Combustible Cladding Fires Italian Style
Another combustible cladding apartment block inferno, fires me up again ...
Sadly, after a relatively quiet period and apparent calm over combustible cladding we’ve seen another major apartment building facade fire in Milan, Italy. Luckily there were no fatalities, but there’s plenty of building damage and new uncertainty over materials and fire safety management techniques for affected high-rise buildings.
[8:00 minutes estimated reading time, 1581 words]
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Introduction
I had hoped not to have to write another article reporting on a high-rise strata apartment building facade fire. But here we are, again.
So, it seems the serious problem of combustible cladding on strata buildings has not gone away yet and the delays [now extending over more than 4 years] in finding and implementing solutions for strata buildings continue.
So, let’s catch up on the latest news about combustible cladding and consider the remaining unaddressed issues affecting strata owners and other stakeholders in affected strata buildings.
The Torre dei Moro cladding fire
On 31 August 2021, the facade of the 20-storey Torre dei Moro building in Milan’s southern outskirts caught fire. According to reporting the fire started near the top floors before spreading down, across, and around the whole building.
The damage appears to be extensive, according to reporting having destroyed the whole building. And, the immediate reports suggest the fire spread very quickly across the building, within minutes.
A few different news reports on the fire are as follows:
From the Evening Standard: Huge tower block inferno covers Milan in smoke as cladding panels ‘burn like butter’
From the Daily Mail: Milan tower blaze evacuees compare the fire to Grenfell Tower after building's 'fire-proof' cladding 'melts like butter': Fears 20-storey apartment block could COLLAPSE
From Euronews: Milan tower block fire 'reminiscent' of Grenfell disaster, officials say
From abcNEWS: Cladding questions arise in Milan's 20-story building blaze
There’s also an evolving Wikipedia page about the Torre dei Moro fire where you can [eventually] find updates and more filtered news and information.
So, where to from here?
For background on the position with combustible cladding in Australia you can read my articles:
Those articles detail long, slow and incomplete actions by governments involving investigation, reporting, regulation, lack of regulation, and remediation that are still a long way from finishing [and in some cases even starting]. And, things are no better today.
For instance, NSW’s Project Remediate hopes that the first strata building remediations under the project will start by the end of 2021. And, in Victoria the there have been only 25 strata buildings remediated so far of the 500 that are listed for combustible cladding remediation, and the VIC Cladding Task Force hopes to start remediation on another 100 strata buildings this year.
That’s very slow progress on combustible cladding and, at that rate, it will take a few more years [at least] to get the limited remediation they cover done.
So there are, in my view, a few things that need urgent addressing as follows.
1. Implementing more effective government assistance packages
The existing government assistance packages are inadequate. Even the better New South Wales and Victorian programmes leave strata buildings with uncompensated costs and losses whilst the other states have offered strata buildings even less or nothing at all.
Innocent and blame-free strata buildings and strata owners should not have to carry the costs of the combustible cladding crisis.
2. Advancing [and fast tracking] class actions and other litigation
For those strata buildings that have taken legal action over combustible cladding and the class action being promoted by William Roberts [see my article ‘Cladding Class Action Gets Bigger’] those actions need to be advanced more quickly to get results for the claimant strata buildings.
The Lacrosse fire case took more than 6 years to get resolved in VCAT and the Victorian Supreme Court and was only resolved finally for the strata building in March 2021 [see my article ‘The Strata Gavel: The Lacrosse Cladding Fire Appeal Decided [mostly]’.
Combustible cladding litigation and other legal actions by strata buildings should be fast-tracked by the lawyers and the courts so they can get compensation from responsible developers, builders, materials suppliers and/or certifiers.
3. Finding fast safety solutions [even if temporary]
Since there are ongoing fire safety issues in strata buildings with combustible cladding whilst they wait for legal, government, and other solutions to happen and those solutions could take a few more years, those affected strata buildings need urgent solutions to thier fire safety issues: even if they are temporary.
