbkc agreed then it would have been handled uh through palm cedric uh and her team
02:21:03 uh through palm cedric uh and her team right but so not your team at all no pam said you were reported to me yes um and so yes she was in my team yes but um i have no recollection of the council um or a member of the
02:21:16 the council um or a member of the housing department agreeing to go to those scheduled meetings uh it's just unfortunately the passage of time means that i don't remember something from that long ago right on the face of this document
02:21:29 right on the face of this document can we take it then that the council was actively engaged in ensuring that the fire risk assessment program um was achieved by the tma in respect of its stock
02:21:40 its stock um i yes we can i would agree with you there yes
02:21:44 there yes and that the and the executives of the council if i can put it that way attended meetings with the tmo and the lfb uh until in the end of that high risk
02:21:57 uh until in the end of that high risk program
02:21:57 program in july 2014. your recollection can you confirm that um i can't call executives attending uh meetings with the lfb uh by if you
02:22:08 uh meetings with the lfb uh by if you mean by executives myself i don't remember attending meetings with the lfb what about those you supervised they may well have done but um i but they undertook their work and i didn't
02:22:20 they undertook their work and i didn't necessarily know the detail of everything that they did right um just taking a half a step back do i take it from that this that nobody who went to these monitoring meetings
02:22:32 who went to these monitoring meetings reported to you about what was happening um i no i don't believe they did do i take it from what you've said that in fact you weren't really aware
02:22:43 in fact you weren't really aware that members of your team for whom you were responsible were attending uh these monitoring sessions um if they were
02:22:51 were if they were attending i don't remember being updated that they were attending um they could have told me in 2011 and 12 but my memory is not good enough to to do that um and
02:23:04 to do that um and uh but i don't know the detail of all of the meetings that all of my staff in my teams attended i managed uh 120 staff of which various grades and various seniorities and attended various
02:23:16 seniorities and attended various meetings
02:23:17 meetings and by the nature of my job it was a as a generalist and i met with my managers to go through what they did how they managed their staff and they updated me on what they did
02:23:28 updated me on what they did and significant projects but that doesn't necessarily mean that i was updated on the specifics of what meetings that specific officers in each teams were attending no i understand that but do i take it
02:23:39 no i understand that but do i take it from what you've just said that the really the topic of the progress of monitoring or co-monitoring uh by the rb by our bkc in tmo's fra program didn't make it that as far
02:23:53 fra program didn't make it that as far up the chain as you that's correct it wasn't uh it wasn't um i would hate to say that it wasn't a priority because of course fire risk assessments in health and safety is a priority
02:24:03 priority and we're all responsible for health and safety it's not just delineated to one person we all have responsibilities where that's concerned but it wasn't raised to me as far as i recollect
02:24:14 recollect on a regular basis um i mean if you all if you
02:24:17 if you as you say all have responsibility for health and safety uh would you accept that that question should have been reported
02:24:28 that question should have been reported to you even if in outline terms um when i say that question but the question of uh um and i'm saying that uh
02:24:38 that uh you know sort of it may have come up in discussion between myself and pam sedgwick over the period of 2009 10 11 i don't have any recollection of it [Music]
02:24:48 [Music] in particular with regard to fire risk assessments i just don't think i can add any great illumination on this subject let's then look briefly at the next document tm00873670 please
02:25:06 tm00873670 this is uh the minute of a joint lfb rbkc council and tmo meeting on the 20th of april 2010
02:25:19 on the 20th of april 2010 and you can see who is present janice ray from the tmo and uh and much more from our bkc
02:25:31 uh and much more from our bkc and if you go to page two please you can see
02:25:34 see in the bottom of page two that there's a heading review and it says tmo are looking to employing looking into employing a full-time member of staff to deal with the continuous works and review
02:25:45 and review of the fras they are also looking into further staff training to be able to carry out in-house reviews of the assessments now you weren't at this meeting but were you aware
02:25:56 you aware that that this was being considered
02:26:02 this is a meeting from 2010 attended by and much more
02:26:08 and again i you know sort of i i may have become aware of it over the course of my conversations uh with my team
02:26:19 with my team in in very general terms but it doesn't um in terms of my memory of this at a particular time ring any particular bells so you can't help us with whether or not
02:26:30 so you can't help us with whether or not that proposal was ever implemented no i'm afraid i can't uh let's then look at the salvus management report then um for the 22nd of september 2009. this
02:26:41 um for the 22nd of september 2009. this is at sal
02:26:43 is at sal fives sorry six zeroes one three sal 6013
