Plan to move residents out of London apartment block owned by Mansfield Council
By Joe Locker, Local Democracy Reporter
Mansfield District Council is drawing up a ‘high-level plan’ to move residents out of a block of flats it owns in London so it can finally fix fire safety problems.
The Labour-run council bought the block of 40 flats, on Bedford Road in Clapham, as an investment in 2017.
It cost the council just under £6m, and the authority had been planning to use the block as a source of income as its finances tightened in the austerity years.
However in 2018 an independent assessment found the building had serious fire safety problems.
The walls, flooring and ceilings may need to be ripped out and building re-built internally.
The assessment came in the wake of the Grenfell Tower disaster, which led to stricter regulations for high rise housing blocks.
The authority told the Local Democracy Reporting Service on Wednesday (March 5) it is now in the process of drawing up a “high-level project plan” to move residents out, so it can begin the works.
A council spokeswoman said: “Residents of the building have received a letter informing them of the next steps as part of the decanting [moving out] process.
“No confirmed timescales have been agreed yet, but we are keen to keep residents informed of key milestones as and when they approach.
“A lot of the questions on cost and timescales depend on the first phase of decant works being undertaken by our contractor.
“Once exploratory works have taken place, it will then inform our approach and timescales moving forward.”
The council agreed at a meeting on Tuesday (March 4) to enter settlement agreements with leaseholders – as well as enter new agreements with tenants who must leave to live in temporary accommodation – to “secure vacant possession” of the property.
It was also agreed the council can approve property transactions for alternative properties for tenants.
The council previously forecast it would need to spend around £19.691m between 2018 and 2025 to fix the issues.
This could involve remediation work, as well as moving residents in the building into temporary accommodation.
However, spending on the project will now stretch beyond this, with around £9.5 million of the overall budget allocated for the upcoming year – which begins in April – instead.
Another £7.5m is then allocated for the next financial year, beginning in April 2026.
In January the council approved a contract with builders Willmot Dixon Construction to conduct an “intrusive investigation” into the building over nine months.
That decision was made during a behind-closed-doors meeting on January 20.
The problems were first made public in 2022 following an investigation by the Local Democracy Reporting Service, which also heard residents inside the building had been living “in limbo” waiting for answers from the authority.
A contract worth £2.2m was signed with estate agency Lambert Smith Hampton in 2023 to assist in moving residents out of their flats, including the authority committing to paying all relocation fees and storage costs for tenants and leaseholders so the work could begin.
The council also approved a decision to begin legal action against developers who constructed the building.
Up to £360,000 was approved in legal fees to attempt to recover the costs of the repairs.
Explore more
