Gove's golden opportunity

FIRE Comment

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hen not dancing in Scottish nightclubs, Michael Gove appears to have turned into John Prescott.

You’ll remember the behemoth that was the Department for the Environment, Transport and the Regions where the then Labour Deputy Prime Minister presided over a vast swathe of government policy.

Over 20 years later we now have a newly created super department with an equally long name.

In September, Robert Jenrick lost his job as Secretary of State for the old Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government as part of a wider reshuffle. As well as holding the brief for housing, he also had responsibility for building safety and after failing to deal with the backlash from post Grenfell building safety reforms, his position became untenable.

The arrival of Michael Gove as Secretary of State for a new department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities saw local government removed from the title but not the policy. This change was a bit of a surprise. Gove has shown no interest in this corner of government before but no doubt it was helped by the sweetener of retaining the brief for levelling up and responsibility for intergovernmental relations. That seems to mean talking to the devolved administrations in a bid to be consistent across the UK. Shortly after taking on this new brief, Gove spoke at a fringe event at the Conservative Party conference and made no mention of building safety, fire safety defects and a policy that is seeing thousands of leaseholders in financial ruin because they can’t afford to pay for them and they can’t sell them either.

Next day, addressing the party faithful, he referred to Grenfell and hinted at

problems with building safety by referring to the impacts that we continue to see to this day. “Our mission will also mean keeping faith with the victims of Grenfell, honouring their memory, making everyone’s home safer and greener and sharing the cost of that work more fairly.”

He’s conflating building safety with environmental concerns which makes sense given he oversaw the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (that used to be under John Prescott too) until 2019. The problem will be where the net zero agenda and building safety agenda clash in terms of policy and funding.

The Building Safety Bill went through its committee stage during Gove’s first weeks in office but it wasn’t until the Select Committee that scrutinises Gove’s department met on November 8 that we heard what he really thought about the building safety crisis. Responding to the Select Committee, he said: “I am coming to it as much as possible with a fresh set of eyes. We must not hang around in dealing with it, but we also need to recognise that while lots of steps have been taken by people with the very best of intentions, we have got to a situation in which simultaneously we are not dealing fast enough with some of the big issues, we are not getting the right response from some in the private sector, and there are leaseholders in particular who are being unfairly penalised.”

It’s good to hear that he recognises that the pace of activity by government isn’t right but it’s the mention of the private sector that is more significant as he talked about ‘guilty men and women’.

“It seems to me that an insufficient level of responsibility is being shouldered by those who were most responsible for getting us into this terrible situation in the first place.”

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FIRE magazine award:

Gove’s golden opportunity

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Michael Gove has a unique but time limited opportunity to do something about the building safety crisis, but Political Editor Catherine Levin thinks that he will struggle to get any more money out of the Treasury

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The trusted voice of fire & emergency since 1908

Comment

“He’s taken on a poison chalice of a policy and he just needs to keep talking enough to keep people happy while he works out what on earth he’s going to do next”

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and legislative framework that allowed the worst loss of life in a fire since World War II. The building safety crisis is too big for small solutions and the destablising impact on the housing market cannot be underestimated. The timing of the Inquiry is inconvenient for Gove and he’ll want to come out on top of that, showing that the experience of the past is not going to blemish his time at this super ministry. This is the biggest problem Gove has and he needs to get on and convince the Treasury to cough up because £5 billion simply isn’t enough.

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play with, he’s taken on a poison chalice of a policy and he just needs to keep talking enough to keep people happy while he works out what on earth he’s going to do next. There’s a reason why Robert Jenrick turned into an automaton as he regurgitated the same old lines all the time: because he had no choice.

I tend to agree with journalist Pete Apps: this is a PR strategy playing out, while we wait for the government’s appearance at the Grenfell Inquiry. The current module will see ministers past and maybe present give evidence about their role in setting up the policy

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18 metres. Robert Jenrick said back in the summer that lenders shouldn’t be looking for EWS1 forms when considering loans for properties in low-rise blocks but it’s still happening. Gove carefully responded to the Select Committee’s question about a timetable for this happening by saying: “I want to do that before Christmas.” He didn’t clarify what he meant by ‘that’ in his response and there’s the beginning of what I think is going to be the Gove way of dealing with things.

He comes across as super concerned and thoughtful, but the reality is that he’s got no money to

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The Select Committee has called for a Comprehensive Building Safety Fund that would cover all fire safety defects and not just those found on buildings over 18 metres. Using height to define higher-risk buildings is a massive concern to many – as highlighted in the October issue of FIRE. Gove deftly sidestepped the issue because he knows that the Treasury has only agreed £5 billion to sort out the problem of cladding on tall buildings and he can’t make new commitments to extend the scope of the fund.

He did the same with the EWS1 issue for buildings below

FIRE magazine correspondents Informing, engaging and inspiring… magazine, keynote speeches at national and international conferences on security and terrorism and contributions to international fora on terrorism. His training events have been delivered at brigade level across the UK Fire and Rescue Service.

In September 2020, Dr Sloggett completed 50 years of working in support of the public sector in the defence and security sectors.

Health & Fitness Correspondent Lorna King Lorna King is a freelance writer with a particular interest in health, fitness and wellbeing.

She is a qualified run leader for her local running and triathlon club, working closely with qualified coaches to deliver a variety of running and fitness sessions including interval training and circuits. Lorna enjoys friendly competition and has entered numerable races of varying distance, from 5k to ultra‑marathon.

Technology Correspondent Andrew Chilvers Andrew started his career on the Middle East Economic Digest at Emap during the first Gulf War. He later worked at the Financial Times and for Daily Mail Group as Night Duty Editor at Teletext.

He also worked abroad for many years in Hong Kong on the South China Morning Post and in Vietnam as an editor and foreign correspondent for Australian Consolidated Press. Back in Europe he joined the Warsaw Business Journal as Managing Editor, also overseeing its sister publications in Prague and Budapest.

On his return to the UK, Andrew was Editorial Director at former FIRE magazine owner Pavilion Publishing where he first worked with the FIRE team.

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Limited, which specialises in FRS incident command training in the UK. Tony has co-authored Fire and Incident Command: A practitioner’s guide and The Grenfell Tower Fire: Benign neglect and the road to an avoidable tragedy.

Tony is a Fellow of the Institution of Fire Engineers and is FIRE’s longest serving active correspondent, having contributed since 2003.

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Political Editor Catherine Levin Catherine has worked with the fire sector since 2003. She writes extensively about the Fire and Rescue Service and has been a regular contributor to FIRE magazine since 2013.

Catherine also works with fire and rescue services providing advice and insight on how to best communicate technical matters in a clear and accessible way.

Prior to her freelance career, Catherine worked for London Fire Brigade as Deputy Head of Community Safety. She joined the Brigade after ten years in the civil service where she specialised in fire policy and legislation.

As Political Editor, Catherine focuses on fire policy and strategy.

Senior Correspondent Tony Prosser Tony served 30 years in the Fire and Rescue Service in Wales, Thames Valley and West Midlands Fire Service including 23 years in tactical and strategic command roles. In recent times, Tony introduced the University of Wolverhampton Fire and Rescue Degrees programmes in 2010 and is a course leader. He is also a joint director of Artemis Training and Development

Security Correspondent Dr Dave Sloggett Dr Dave Sloggett is wellknown throughout the UK Fire and Rescue Service for his contributions to FIRE

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