02:26:53 now at this point salvas were the tmos appointed fire risk assessor this is a management report produced by them it's a fire risk assessment for fire safety policy and
02:27:05 assessment for fire safety policy and procedures as you can see and it's
02:27:15 it's dated the 22nd of september 2009. is this just looking at the first page of this is this a document you've ever seen before i don't believe i have right and is it a document that you would have expected to
02:27:26 document that you would have expected to see at the time given its subject matter i may or may not have done
02:27:32 done you may or may not have um uh it's uh it's a it's a document that is uh i i wouldn't necessarily have expected to be sent on to myself right i'll just show you what it's about if you can go to page two
02:27:43 if you can go to page two under introduction it says this fire risk assessment management report has been completed at the request of russell thompson head of asset strategy and investment of tenant management organization tmo of
02:27:55 tenant management organization tmo of the royal borough of kensington and chelsea this management report reflects information gathered on the fire safety management systems of the tmo and respect of its property portfolio as per contract agreement dated second
02:28:06 as per contract agreement dated second september 2009. does this ring any bells with you at all no is this is this something that you would have expected to see or did expect to see even though you didn't see it um i wouldn't necessarily have expected
02:28:17 um i wouldn't necessarily have expected to see a document like this right
02:28:24 uh
02:28:28 did anybody report to you the fact that salvas or or in the name perhaps is irrelevant a consultant had produced a a safety
02:28:40 a consultant had produced a a safety first safety management report into the tma's systems i don't remember them doing that that's not to say that they didn't i just don't remember
02:28:50 remember did anybody tell you that an independent consultant had found that there was no overall tmo fire safety policy statement
02:29:01 overall tmo fire safety policy statement they may have done but i don't remember and that was a high risk uh fact again you don't nobody told you that there was no senior
02:29:12 nobody told you that there was no senior managerial audit of fire safety arrangements adopted by the tma they may have done but i don't remember right or and nobody told you that the inspections don't currently include any formal checks on fire doors or fire exits
02:29:24 checks on fire doors or fire exits storage security they may have done but i don't remember and presumably i'm taking it that nobody ever brought the fact that there was an action plan identified by the by this consultancy to your attention
02:29:35 by this consultancy to your attention again as per
02:29:39 uh summarizing this document um it identifies some 25 areas where the hazards existed and where the tma's
02:29:51 hazards existed and where the tma's management process is in place posed a medium
02:29:54 medium or high risk of fire uh in uh in and in 22 instances um a higher risk of immediately more high risk of fire and it set out 49 actions as necessary
02:30:08 and it set out 49 actions as necessary to ameliorate the risks identified in it did anybody ever tell you that there was this level of deficiency
02:30:20 there was this level of deficiency in the tmos fire safety management system
02:30:24 system they may have done but again i don't remember
02:30:28 would this document would you have expected this document or even a summary of its findings as i've just summarized to you
02:30:36 to you be fed into one at least of your teams yes which one would have been fed into the
02:30:43 the housing commissioning team as managed by that time by pam sedgwick so and much more yes and much more right i see
02:30:53 but would not have made it high enough up the hierarchy to you it um it will would depend on what pam said you were considered appropriate to put before me right but so far as we can tell from
02:31:06 right but so far as we can tell from your evidence you simply have no recollection of whether she put anything before you i have no recollection of seeing this report um if there was uh an email train that has been discovered that showed that i did see it
02:31:17 discovered that showed that i did see it then fair enough but i don't remember seeing it um i may uh i've only seen the front page of it so it may be that if i saw more of it it may jog my memory but just viewing it um from what you've
02:31:28 just viewing it um from what you've shown me today i don't have a memory of seeing it
02:31:49 right
02:31:54 so you can't help us answer the question whether rbkc ever supervised or exercised any scrutiny over whether and to what extent the tmo
02:32:03 the tmo actually did anything as required by this report not unless it was raised not unless it was the subject of uh regular conversations as part of their uh
02:32:14 their uh arrangements uh the regular meetings that undertook between the housing commissioning team and the tmo and or whether it's documented in the regular reports that came to scrutiny committee
02:32:25 committee or if it was documented as part of any minutes that were undertaken but as part of the audit process that was undertaken by that the tmo commissioned and rbkc
02:32:37 that the tmo commissioned and rbkc undertook on the health and safety arrangements by the tma
02:32:45 can i then move on to early 2010 can we go to lfb triple 0031977
02:33:02 and if we go in that please to page 30.
