Examination of witness

Pamela Oparaocha.

Q26 The Chair: Good morning. This is the Industry and Regulators Committee of the House of Lords. We have an inquiry at the moment on the Building Safety Regulator. Our witness this morning is Pamela Oparaocha, who is the assistant commissioner for safety at the London Fire Brigade, a very relevant position in terms of what has been happening and the origins of the Building Safety Regulator.

There were some changes announced yesterday, and we may come on to some of those later, but perhaps you could tell us at the beginning what your take is on the Building Safety Regulator set-up, how it is functioning, and whether it is making a difference to the safety of the buildings that we are all concerned about.

Pamela Oparaocha: At the start of the regime, it was challenging. There is a skills shortage in the sector, which was not helpful to us as a regulator. The Building Safety Regulator had its own staffing issues as well. There is room for efficiencies in the processes, and particularly the gateway processes, in terms of the way that we triage buildings through them. I can explain a bit more of that later if you like.

There is clear evidence that the gateways are driving change. For example, we went on a joint visit with the Building Safety Regulator and building control to a building as part of the gateway 3 process. That is before the buildings are occupied. This building was built post-Grenfell. It was part of the older regime until the approved inspector ceased to trade, and is now under the Building Safety Regulator.

As part of this joint visit, we found a number of issues with the building. For example, the sprinkler system was not working on some of the upper floors in the building. The lift was not correctly configured. There was limited information about the external wall system. Doing the joint visit allowed us, working with the Building Safety Regulator and building control, to speak with the person responsible for the building about remediating those parts of the building before people moved into it. There is definitely evidence that it is working.

This has to work. Working jointly with the Building Safety Regulator and other stakeholders in this space is important. We are all here for the same reason, which is the Grenfell Tower fire and to make sure that the building stock that we have in London is safer, and that what we build in the future is safe.

The Chair: You will know that we have heard lots of complaints about the system that is working, or not, at the moment, and some of the delays, so we will want to follow up on some of the specifics following what you have been saying.

Q27 Baroness Harding of Winscombe: I wonder whether you could just share a bit more insight into how the fire and rescue services feed into the BSR’s regulatory framework and how the relationship has developed between the two of you.

Pamela Oparaocha: We contribute specialist fire safety advice and ensure that fire safety is fully integrated into the gateway process. We contribute to multi-disciplinary teams (MDTs) by reviewing fire strategies and looking into key systems such as evacuation lifts, smoke control systems and sprinkler systems as part of the gateway process. Am I being clear? Does everyone understand what I mean by the gateway process?

The Chair: Yes.

Pamela Oparaocha: We also work alongside other specialists to ensure that fire safety is embedded into the process for making buildings safe. That is our part of the process. What was the second part of the question?

Baroness Harding of Winscombe: How has the relationship developed?

Pamela Oparaocha: In the beginning, we struggled to communicate with the Building Safety Regulator, which was under its own pressures, as was talked about earlier, in terms of recruiting people. This is a huge bit of legislation after a long period of not having significant legislation since the regulatory reform order from 2005.

That relationship has developed. We have more meetings with it. It feels much more like a partnership. The more that stakeholders are involved, which includes not only us but the industry and the Building Safety Regulator, the more we will create a regime that works. It definitely is getting better.

In the beginning, it was really challenging for us. It has been widely reported that there is a skills shortage in the sector, and we definitely suffered from that. In my department, I have fire engineers, inspecting officers and fire safety advisers. To be a fire engineer, you are talking about four years’ or more study. To be an inspecting officer, you are talking about between two and three years. To inspect high-risk, high-rise buildings, you have to be competent.

It was difficult in the beginning, because we were trying to recruit and train, and it felt like the timing of the funding could have been better. If we had had funding earlier, we would have been able to train people earlier, but it is definitely a better relationship than it was in the beginning, and does feel more like joint working. Our purposes are aligned.

Baroness Harding of Winscombe: One thing that we have heard from developers has been that different teams in the BSR have worked quite differently. Have you found that same lack of consistency?

Pamela Oparaocha: I cannot really comment on what the Building Safety Regulator does in that space. I can talk about what we do in that space. In London, we have engineers and fire safety inspecting officers working through the different gateways. Some of the issues with the regime are teething problems. It is complicated and significant legislation, so we had to expect it to be the way that it was in the beginning, as long as we are moving forward and working together to create something that is purposeful and does what we want it to do, which is to make people and their homes safe.

