Seven organisations to be investigated over Grenfell Tower fire

Seven organisations will be investigated over the Grenfell Tower disaster and all recommendations of a public inquiry will be met, the government has said.

Manufacturing companies that are probed could be prevented from bidding for public contracts, while two existing bodies will be merged to form a single building safety regulator as part of the changes.

Housing Secretary Angela Rayner said: “The bereaved and the survivors and members of the Grenfell community are still waiting for the justice they need and deserve. And justice must be done.”

The government has said it is already working on a list of reforms to building safety which came from the cladding crisis following Grenfell, and it will begin implementing the changes from 2028.

The fire in the west London tower block killed 72 people in 2017. The inquiry found all their deaths were avoidable.

It concluded that the fire was the result of a chain of failures by governments, “dishonest” companies and the fire service, which lacked a strategy for dealing with high rise cladding fires.

Rayner, who is also deputy prime minister, said the Grenfell Inquiry had uncovered “serial incompetence and negligence, complacency and inaction, and blatant dishonesty and greed” which led to the fire.

She said the government was acting on its findings and would take “tough action” to reform the system and “ensure no community will ever have to face a tragedy like Grenfell ever again”.

“That means greater accountability, stronger regulation, and putting residents at the heart of decision-making,” she added, saying it was owed “to the memory of those who lost their lives”.

Ed Daffarn, who survived the fire, told the BBC the announcement left him feeling frustrated, adding the government’s intentions “may be good but the wait is torturous”.

Rayner said three of the organisations set to be investigated – manufacturing companies Arconic, Kingspan, and Celotex – were found by the inquiry to have acted with “systemic dishonesty”.

“Their disgraceful, mercenary behaviour put profit before people and exploited the regulatory regime to evade accountability with fatal consequences.”

She also said the organisations that failed “included the government and regulators”.

The department she now leads, she said, “failed to act on known risks and ignored, delayed, or disregarded matters affecting the safety of life”.

The full list of seven companies set to be investigated for professional misconduct is:

• Arconic Architectural Products SAS – made cladding
• Saint-Gobain Construction Products UK Limited – in relation to its then ownership of insulation firm Celotex Limited
• Exova (UK) Limited – carried out fire risk safety assessments
• Harley Facades Limited – installed cladding
• Kingspan Insulation Limited – insulation
• Rydon Maintenance Limited – main project contractor
• Studio E Architects Limited – architects

They will be investigated using powers under the Procurement Act passed in 2023.

The government’s role in failing to regulate safety in the construction industry became apparent early in the Grenfell inquiry.

During the hearings it apologised for its “past failures in relation to the oversight of the system that regulated safety in the construction and refurbishment of high rise buildings”.

Wednesday’s announcement is part of a continuing effort to strengthen the regulations and oversight of construction.

On Wednesday, the government published a new Construction Products Reform Green Paper setting out possible penalties for companies found to have breached safety obligations.

These include fines based on the company’s revenue and powers to limit individuals being involved in the industry.

However, officials will not say if these penalties will be applied retrospectively. The failures which led to the Grenfell fire happened in the years before its refurbishment in 2016.

The government has backed a new “Hillsborough Law”, which would create a legal duty for public authorities to tell the truth and be transparent.

Ministers are promising a new single construction regulator will improve standards in the industry.

In a rapid series of reforms since the fire, the Conservatives set up both a Building Safety Regulator and a National Regulator for Construction Products.

Sir Martin Moore-Bick, the chairman of the Grenfell Inquiry, recommended there should be just one body.

The government will effectively merge the existing ones into a single regulator in what the housing ministry described as further “sweeping construction, building and fire safety reforms”.

These are likely to introduce new rules on the testing of specific construction products.

Mr Daffarn, a member of the Grenfell United campaign group told BBC Radio 5 Live: “The report is full of recommendations for further consultations, further reviews – we are eight years on from the tragedy.

“It feels like we are just in this carousel of waiting, waiting for justice.”

Grenfell Next of Kin, which represents some of the bereaved, said it welcomed the measures being put in place but told the Reuters news agency these “should have been basic requirements for a developed country such as ours”.

The Grenfell disaster was caused by the use of highly flammable cladding backed by insulation which also contributed to the spread of the fire.

Manufacturers either concealed evidence of the risks their products posed or made false and misleading claims, the inquiry found.

The housing ministry wants to create stronger enforcement of safety standards but also force the construction industry to be more transparent and take responsibility to ensure a fire like Grenfell does not happen again.

The London Fire Brigade failed to respond to the rapid spread of the fire at Grenfell due to poor training and a lack of guidance about how to deal with flammable cladding.

The government is setting up a new College of Fire and Rescue later this year to “improve the training and professionalism of firefighters”.

Another finding of the inquiry was that Grenfell was inspected by a fire risk assessor who lacked the necessary training and experience. The government will bring in certification for assessors.

The government will provide an update on its work to meet the Grenfell recommendations every three months as part of an attempt to beef up the impact of public inquiry findings.

The MHCLG has now taken over responsibility for fire safety from the Home Office and says it will support both the continuing police investigation and plans for a memorial which will replace the tower once it is dismantled in two years’ time.