02:33:08 now we can see a letter from rbkc
02:33:14 dated the 27th of january
02:33:18 to angus sangster and if we turn please to page 32 in this run of documents we can see that the
02:33:29 run of documents we can see that the letter is signed both by robert black tmo chief executive and by you chief housing officer so it's a letter that comes both from the tmo and from our bkc
02:33:43 as you can see yes and the title is compliance with the regulatory reform fire safety order 2005.
02:33:55 and it says at the beginning further to our recent meeting at your offices with pam sedgwick rbkc's housing client side manager
02:34:02 manager and janice ray the tma's health and safety advisor we right to confirm our commitment to complying with this legislation and to set out our approach to achieving compliance
02:34:14 compliance and i show you that there's more to come but
02:34:18 but do you remember signing this letter no i'm afraid i don't it's uh it's 11 years since i've signed that letter and i looks like it was
02:34:27 was uh drafted by janice ray for signature by myself and robert black in order to respond to the lfb around issues that they had raised and
02:34:39 around issues that they had raised and to provide them with comfort that the tmo were addressing the matters raised why do you say that it looks like it was drafted by janice ray
02:34:48 ray because at the top of the letter there it says please ask for janice ray so i presume that i'm making an assumption that she drafted the letter because her name is at the top i see
02:35:03 do you remember anything of the circumstances in which you came to write a joint letter to the lfb together with the tma no i don't but i can make an assumption that because the lfb met with rbkc and the tmo jointly in
02:35:15 met with rbkc and the tmo jointly in 2000
02:35:16 2000 and earlier as we have been through that robert black on undertaking some of the actions or the actions set out below
02:35:27 the actions or the actions set out below then suggested that we write in response following that meeting now you say that janice ray drafted it do you remember going through it carefully
02:35:35 carefully to check it and assure yourself that you wanted to sign it before you signed it i would have gone through the letter and read it and properly um and signed it when you say you would
02:35:46 um and signed it when you say you would have is that because it was your habit yes i'm not in the habit of just signing off letters without having read it first uh and and therefore when we look at the first paragraph and see
02:35:58 first paragraph and see that you're confirming quotes our commitment to complying with this legislation um the r there was is this right both rbkc
02:36:09 was is this right both rbkc and tmo yes because we've jointly signed the letter um and i appreciate what you're going to ask me now about the regulatory reform fire safety order and joint commitment but because the lfb came to
02:36:20 commitment but because the lfb came to see
02:36:20 see us both in terms of the council and the tmo
02:36:24 tmo then that's why we probably felt although i can't remember it why it was worthwhile responding to the uh
02:36:31 uh responding jointly on this particular issue
02:36:34 issue right although i can't remember it why it was worthwhile responding to the uh responding jointly on this particular issue right i i mean i take it that you didn't
02:36:47 right i i mean i take it that you didn't take the opportunity to make it clear to lfb that
02:36:50 lfb that so far as rbkc was concerned it was not the responsible person no and i don't think i would have even thought about that that at the time does that tell us having not thought
02:37:01 does that tell us having not thought about it at the time that you perhaps unthinkingly assumed or proceeded on the basis at least that rbkc was the responsible person
02:37:09 person uh i may have done i may have done at the time
02:37:12 the time i am clear that um during my time at rbkc and i can't remember at which point in time that i thought that uh i was clear that uh i the uh rbkc was not the responsible
02:37:25 the uh rbkc was not the responsible person
02:37:26 person uh but i can't say for i can't guarantee that in
02:37:29 that in january 2007 that i had that thought process
02:37:33 process nor that that thought process influenced the drafting of that letter or that there was a particular discussion at that time about the references to joint or singular responsibility under the rro
02:37:44 singular responsibility under the rro you said january 2007 in fact then 2000 i did yes
02:37:49 i did yes now uh if we go to the bullet points on the first page there we can see that you say that um or it is said uh specif however
02:38:00 or it is said uh specif however specifically jointly with rbkc and in liaison with your fire safety team that's the lfb we have agreed to and then there's a long list of bullet points set out there um one of those