Baroness Harding of Winscombe: How does the BSR’s approach to implementing this legislation compare with, say, the fire and rescue services’ approach to enforcing fire safety legislation?

Pamela Oparaocha: Its approach is more holistic. It deals mainly with residential high-rise buildings, whereas the fire safety order is broader in its remit. The scope of our buildings includes transport, hospitals, hostels, care facilities and commercial. It is super broad, and we take a risk-based approach, so we will actively go out and inspect buildings. That is the main difference.

Q28 The Chair: You mentioned that you are still finding faults at gateway 3 either on sprinklers or some aspect of fire safety. Is that because the developers have been negligent or not understood what they are supposed to do, or has there not been enough clarity in terms of what has been expected at gateway 2?

Pamela Oparaocha: I cannot really speak to the developers’ understanding of the process. Even though it has been more than a year, the building that I gave you the example of was one that was already built. It is difficult to answer that, because we do not deal with the first gateway. We work in a limited space. If you could give me the question again, I might be able to give you a better answer.

The Chair: I am just wondering whether there is a lack of standardisation about what is expected, whether there is clarity in the standards expected and the developers have not implemented them, or whether it is a lack of clarity, so the developers do not really understand what they are supposed to be doing.

Pamela Oparaocha: We are clear on what our role is, but, like I said earlier, I cannot really speak to what the developers’ experience of the process is. I can say that, in the early stages, specifically with the in-occupation gateways, there was a real difference in the evidence that we were getting from persons responsible for the buildings. This was prior to the guidance, and then the guidance being reviewed at the end of last year.

Sometimes, the quality of the safety cases would be quite different. Since the guidance, we are seeing improvements and a bit more uniformity in the information that we are getting. In the beginning, it was possibly a lack of clear guidance, not necessarily for the developers, because I am speaking about the in-occupation buildings, which is where most of our experience is.

Having the guidance is definitely improving what we are getting through the door at the MDT. Sometimes, you would have a safety case that was 10 pages long. Other times, you would have the equivalent of three boxes’ worth of paperwork, and we would have to sift through and find the bits that were relevant to us, but that is getting better.

Lord Teverson: Just following on from that, it is totally obvious that a sprinkler system should work. It is not part of difficult regulations.

The Chair: It is not rocket science.

Lord Teverson: It is obvious. Was the owner or the developer embarrassed by that matter or was it seen as something that just happens in the industry? Did you turn up unexpectedly? If you booked in, I would expect any organisation I was in charge of to make sure it was right before you arrived. I am not shocked, because of what we have heard, but I ought to be profoundly shocked by that observation.

Pamela Oparaocha: I cannot speak to what they were feeling at the time, but we are working with them so that that building, prior to occupation, is remediated. That is our role in that space. That is where we are going to focus our efforts.

Lord Teverson: Were you surprised by that?

The Chair: Were you shocked?

Pamela Oparaocha: I have seen some things in my time. It was not nice. It was not good to see, but the good thing is that we are working with that developer to make sure that that building is as it should be prior to people moving in.

Q29 Viscount Chandos: From your experience of developers, but also managers of existing buildings, do you think there is a culture of getting away with as little as possible or is there a sense of responsibility inherent in the way they operate?

Pamela Oparaocha: It is nuanced. We work across London with a number of developers and accountable persons, and our experience is different case to case. Some private developers are better than others and work more quickly than others. I cannot attest to what their motives are, but I can say that the regime is becoming less complicated for people, because they understand it better.

We have worked with some developers in Tower Hamlets. Tower Hamlets is one of the boroughs that had a huge stock of buildings that needed remediating, but some of the buildings that we saw a year ago, which were almost 90% covered in cladding, are going through the process now. Some are completely remediated. As long as we are moving in the right direction, support and encouragement is a better way to create progress, working with responsible persons, local authorities and the regulator.

Q30 Viscount Thurso: You mentioned earlier in your remarks about multidisciplinary teams. Can I ask you how your fire inspectors and fire engineers have fitted into and got on with—and what their thoughts are on now being part of—the building standards multidisciplinary teams? They are, I suppose, used to being the sole kid on the block when it comes to fire safety for many years.

