Contracts Awarded to Main Grenfell Contractor Despite Bans

The building firm found to have borne “considerable responsibility” for the Grenfell fire with its “casual attitude to fire safety” was handed contracts worth tens of millions of pounds by councils, colleges and NHS trusts after the tragedy.

Property group Rydon was the lead contractor overseeing the refurbishment of Grenfell Tower between 2014 and 2016, including the installation of combustible cladding. The inquiry found that the firm should have been aware of “the risks of using combustible materials in the external walls of high-rise buildings”.

Founded in 1978, the Kent-based group has won construction and maintenance contracts mainly across London and south-east England. The Grenfell contract was delivered by Rydon Maintenance, one of its subsidiaries.

In June 2018, the mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, signed an order saying that the construction arm of Rydon should not be permitted to bid for any contracts under a development scheme “until the Grenfell Tower inquiry has reported on the extent to which any Rydon group companies or employee contributed to ­causing or exacerbating the Grenfell Tower fire.”

The following year, the then housing secretary, Robert Jenrick, said that Rydon should not bid for further work “until we know the truth”. He wrote on Twitter, now X: “I understand why survivors and bereaved do not want to see public contracts awarded to the main contractor for the Grenfell Tower [refurbishment].”

In December 2021, Rydon Homes, another subsidiary, was blocked from the government’s help to buy loan scheme. Ministers said the decision had been made because of concerns over “unacceptable business practices” in the group.

Despite the bans in the wake of the fire, which killed 72 people in June 2017, Rydon subsequently picked up a string of multimillion-pound contracts, according to analysis by Stotles, a public sector procurement intelligence platform.

In September 2019, Maidstone council awarded Rydon a £9.9m ­contract for the building of a new innovation centre to serve as a hub for work in medtech, life science and healthcare. The council said its position in 2019 was that it had been “appropriate to wait until the public inquiry ran its course before making judgments”.

The next month, Labour-controlled Ealing council in west London awarded Rydon Construction a £99m contract for the regeneration of the 264-home High Lane estate, which was built in the 1970s and was plagued with damp and mould.

In 2021, Rydon transferred regeneration and construction projects to Real Contracting Group, which later collapsed into administration. Ealing council now states on its website: “Due to the council’s developing partner going into administration in late 2023, it is not known at this stage when the redevelopment will be complete.”

Liberal Democrat councillors have criticised the “appalling decisions” that were made in the choice of construction partners. Jon Ball, the Liberal Democrat opposition spokesperson on housing at Ealing council, said the choice of contractor had delayed the construction of hundreds of properties, with residents waiting for much-needed homes. He said: “It leaves questions to be answered about why Ealing’s Labour administration awarded a contract to Rydon in 2019 when they must have known the appalling Grenfell legacy.”

Also in 2019, the University of Bath awarded Rydon a £30m contract for the construction of a new automotive propulsion research facility, as part of the Institute for Advanced Automotive Propulsion Systems.

Glass for the project was supplied by Saint-Gobain, a French multinational and former owner of Celotex, which manufactured the combustible insulation used at Grenfell.

The Rydon group has also won maintenance contracts with NHS trusts since the Grenfell fire, including a £4.3m contract awarded in April last year by Avon and Wiltshire Mental Health Partnership NHS trust. Oxleas NHS foundation trust, which provides a range of healthcare services in south-east London, awarded Rydon Maintenance a £6.6m contract in July 2022.

The Guardian has previously revealed that about £250m in deals have been made with corporations involved in the refurbishment of Grenfell Tower in the past five years, based on searches of public contracts by the outsourcing data firm Tussell.

The Grenfell inquiry report found the Rydon team working on the Grenfell Tower project had been “notably inexperienced” and had lacked “even the most basic knowledge of the regulatory regime”.

The inquiry report strongly criticised Studio E, a now defunct architectural practice involved in the refurbishment, and Harley Facades, the cladding contractor. It also found that Arconic, the US firm which supplied the cladding panels, had sold them despite knowing the dangers; that insulation firm Celotex had “embarked on a dishonest scheme” to mislead customers; and that building products firm Kingspan had knowingly made a false claim about test results.

Arconic said its subsidiary Arconic Architectural Products did not mislead or conceal information, and that its product was legal to sell in the UK; Kingspan said it had long acknowledged “unacceptable historical failings” which were not reflective of the overall group; and Celotex said it had since reviewed its marketing and process controls to meet best industry practice.

Keir Starmer said after the Grenfell inquiry report was published that the government would write to all companies found by the inquiry to have been part of the “horrific failings”. He said it would be a “first step to stopping them being awarded government contracts”.

Ealing said it had initially selected Rydon as a partner on the High Lane development in April 2017, prior to the fire. The council said Rydon was no longer involved in the project and “the council is continuing to work with residents to determine a new way forward”.

The University of Bath and Avon and Wiltshire Mental Health Partnership NHS trust said they had followed all relevant procurement rules. Oxleas NHS Foundation Trust and Rydon were contacted for comment.

Source: The Guardian