02:38:14 um one of those it was in the third one to appoint a competent fire safety consultancy partner
02:38:20 partner to undertake the fire risk assessments at each of the 110 potentially high-risk blocks did the phrase fire consultancy partner mean anything specific
02:38:31 specific in relation to the level of qualification of the fire consultant that was agreed with the lfb i don't know when you say you don't know
02:38:43 i don't know when you say you don't know let me try it a different way it's clear that this letter agrees or records an agreement with lfb that a competent fire safety consultancy
02:38:56 a competent fire safety consultancy partner
02:38:57 partner would be appointed to undertake the fire risk assessments in the high-risk blocks do you remember whether there was an agreement as to the level of competency that that
02:39:05 that that person would have i do not remember was there any discussion uh with the lfb about how either the tmo or rbkc or both
02:39:16 or rbkc or both would go about assessing competence in this context um i do not remember there being a conversation about competency if the fire risk has set the fire risk assessor competency
02:39:27 set the fire risk assessor competency i see did you have no understanding at all about the about what competency meant
02:39:32 meant well i generally understand what the team competency meant but in terms of undertaking undertaking fire risk assessments um i would not have had a view about what
02:39:43 i would not have had a view about what qualifications a qualified or competent fire risk assessment consultant would have had if we go to page 31 on page two of the letter
02:39:51 letter you can see that the first bullet point on the top of the page reads as follows evaluate the performance of the fire consultant and resource permitting adopt the same approach to completing the fras of the medium and also the low risk properties aim to
02:40:03 and also the low risk properties aim to undertake the program of medium risk fras at the conclusion of the high risk program
02:40:07 program aimed to commence the low risk program immediately on completion of the medium risk project um can you help us with what was discussed in terms of evaluating the performance of the fire consultant
02:40:19 the performance of the fire consultant uh no i'm afraid i can't do you know how the uh either the tmo or rbkc or both jointly we're going to perform
02:40:26 perform that evaluation um i can say uh no i can't but it would probably be my expectation that it would be the tmo who would undertake the evaluation of the performance of the
02:40:37 the evaluation of the performance of the fire
02:40:38 fire risk assessment consultant how would they do that do you know um i don't know but if you ask me now how i would expect someone to evaluate the performance of a fire risk assessment consultant in 2021
02:40:51 assessment consultant in 2021 then you would have an audit undertaken of fire risk assessments and you may even bring in a a regular auditor to undertake a review
02:41:02 auditor to undertake a review periodically of say five or ten percent of the risk assessments to have a look at the quality of them in order to make sure that they were um up to date yes well i'm not asking you about no no i know you're not asking me but i'm asking you about
02:41:15 asking you about uh 2010 and just want to know whether as a matter of fact at the time there was any thinking as far as you know about how it was or what process would be adopted
02:41:28 or what process would be adopted to conduct this evaluation um i do not remember if what or i do not remember what the process was for evaluating the performance of the fire risk assessment consultant do you remember whether there were any
02:41:40 do you remember whether there were any criteria or standards agreed or to which lfb referred against which this evaluation would take place i do not know it may have been
02:41:51 have been discussed with members of my team who were undertaking the regular conversations with the tmo but i it wasn't discussed with myself as far as i remember uh and then if you look
02:42:03 uh and then if you look below the bullet points on page 31 there page two of the letter it goes on to say additionally we can confirm that in order to effectively progress the recommendations from the assessment reports
02:42:14 reports in a timely manner tmo officers have established a working group which meets every two weeks the working group discusses in detail each report that's received and agrees a responsible person and a time scale to
02:42:26 responsible person and a time scale to progress each action
02:42:30 uh were you aware what that working group
02:42:34 group was for no was it actually ever set up do you know i don't know