Pamela Oparaocha: In the beginning, it was a challenge because of the complexity and the volume of the work that was coming in. London has 65% of the country’s high-rise stock. We were dealing with a lot of volume alongside what we would normally be doing day to day in terms of inspecting, auditing and enforcing.

We have thousands of building fires a year and, as part of the process of learning from that, we will audit and inspect those where the buildings did not behave the way they should do in fires. We are inspecting constantly. We are responding to inquiries from the public. We are responding to inquiries from our fire stations when they come across buildings that are not safe in the way we hope they should be. It felt like a lot of work in the beginning that we were being asked to do with limited resources.

In London Fire Brigade itself, we are a limited resource. We are not an infinite resource and London has thousands of buildings that we are involved with in that regulatory space. It was difficult, but now that we are involved in more meetings, we meet more regularly and the guidance has come out, the quality of what we receive from MDTs is improving. That is making things better for us, but the bottom line is that the two regulators have to work in this space together.

Otherwise, we are not going to achieve our aim. We are here because of Grenfell. We are here to make sure that, going forward, the housing stock is not built the same way that it has been built over the last 50 years. That is why we are here. Our engineers and our inspecting officers definitely understand that and have worked through a lot of difficulties. We also understand that there are efficiencies to be made. We are having conversations with the Building Safety Regulator about how buildings go through the gateway processes, so they are not going through one at a time.

You can have 10 identical buildings. We would want them to go through a gateway process at the same time, with the same team, to create efficiency, but not efficiency at the expense of quality. There are other efficiencies that we have been talking about. For example, there are buildings going through the gateway processes because of minor building works, such as a kitchen refurbishment, rather than safety work. They would sit better outside of the gateway processes, so that the buildings that are going through because they need safety works are going through without those buildings being in the same process as them.

Viscount Thurso: In terms of the overall resourcing, you have made clear this has taken up extra resources. Would it also be fair to characterise what you have said as a painful process, but arriving at a net gain for everybody at the end of it?

Pamela Oparaocha: I would agree with that.

Viscount Thurso: Can I come on to another issue? That is the way in which the Building Safety Regulator tries to strike a balance between providing a holistic outcomes-based view of safety and the requirement for developers and building owners to understand the real detail of what makes their buildings safe. Do you think the Building Safety Regulator gets that right, from the safety point of view that you have responsibility for?

Pamela Oparaocha: You are talking about the relationship between the Building Safety Regulator and the building industry. I would love to answer that, but I cannot really speak to that aspect of it. I can speak to our relationship with the Building Safety Regulator and how that has improved over time. We share a purpose. It definitely does feel like we share a purpose.

In the beginning, because of the way that it started for us, having to organise ourselves and recruit a lot, it was a real challenge, but it does feel like we are in a better, more collaborative space with the regulator. I keep saying this. We have to be able to work together. We have to. Otherwise, there is absolutely no point to this.

Q31 Lord Best: We have talked a lot about the lack of clarity and the need for spelling out the rules. We have looked at whether developers could do better and whether the BSR could do better. Perhaps I could turn to the announcements the Government have been making in the last 24 hours.

You may not have had time to process these, but it does sound as if the working together between your side of the business, the fire and rescue services, and the BSR is now going to be consolidated. You are talking about improved working relationships. You are getting on better and doing more together.

I note that the new chair, Andy Roe, is the current commissioner of the London Fire Brigade and the new chief executive, Charlie Pugsley, is currently deputy commissioner of the London Fire Brigade for prevention, protection and operational policy. Can we take it that this looks like a consolidation of the improved relationships. The working together has already started and this is a further step in that direction. Is it welcome, from your end?

The Chair: Or is it a takeover?

Pamela Oparaocha: From today, we have a new commissioner. Andy Roe was commissioner yesterday and Jonathan Smith is our commissioner today. Andy is no longer London fire commissioner. Charlie Pugsley is my direct line manager and I really value Charlie’s opinion in this space. Their knowledge and understanding, given that London has 65% of the high-rise building stock, is a positive.

I had no say in their recruitment. London Fire Brigade had no say in their recruitment. I cannot speak to why MHCLG would have chosen them, but I have a view of them both and they are both driven people. You know Andy Roe was at Grenfell. He was incident commander at Grenfell, so this is very close to his heart.