The narrow focus on combustible cladding removal and replacement as the ‘perfect’ solution is occurring at the expense of other potential solutions that may be effective [or even 90% plus effective] that can be implemented now.
So, quick and [largely] effective temporary solutions are needed for strata buildings now.
4. Finding cost-effective solutions for buildings
There’s a real risk and likelihood that only combustible cladding removal and replacement as the ‘perfect’ solution will be contemplated or accepted for remediation by regulators. That’s because in most instances governments want fire authorities, local councils, and insurers to approve the solutions and since those groups aren’t paying for the remediation [since the strata buildings pay] they can easily require more work to be done. I identified those problems in my article ‘Is the Project Remediate Mouse Trap Being Sprung?’.
So, very little investigation of and testing of alternative solutions to manage combustible cladding fire risks are taking place.
Plus, because everyone [apart from the strata buildings] involved in the various government programs have commercial beneficial interests in doing more work, they’re not likely to say ‘hang on we can fix this in a simpler and cheaper way’ are they?
I identified those problems in my article ‘Is the Project Remediate Mouse Trap Being Sprung?’.
5. More transparency about affected buildings
So far the details of the high and medium risk strata building affected by combustible cladding have been kept secret by state governments. A range of excuses have been given for that including the following [as reported here and here]:
releasing the list would increase the risk of arson and terrorism,
the release could hurt property owners,
it would potentially mislead the public,
breaching expectations of confidentiality, or
because many owners of the buildings don't want their addresses published, due to the impact on their property’s value.
But, that’s neither acceptable nor fair since prospective buyers of apartments in combustible cladding affected strata buildings can’t and won’t know about the problem at all [when everyone else does]. And, they will become even more innocent strata owners taking on these problems and playing the strata defects musical chairs game I wrote about in my article ‘Strata Defects Whistleblowers’.
Affected strata buildings need to be publicly disclosed and the government’s and the strata buildings’ actions to remediate the problems are also included in that disclosure.
6. Calming down councils and fire authorities
Anecdotal information and stories indicate that local councils and fire authorities are issuing orders and other mandates to strata buildings affected by combustible cladding to do work and otherwise certify the fire safety compliance of the buildings.
This also appears to be occurring independently of any actions the strata building is taking about the combustible cladding or their registration with and participation in NSW’s Project Remediate or Victoria’s Cladding Task Force.
But it’s a bit rich to tell strata buildings to hurry up on combustible cladding issues when state governments have and continuing to take years to do anything at all and even more years to get their limited solutions completed.
So, local council and fire authority regulatory actions over strata building combustible cladding need to be put on hold.
7. Limiting insurance premium increases and other penalties
Strata building insurers are charging more for premiums, adding loadings on policies, and imposing higher excesses for strata buildings with combustible cladding in relation to building damage and replacement coverage and other kinds of insurance. Those increased charges also appear to be implemented across the board and not just in relation to events, damage, and losses that occur for things related to the combustible cladding.
Whilst it’s fair that insurers take into account increased risks, in the case of strata buildings with combustible cladding that needs to be supported by actual risk assessments and limited to specifically identified causes of those risk increases [in other words, only in relation to combustible cladding fires and consequential damage from combustible cladding fires].
So, those kinds of strata building and strata owner insurance cost increases need to be limited to cover the actual risks arising from the presence of unremedied combustible cladding.
Conclusions
I feel pretty stupid saying that:
almost 7 years after the Lacrosse fire,
more than 4 years after the Grenfell fire,
more than 2 years after the Neo fire, and
2 years after the Glebe Park fire,
it’s now urgent that the combustible cladding crisis is resolved for strata and other highrise building stakeholders because of this week’s Torre dei Moro fire.
It was always urgent and remains so.
And, the unhappy risks and consequences for strata buildings with combustible cladding, strata owners in those buildings, and unaware potential apartment buyers just continue.
So, where are the governments’ solutions and when will they happen?
02 September, 2021
Francesco …