02:42:42 were you as a signatory of this letter not keen
02:42:45 not keen to make sure that it was um unfortunately with the passage of time um uh i i can't remember um as clearly i have signed this letter
02:42:56 as clearly i have signed this letter clearly i understood that tmo were taking action in order to make sure that took place and i think it would be my assumption that the tmo would set up the working group and it would meet every two weeks i had no
02:43:07 would meet every two weeks i had no reason to believe that the tmo wouldn't um and then it would be
02:43:12 would be my understanding that anything that revolved regular monitoring of tmo actions that they had made a commitment to
02:43:18 to would be raised through the regular meetings that were undertaken as part of the performance monitoring of the tmo which didn't necessarily involve myself right
02:43:26 right would it be i mean would it be fair to say looking at this letter and standing back from it that by at least january uh 2010
02:43:37 at least january uh 2010 uh this question of the deficiencies in tmo's historic uh fras had not been only be brought to your attention but you and mr black the two people
02:43:50 you and mr black the two people senior people in the each organization responsible had not only addressed the problem uh but actually gone to the lfb and were promising how you were going to continue to address the problem
02:44:01 continue to address the problem um i think that's what that's what the letter says yes in the light of that can you explain why um thereafter you didn't um keep a grip on it at least to make
02:44:12 um keep a grip on it at least to make sure
02:44:13 sure that what is said in this letter the tmo would do
02:44:16 would do was done i cannot explain that right
02:44:26 [Music] can we then look at something a little bit later in 2010 which is
02:44:34 which is gene daintith's peeps email and that's a rather um obscure title but can we look at rbk3026862
02:44:48 this is an email of the 28th of september 2010 which you produced as your exhibit lj27 and it begins with an email from
02:45:00 and it begins with an email from uh jean daintith if you look down please to page two
02:45:09 uh with her sending robert black and brian deans at lfb an article on fire safety research that's how it begins and we can see that robert black responds uh on the 30th of september
02:45:22 uh on the 30th of september if you look at page one two gene dentist and brian deans and he copies in both janice ray and you
02:45:33 and he says in the second paragraph i feel it's worth reiterating that as we have now completed the fire risk assessments on all of our
02:45:44 risk assessments on all of our potentially high risk which includes all of our high-rise blocks and in each case the evacuation strategy has been confirmed as being stay put defend in place specifically the assessments have confirmed that because these blocks
02:45:56 confirmed that because these blocks consist of purpose-built self-contained dwellings
02:45:59 dwellings and the compartmentation is good if a fire were to break out elsewhere in the block
02:46:03 block the residents would be safe to stay put obviously if the fire was within their flat they should evacuate immediately now just pausing there were you familiar at this time since late september 2010
02:46:16 at this time since late september 2010 with the concept of the stay put strategy yes it was was there any ever any discussion about whether the stay put strategy was suitable for all of the high-rise buildings in the tma's stock
02:46:28 tma's stock um i don't remember there being a specific discussion about individual blocks i just i understood there was a stay put strategy that's what i understood
02:46:39 what i understood right i didn't i did not know if there was a different differentiation between different blocks i see do you remember ever having any
02:46:50 i see do you remember ever having any discussion about what arrangements should be made for full or partial evacuation of any particular block or any particular group of blocks
02:47:01 or any particular group of blocks uh in the event that they stay put stay put strategy was abandoned no going on with the email he says in the next paragraph however with regard to emergency
02:47:13 however with regard to emergency procedures for disabled residents we are aiming to produce personal emergency evacuation plans peaks specifically as and when people's disabilities are brought to our attention
02:47:22 attention there is a need to produce a peep to clearly identify what their emergency procedures would be and if necessary to fit devices to help give them early warning of fire in truth
02:47:33 in truth to date we have only done this in a small number of cases most notably where residents had no hearing and impaired speech and or were blind