Lord Best: I think we can take it that you approve of the way things are turning out. Let me leave it at that.

Q32 Baroness Valentine: Good morning. The BSR has suggested it would like to issue notices on an organisation‑by‑organisation basis, rather than the current system of going building by building. Would you support a move to the BSR focusing on organisations or do you feel that this would lessen its focus on the safety of individual buildings?

Pamela Oparaocha: We support this as one possible way forward, but with a caveat. We expect a clear focus on safety and Grenfell, and no sacrifice to quality. There are definitely efficiencies to be made with the gateway processes and this could be one of them. I talked earlier on about how the buildings are triaged through the processes. Efficiencies could be created through grouping buildings together, by the way they are constructed, by the materials that are used or possibly, as you have just said there, organisation by organisation.

We need to look at everything. We need to work together to look at everything, just to create those efficiencies so that we are creating a better regime.

Q33 Viscount Trenchard: Could you tell us, please, whether you think the BSR has sufficient resources, in terms of both numbers and funding, to ensure the safety of buildings and to provide timely approvals? Do you think there is a need to give the BSR more funding and, if so, who should pay? Should developers accept an increase in regulatory fees or do you think the state, the taxpayer, should pay for increased cost of regulation?

Pamela Oparaocha: Can I say again that I am not best positioned to answer that question? The sector as a whole did suffer early on from a lack of resources; certainly we did. We are still recruiting people who are able to work in the MDTs.

It is public knowledge that there is a lack of professional skilled people in this sector. We are competing with the private sector. We are competing with local authorities for skilled people, for fire engineers, for inspecting officers and it would not be any different for the Building Safety Regulator. Our aim is the same.

Certainly, in the London Fire Brigade, in terms of our teams, we are paying our engineers and inspecting officers a market rate supplement just to try to compete with the salaries that are paid out there. We are not going to be able to match their salaries. We are not going to be able to, but London Fire Brigade offers different things to people who work in this space. We have attractive leave. We will pay for degrees. We will pay for courses for people to come on, so that they get their fire safety qualifications. Some of our experiences are probably mirrored in the Building Safety Regulator space.

Viscount Trenchard: Do you think that the constraint on funding means the BSR does not provide timely approvals?

Pamela Oparaocha: It has been acknowledged that there are delays in the gateway process. I said as well that we can create efficiencies to make sure that process is smoother and buildings go through in a more timely way, but I cannot really speak to whether funding is going to do that or if it is other efficiencies that are going to create speedier processes without losing quality.

Q34 Lord Udny-Lister: As part of this, there is a proposal that the BSR should bring all its staff in‑house. Do you think there is merit in that mix of external consultants and internal consultants? Is there something here about spreading learning right across the piece and, to a large extent, to the private sector, so it knows what the BSR is looking for?

Pamela Oparaocha: Sorry, could you give me the first part of the question again? I am really sorry.

Lord Udny-Lister: The proposal, as we understand it, is that the BSR is going to take its staff in‑house. I am really asking whether that is the right thing to do. Should we have a mixed economy of external consultants and internal people? The question could also apply to you. Do you use external people where it is suitable?

I am sorry. I failed utterly to do the most important thing, which is to declare my interest before even asking you the question. I am a non-executive director of Stanhope, the office developer. I am also involved in Delancey, to which I am an adviser, and I am chair of a registered housing provider, BMGP Homes. I should have said that in the beginning.

Pamela Oparaocha: I saw the headlines yesterday that you are referring to with regards to bringing the talent inside. My department is going to be working under MHCLG going forward, so maybe that was what they were referring to. Like I said, the sector is suffering from a lack of skills. There needs to be long-term investment to make sure that we create sustainability, in terms of developing engineers and inspecting officers across the piece. I definitely agree with that.

At the moment, we are still fighting over resources across the sector, between fire and rescue services, private sector and local authorities. We all want the same set of skills to make this work.

The Chair: You are having real recruitment problems, are you, despite the fact that you pay this market rate supplement?

Pamela Oparaocha: We are recruiting. We are recruiting now, but you do not get fully developed fire engineers. If we recruit today, that fire engineer can work with high-risk buildings in a few years from now. It is the same with our inspecting officers. To become a competent inspecting officer, you are talking about a two to three-year process.

