FOCUS
Grenfell Tower
consequence, a fundamental change is required in the regulatory philosophy surrounding building regulations for fire safety.
Fundamental change
So as an industry, what do we want to see happen, and on which issues must we endeavour to keep the minds focused of those who are responsible for enacting and codifying change? At the root of the current ‘not fit for purpose’
system is the lack of clarity of roles and responsibilities across the whole building control system. The ABI has called for a detailed review
of this for all those involved in ensuring the fire safety of a building. This should include explicit guidance which ensures responsibilities are clearly understood, as well as recommendations that ensure effective enforcement in all aspects of fire safety regulation including design, implementation, supervision, control and authorisation. We believe this will mitigate the risk of
things falling through the gaps in the current system and can give insurers greater confidence that risks will have been better managed in line with regulations. Another inherent element of the broken system is the amount of combustible material that is permitted by regulations within building design and construction.
20 JUNE 2018
www.frmjournal.com
Vital to this is a need for change to the building control’s testing regime for the performance of materials used on the outside of buildings. A modern day building control system should not tolerate the use of materials of ‘limited combustibility’ on the envelope of buildings. There may be some manufacturers that claim such materials are perfectly safe, but to insurers they represent additional risk. No building control system will ever be 100% perfect, so non combustibility as standard must be our overall goal.
Inadequate testing
Recent ABI research conducted through the Fire Protection Association has highlighted concerns with the testing regime itself. This may well have ruffled some feathers among those responsible for the adequacy of current tests, but we make no apologies for this, as the evidence in the research is clear. It demonstrates conclusively that current cladding tests simply do not replicate real world conditions, and that materials perform differently when exposed to more realistic conditions. The result is that insurers, fire and rescue
services and others simply cannot be confident that the materials used on the outside of buildings, particularly high rise or high risk buildings, will perform in line with what the current test suggests. We want a testing
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