02:47:41 blind and we liaised with the nfb to fit the most appropriate detector however the fire risk assessments have clearly identified the need for us to extend this work in relation to residents
02:47:50 residents known by us to have disabilities i'll just
02:47:54 just continue over the page the fras themselves have sometimes identified individual residents who we should target and the tp tracker and the big wow work will clearly identify others
02:48:05 will clearly identify others we were planning to work with the new fra consultant to produce generic peeps for larger blocks that could then be personalized to individual needs just out of interest what was the big
02:48:16 just out of interest what was the big well project um i don't remember um i uh i don't remember the the tmo having a big wow but um i can't i can't i can't provide you with
02:48:28 i can't i can't i can't provide you with any more uh answer that will elucidate that particular question all right were you familiar at the time with the concept of personal emergency evacuation plans um only as a result of the article that claire wise had written who was a member
02:48:40 claire wise had written who was a member of my team so as a result of this exchange
02:48:41 exchange yes i see do you know if the tmo ever in fact produced peeps for any of its housing stock uh across the board i don't know and what about in particular for grenfell
02:48:53 what about in particular for grenfell tower
02:48:53 tower uh i don't know can we go to your second witness statement well we don't need to go to it but you say paragraph 22 of your second witness statement
02:49:01 statement that you didn't follow up on whether the tma produced peeps that's correct why is that um it was an item that
02:49:09 item that i discussed with with robert black and then i left it to the tmo in order to be able to take that forward and uh i didn't i didn't follow it up any further right
02:49:20 i didn't follow it up any further right do you know why you didn't follow it up you just left it to him um i just left it to the tmo to take action on that account right
02:49:29 [Applause] are you aware of the fact that the tma produced no peeps in respect of grenfell tower at all um i am now but i wasn't uh in 2010. you
02:49:40 um i am now but i wasn't uh in 2010. you agree that it's a failure of rbktc's oversight that peeps were not produced by the tmo specifically for grenfell tower um well peeps
02:49:49 peeps um as i understand it we're not a statutory requirement well never mind that do you agree that it was a failure of rbkc's oversight given
02:49:58 given robert black's statements in this email that peeps were not produced by the tmo um i would agree that i should have taken action in order to follow up that with robert black
02:50:09 with robert black to inquire further as to whether peeps were actually being produced but i didn't can i then ask you to look at rbk four zeros 1176
02:50:28 this is about fire safety protocol and this is an email exchange between you
02:50:34 you kevin thompson who was interim head of service residential operations environmental health and trading standards and also janice ray from mid-december 2010 and it bears the
02:50:45 from mid-december 2010 and it bears the subject line fire safety protocol can we look at page two in that email ron please and there you will find an email the 14th of december from kevin thompson to you with that
02:50:56 from kevin thompson to you with that title
02:50:57 title and he starts by saying hi laura the legal framework for fire safety and residential accommodation is complex and overlapping the housing act 2004
02:51:05 act 2004 gives duties and powers to our bkc as local housing authority and the fire safety regulatory reform order 2005 gives duties and powers to the fire authority these can apply at the same time in the same premises
02:51:17 time in the same premises there is therefore escape for at best duplication and at worst conflict and and then um he goes on four paragraphs down uh to uh say fire safety enforcement in
02:51:31 uh to uh say fire safety enforcement in council lane stock is the responsibility of the fire and rescue authority under the fire
02:51:35 the fire safety regulatory reform order 2005. this requires the relevant person in this case the tmo to undertake fire risk assessments and take all reasonable steps to ensure fire safety in all their premises
02:51:46 safety in all their premises including the large purpose-built blocks the fire safety protocol contains obligations for rbkc which need a mending to be fit for purpose i suggest the following amended wording
02:51:56 wording what will our bkc do and he goes on to say kensington and chelsea tmo will undertake
02:52:02 undertake the monitoring and inspection of premises they manage to ensure adequate fire safety in compliance with their duty under the regulatory reform fire safety order 2005 section 4 bullet point 2.