While they can inspect low-risk buildings all the way through their development journey, it is at the end where we can say, “You have the skill set to inspect high-risk buildings”. That is the environment that we are talking about, high-rise residential buildings.

The Chair: You are finding people who are wanting to go on and progress to that.

Pamela Oparaocha: Yes, we definitely are.

Q35 Lord Teverson: Thank you for a bit of optimism earlier in this subject. Things are getting better in terms of relationships and the overall idea of having a building regulator is starting to work. That is more optimism than we have had from some witnesses.

I wanted to ask about low-rise buildings, which you also have responsibility for. Is the BSR making any progress in this area or is it something that you see as important as well?

Pamela Oparaocha: The BSR is mainly focusing on high-rise residential buildings, but it does have remit for lower-rise buildings. We inspect them as part of our normal inspection programme. They are included from a fire safety order standpoint. The regime is going to develop and we will learn lessons from what we are doing now with the high-rise buildings. When we move to lower-rise, medium-rise buildings, we will have learned lessons and maybe have better processes then. That is everyday business for London Fire Brigade. They are part of our inspection regime.

Lord Teverson: One thing we mentioned earlier in terms of that broader remit is your additional responsibility for commercial buildings. They are some of the tallest. You probably have the total market share in the UK in terms of commercial buildings, whether it be The Shard or other, slightly more modest, buildings.

If you looked at this issue from the man in the moon, if you like, you might say, “Those buildings are occupied by thousands of individuals who are equally at risk as those in residential buildings”. I am interested in whether there are similar issues for commercial buildings as for residential ones. If not, if those commercial ones do not really require the same level of scrutiny through a national regulator, what is it that makes those buildings safer? Are the builders better? Is the management work better? Are there some lessons there to understand? I am trying to get to that.

Pamela Oparaocha: From a London Fire Brigade perspective, it is the people risk. High-rise residential buildings have a sleeping risk. Even if people are familiar with the buildings, but particularly where people are unfamiliar with the buildings, a sleeping risk is where we will focus. That is a higher risk building than a building that is an office block, even 30 stories high, which is occupied only during the day. You will have fire wardens on duty. Everybody is familiar with the building and can escape from the building.

The Grenfell Tower fire happened when people were asleep on a hot summer’s day with their windows open. People were unable to escape from the building. When people are awake and working, the likelihood is that people will escape. They will have regular fire drills and those sorts of things. It is the sleeping risk that we look at. That is where we need to focus.

These are people’s homes. We do not hold offices in our hearts the same way that we hold our homes. Your home should be your safe space. That is why we are here, so that we make the homes that people are living in now safer and that, going forward, we build differently and build safer buildings. Then people will not have the same worries that they have now, post Grenfell.

Lord Teverson: That is very helpful. I understand that entirely. Given that example of when you found sprinklers were not working in a building you inspected, do you get the same level of laxity in commercial buildings as in private buildings?

Pamela Oparaocha: It is nuanced. We see a range of everything. We see buildings that are in really good order and then, right down the other end of the spectrum, buildings that are not in good order. We will enforce at different levels to make sure that the persons responsible for those buildings remediate.

Q36 Viscount Chandos: Yesterday’s announcement had a direction of travel towards a single regulator to cover construction products, as opposed to the current separation. From the London Fire Brigade’s point of view, what is your experience of the current division and, therefore, how would you see that direction of travel?

Pamela Oparaocha: Having two regulators in the space, as long as we are working together, is a good thing. The fire safety order deals with buildings, as I explained earlier, in a different way from the Building Safety Regulator. As for having it under one roof, it is quite difficult for me to answer, because I do not know what that space is going to look like going forward. The more stakeholders that are involved in the conversation, the better.

We will be in a better space if we are working together and it is not just the two regulators talking, but the construction industry is also part of that conversation. That can only make us better in this space. Also, we have to be cautious of not having the developers influence what we are doing to make the buildings safe. That space has to be protected while we work together.

Viscount Chandos: I would have thought the London Fire Brigade’s input would be hugely important in thinking about that change.

Pamela Oparaocha: I agree.

Viscount Chandos: Are you optimistic that that input will be invited and responded to?

