Bristol council to hire fire marshals in tower block safety scheme

The council will use 77 fire marshals to keep watch daily

A £200,000-per-week scheme will see fire marshals patrol council tower blocks with flammable cladding.

Bristol City Council will take on 77 wardens to carry out a daily "waking watch" to alert residents if a fire breaks out.

The move follows recent fires at Twinnell House in Easton and Eccleston House in Barton Hill.

The council said the plan would be put in place until new fire safety measures were permanently installed.

Out of the city's 62 high-rise blocks, 37 use flammable expanded polystyrene (EPS) cladding, plus one block has similar cladding.

Removing flammable cladding is expected to cost £48m

According to the Local Democracy Reporting Service, the estimated cost to taxpayers will be twice as much as the council had planned to spend on installing sprinklers inside tower block flats, in January 2019.

Cabinet papers revealed the scale of the cost of new fire safety measures:

• Each warden will cost £2,604 per week, costing an estimated £4m up to March, and then £10m over the next financial year

• Removing EPS cladding is expected to cost £48m, although this could be spread over the next 10 years

• Recent fire safety inspections cost £1m

• New smoke alarms are expected to cost £9.9m

The council's cabinet report states: "Since the Grenfell tragedy in 2017, we have carried out checks and reviews of our blocks to ensure they don't have the same cladding and were assessed as safe.

'Interim measures required'

"We have installed fire breaks, improved compartmentation and replaced fire doors in many blocks.

"However, there has been development of new knowledge within the industry as a result of extensive testing of insulation types, and risk aversion and legislation is changing, shifting focus to materials other than aluminium composite material cladding [found in Grenfell Tower].

"Despite EPS cladding being installed to building regulations at the time and in accordance with manufacturer's instructions, interim measures are required while remediation works are undertaken.

"The introduction of waking watches as interim measures will help ensure the safety of residents remains paramount and secure."

The cabinet will be asked to approve spending £14.4m on waking watches, at a meeting on 6 December.