02:52:15 section 4 bullet point 2. next bullet point rbkc cannot enforce in premises it owns but where deficiencies are identified it will seek to ensure that the kensington and chelsea tmo comply with their contractual obligations and legal responsibilities
02:52:28 obligations and legal responsibilities under the
02:52:28 under the regulatory reform fire safety order 2005 to ensure adequate fire safety
02:52:35 and then he goes on to to note he says the first bullet point merely reflects the requirements of the law
02:52:42 law applicable to the tmo so brings nothing new
02:52:46 new however the second bullet point puts a clear onus on the council this is surely something we want to do anyway but could i please have your comments please the bulk of the protocol is good news for the private sector
02:52:57 for the private sector and i'm keen to have a sign up to it but i am conscious of this obligation in relation to the tmo stock
02:53:06 tmo stock uh now i've read that at length to you so that you can understand what it is you're responding to when you do and if we go to page one we see your response it's the next day
02:53:17 we see your response it's the next day 15th december 2010 to janice ray and robert black in fact it's not a response it's a forward janice and robert please find attachment below from kevin in eh about
02:53:29 attachment below from kevin in eh about fire safety into agreed protocols he suggested a form of wording with regard to duties and responsibilities for both rbkc and the tma i don't have any objection but before agreeing i would really
02:53:40 but before agreeing i would really appreciate your thoughts and then at the top of the page uh janice ray comes back to you the following day 16th of december 2010
02:53:51 following day 16th of december 2010 and says laura have had a look at the protocol and it seems fine however i'd like to run it past our fire risk assessor in case i've missed something i'll ask him to come back to me asap with any comments
02:54:04 me asap with any comments now just looking at what was said about rbkc's obligations or proposed obligations did you understand from this exchange that the form of words
02:54:16 that the form of words that was being proposed was that um was an obligation on our bkc to ensure that the tmo complied with its contractual and legal obligations
02:54:28 its contractual and legal obligations could we go down yes of course down please to page two bottom of page two
02:54:38 but in in other words in pr in premises which rbkc owns itself it would be uh either assuming or confirming
02:54:49 uh either assuming or confirming obligations to ensure that the tmo comply with their contractual obligations and legal responsibilities yes do you know what had prompted that suggested
02:55:01 suggested insertion or into or change to the protocol at that point december 2010 no i don't can we look at lfb3032248
02:55:14 no i don't can we look at lfb3032248 this is the actual protocol agreed between the lf epa and rbkc as you can as you can see there
02:55:22 see there uh and that's the first page of it if you go to the second page page two you can see that um it's dated the first of october 2011
02:55:33 um it's dated the first of october 2011 and reviewed or to be reviewed on the first of october 2012. so this is a a slightly later version or perhaps comes
02:55:44 slightly later version or perhaps comes a little comes a little bit later than december 2010 but um if you go to page eight please we can see that it's signed by paul morse on behalf of rbkc
02:55:56 morse on behalf of rbkc he's the director of environmental health you see that yes and he signs it on the 17th of november 2011.