Pamela Oparaocha: I want to be optimistic, but we all need to hear more to know where that is going and to make sure that safety and the integrity of the system are not compromised because the developers are in that space.

Viscount Chandos: That means the priority for creating—

Pamela Oparaocha: It has to remain the same.

Viscount Chandos: It has to be safety-led and not growth-led.

Pamela Oparaocha: Save life and property in that order, yes.

Q37 Lord Gilbert of Panteg: You are the first and you will certainly not be the last witness to come before us and drop a pile of acronyms, leaving us with a sense of a hugely complex set of organisations and relationships. It clearly is complex. What can be done to bring greater simplicity and clarity to the respective roles of the organisations that you have described?

You have also talked a lot about the need for more resources, greater expertise, and more skills and training. Every witness in every inquiry says broadly the same thing to us. Where are the savings going to come from? The one thing you have not talked about is productivity. How can the sector be made more productive, so the resource can be pushed into getting the human expertise needed to really deliver the level of service you say needs to be delivered?

Pamela Oparaocha: I talked earlier on about creating efficiencies. There are ways to create efficiencies such as, like I said, grouping buildings together. We are, at the moment, working with other stakeholders to look at an estate in east London, where we are dealing with about 60 buildings that need different remediation, to do with the balconies, the external wall systems and compartmentation issues.

We are looking to group buildings together. At the moment, the buildings are coming through one by one. You send one MDT per building and they are going through like that. If we are able to group five identical buildings built in the same time period, the issues are likely to be the same. I do not want efficiency to get in the way of doing the job properly, but having five buildings in the same team, so they are familiar with the buildings, will speed up the process.

As I said earlier, we can also remove some of those buildings from the MDT process that do not require safety work but require cosmetic work such as new kitchens or bathrooms. You will have fewer buildings going through the MDT process, but they will be the right buildings going through the process.

Lord Gilbert of Panteg: How about making your organisation more efficient in itself, moving resources to the really important roles that you have identified or to training and hiring expertise? You have not talked about AI. Some parts of the private sector have seen a 20% to 30% reduction in headcount and investment in really senior people. Have you explored the use of AI?

Pamela Oparaocha: We are exploring the use of AI within London Fire Brigade for different things. We have to be careful. We certainly do not know enough about AI to just be using it broadly to read, say, technical drawings and things like that. We need a bit more information and more proof that that is a workable solution.

The whole sector needs to be open to the use of technology to create efficiencies. You are absolutely right. The way we store data could be better. The way we share data could be better. There are a lot of efficiencies that technology would help us create.

Lord Gilbert of Panteg: Is there a role for Government in gripping the sector, trying to get that best practice across the piece, and establishing networks of organisations to investigate and implement AI solutions?

Pamela Oparaocha: I cannot really answer that. I should just be able to say yes or no to that, but we have to explore. I cannot say that I know what I am talking about with regards to AI in that way and what it will do for, say, our fire engineers. Fire engineers play a huge role in the MDT process, but I cannot say that AI is going to help them. I know that there is AI that exists that will help them to do certain things with plans but, in this space, because it is so new, we have to be really careful.

This regime has not been around long enough for us to say, “We have five years of data. Let’s look at this”. It is still relatively new, so I cannot really speak to that with any expertise. I do quite like technology and there is definitely a space for it.

Lord Gilbert of Panteg: Have you been looking at other jurisdictions, other countries and how they are addressing building safety in general? If so, where have you seen the best practice?

Pamela Oparaocha: Where have we seen—

Lord Gilbert of Panteg: In terms of learning from other countries, which ones do it best?

Pamela Oparaocha: I do not have any data about other countries. Our focus has definitely been on what we are doing and working well with the regulator. There are probably lessons to be learned from other countries, but I cannot speak to that at the moment.

Lord Gilbert of Panteg: Is there an international umbrella group that you are a member of?

Pamela Oparaocha: I honestly cannot answer that question. I will go back to our team and speak to some of our engineers, because I know our engineers work with a lot of other organisations. Is it all right if I write back?

Lord Gilbert of Panteg: It would be great if you would. I appreciate it. Thank you.

The Chair: We have exhausted our questions, so thank you very much for your time. If there are points that you would like to elaborate on, write back to us on or follow up in any way, please do so. Thank you very much for your time.