Councils spend £100m on safety work following Grenfell

New figures show that London councils have spent nearly £100 million on building safety measures over the last 12 months, following the Grenfell Tower fire.

Declared by 24 boroughs in response to BBC freedom of information requests, the near £100 million of spend has predominantly focused on cladding removal, operating waking watches on buildings that were found to be at risk of fire, safety surveys and other improvements.

However, a number of councils have had to delay refurbishing council flats to pay for the fire safety work, with Croydon Council conceding that a lack of government funding has caused it to cut refurbishment work to pay for sprinklers installation in high rises.

Some councils have also seen funding requests rejected, with Enfield and Brent councils having had applications for government funding to fit sprinklers turned down, and Newham claiming it has yet to receive any money from the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government for its safety work.

Individual spend has seen Camden Council spend £33 million since last June, Newham spend £20 million, while Kensington and Chelsea has reportedly spent £4.6 million on fire safety improvement work, and has separately spent £235 million in responding to the Grenfell disaster directly so far, exhausting its reserves.