02:56:04 2011. steve churek the assistant commissioner for the epa signs it on the 20th of february 2012. do you remember seeing this document at the time no have you ever seen it before
02:56:16 the time no have you ever seen it before i don't believe i have even though it was copy it was uh it appears to have been uh sent to you in
02:56:22 in december 2010. if it was sent to me i would have read it i don't recollect seeing it right this is to be fair to your final signed version you don't recall seeing an earlier draft no i don't right
02:56:33 earlier draft no i don't right well let's see how we go with it can we go to page four please
02:56:38 on page four you can see uh it says at the bottom of the page what will the royal borough of kensington and chelsea do
02:56:47 do and there are some bullet points rbkc will undertake in line with their statutory requirements the monitoring and inspection of premises identified in section three of this protocol rbkc will undertake the monitoring and inspection of their own premises to
02:56:59 inspection of their own premises to ensure adequate fire safety standards rbkc will enforce fire safety standards in accordance with the provisions of the housing act 2004 and the hhs rs having regards to relevant documents published by the
02:57:10 relevant documents published by the government including fire safety risk assessment sleeping accommodation and the page statutory operating guidance on the hh srs and in accordance with any guidance
02:57:21 srs and in accordance with any guidance jointly agreed with lfepa next bullet point rbkc will when taking enforcement action under the housing act 2004
02:57:29 2004 have regarded the fire safety order as our rbkc cannot enforce in its own premises it will ensure that when deficiencies are identified it takes appropriate action in a timely manner
02:57:40 in a timely manner to ensure acceptable fire safety standards are maintained and achieved in these premises and then last bullet point is about a suitable means of complying with fire
02:57:51 a suitable means of complying with fire safety requirements and we'll all it will also ensure guidance accompanies all statutory notices and forming owners straight landlords of the need to undertake their own fire risk assessment ensure that any relevant notice the
02:58:02 ensure that any relevant notice the schedule of work is drafted in such a way
02:58:05 way as to offer the owners straight landlord the opportunity to bring forward alternative means of flying in accordance with iran fire risk assessment where where such alternatives are brought forward by the owner or landlord rbkc will consult with lf epa
02:58:19 rbkc will consult with lf epa now uh there's no reference in in in there to the tmo do you know why kevin thompson suggested amendments
02:58:30 why kevin thompson suggested amendments will be saw in the email to you in december 2010 don't appear to have been carried into the final draft no i'm afraid you'd have to ask kevin thompson well okay and did did the protocol as signed
02:58:44 okay and did did the protocol as signed as i'm showing it to you reflect your understanding at the time this is 2010 2011 of rbkc's responsibilities to ensure monitoring and inspection of their own premises
02:58:56 premises i have no reason to dispute what's in this document right do you know how rbkc went about in as it says in the second bullet point on page two in the indent ensuring that when deficiencies are
02:59:09 ensuring that when deficiencies are identified it that's rbkc takes appropriate action in a timely manner to ensure acceptable fire safety standards are maintained and achieved in those premises um if in the case of the tmo then it
02:59:21 um if in the case of the tmo then it would have been requesting the tmo undertake uh the works required to remedy the deficiency notices
02:59:29 notices and do you accept that under this protocol as agreed by the up by rbkc rbkc was agreeing with the lf epa
02:59:41 agreeing with the lf epa that it itself was obliged to ensure that appropriate action was taken yes mr chairman is that a convenient
02:59:52 yes mr chairman is that a convenient moment
02:59:52 moment yes i think it is thank you very much i think we'll have a break now mr johnson said we can all get some lunch we'll resume at two o'clock please and again please don't talk to anyone about your evidence
03:00:04 about your evidence or anything relating to it over the break right thank you very much [Applause]
03:00:18 thank you two o'clock please
03:00:49 you