Grenfell Inquiry: Arconic sales manager for flammable cladding panels had ‘never heard of Lakanal House fire’

Deborah French giving evidence to the Grenfell Tower inquiry
Grenfell Inquiry

A sales manager for flammable cladding material has told the Grenfell Tower inquiry that she has never heard of the fatal 2009 Lakanal House fire.

Six residents died when fire tore through the south London housing block, with flammable cladding identified as a key reason behind the rapid spread of the blaze.

Deborah French, a former sales manager for Arconic, was responsible for selling Reynobond PE panels with a flammable plastic core to construction projects in the UK between 2007 and 2014.

But she told the Grenfell inquiry on Wednesday she had never heard of Lakanal House, and was oblivious to other fires involving cladding around the world.

Counsel to the inquiry, Richard Millett QC first asked about a 2009 fire in Bucharest which Ms French said she was not aware of.

“Can I take it no one at Arconic discussed it with you, told you about it, alerted you to it - is that right?”, he asked.

She replied: “I’ve never heard of it”, and said she could not remember any internal discussions in 2009 about fires involving cladding with flammable cores.

“Do you remember there was another fire in 2009 which had fatal consequences in south London, in a building called Lakanal House”, asked Mr Millett.

When Ms French replied: “No I don’t recall”, he probed further: “You weren’t aware in 2009 or in the years following 2009 of the Lakanal Housefire, is that right?”

Mispronouncing the building’s name, Ms French replied: "No, I’ve not heard of Lakan house.”

“Even today you have not heard of it?”, countered Mr Millett, and Ms French confirmed: “No, it doesn’t…no.”

An inquest into the Lakanal House deaths found fire had burned through flammable cladding - applied during £3.5 million refurbishment works - in the space of five minutes.

Arconic supplied aluminum composite material for the cladding system at Grenfell Tower, which has been blamed for the rapid spread of fire through the block in 2017 when 72 lives were lost.

The firm is accused of knowing, internally, about the dangers of their product but not passing the details on to clients or removing it from the market.

Ms French sent an email to Arconic technical manager Claude Wehrle flagging up a news story about a cladding fire in the United Arab Emirates in 2013.

But the inquiry heard she had not been aware of other fires around the world, including blazes in Roubaix, France and Bucharest.

In 2015 Mr Wehrle shared with colleagues photos of a cladding fire in China, the inquiry has heard, and in early 2016 he sent an email about a building clad in flammable material which had been close to a fire, suggesting they remove the material from the market.

“We are in the know and I think it is up to us to be proactive AT LAST”, he wrote.

However at that stage the material was already in use in the Grenfell Tower refurbishment.

The inquiry hearings continue.

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