Grenfell: Kingspan tried to lobby MPs over safety of its insulation after Grenfell

Kingspan hired public affairs companies after the Grenfell Tower disaster and targeted MPs and other decision makers in a bid to convince them that combustible insulation in high-rise buildings was “no more dangerous than non-combustible materials when properly installed”, the Grenfell Tower Inquiry has heard.

Adrian Pargeter, now director of technical, marketing and
regulatory affairs for Kingspan Great Britain, told lead counsel to the Inquiry
Richard Millett QC how he had attended meetings with PR firm Portland in 2017,
although he could not remember who at Kingspan engaged them in the first place.

A document headed “Kingspan political engagement plan”,
drafted by Portland, read: “It’s time to get our message out to the people that
matter,” suggesting that Kingspan make contact with MPs and other key decision
makers.

It read: “We must be realistic though: some people will not
want to meet you and they will not want to be lobbied. But there is still
immeasurable value in getting Kingspan’s manifesto in front of these
decision-markers. We want them to read it. We need them to read it. And that is
why it’s vital that our messages are punchy, memorable, and easy to understand.

“…Finally, there is still a discussion to be had about the
approaching public inquiry. We don’t know the inquiry’s terms of reference and
we don’t know if Kingspan will be asked to give evidence.”

Among the public figures the document listed as targets were
MPs Kevin Hollinrake and Helen Hayes, members of the Ministry for Housing
Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) select committee, and Clive Betts,
chair of the MHCLG Committee, as well as “key decision makers” such as then-housing
secretary Sajid Javid, then-home secretary Amber Rudd, Michael Gove, and Dame
Judith Hackitt.

The Portland document also suggested meetings with then housing
minister Alok Sharma, minister for policing and the fire service Nick Hurd, and
minister for agriculture, fisheries and food (including “better regulation”)
George Eustice.

A later email from an employee at public affairs firm
Grayling read: “One of the key arguments that we need to win with political
stakeholders is that combustible materials are no more dangerous that
non-combustible materials when improperly installed. We’ve attempted to provide
some lines on this but feel the argument needs to be stronger.”

Director denies ‘sowing doubt’ about non-combustibles

Kingspan embarked upon a series of tests of its own
insulation behind rainscreen cladding, as well as tests of mineral wool
insulation, in a bid to prove that systems involving non-combustible insulation
could also fail system tests. Discussion of the tests came before the
government eventually banned combustible materials on new high-rise homes in
November 2018.

In a March 2018 email from Kingspan employee Mark Harris to
Pargeter and others headed “Ulster tests/MHCLG lobbying”, Harris remarked it
was clear that Hollinrake was “still pretty lukewarm about our draft
letter/arguments to address MHCLG.”

Harris went on: “The major evidence gap is his concern about
fire spread with ‘combustible’ systems but not with ‘non-combustible’. In other
words he, and [members] of the select committee, need to see evidence to
persuade them that poor installation is an issue in both systems.”

Harris suggested submitting Kingspan’s K15 to a medium-scale
ISO 13785-1 test at Ulster University in a rig with 100m of insulation behind
ACM cladding without cavity barriers and flashing at the top of the rig, and a
second test with the same setup but using Rockwool Duorock insulation instead.
He said: “There’s little doubt that flames will appear at the top of the rig
during the test and the time differential between K15 and Duorock may not be
significant.”

He added: “I think this evidence will be critically
important in persuading Kevin Hollinrake to become an advocate of our view and
very useful in lobbying activities elsewhere to demonstrate that so-called ‘deemed
to satisfy’ systems can have rapid fire spread if cavities are not protected
(for example as a result of poor insulation).”

There is no suggestion that Hollinrake or any of the other
individuals targeted were influenced by Kingspan’s attempts at lobbying.

Later in the email exchange, Kingspan employee Jon Garbutt
suggested that to ensure flames got to the top of the rig on the tests, the
rigs should be built in such a way as to “create some draw”. He asked a
colleague: “Would we be better using FR or A2 for this test Roy? Which would
give most fuel to get the flames up there?”

In yesterday’s hearing, Millett asked Pargeter: “Why is John
Garbutt asking the question, ‘Which would give most fuel to get the flames up
there?’…Is he setting the rig up to fail?”

Pargeter replied: “I don’t think so, no, because like I say,
you’d have to do it for both. So if it was more challenging for one, it would
be equally more challenging for the other.”

Millett asked: “Was the purpose of that to demonstrate that
K15 was no more risky than mineral wool?”

Pargeter said: “Yeah, I think it was to show a similar performance,
yes.”

Dubai tests

The Inquiry also heard of Kingspan set up BS 8414 tests in Dubai
on non-combustible materials “deemed to satisfy” BR 135 (Fire performance of
external thermal insulation for walls of multistorey buildings). Kingspan
employees discussed building up a test configuration involving Duoslab
insulation, a 38mm ventilated cavity, Alucobond A2 ACM cassettes with “weak”
structural specification, and cavity barriers, that had the potential to fail
the BR 135 criteria.

Millett asked Pargeter: “Looking at this, is it right that
the basic plan was to show that materials which could be used on the linear
route might be included in the BS 8414 system test, which would then fail?…Your
commercial purpose in undertaking this effort would be to promote the use of
K15 through 8414 tests?”

Pargeter confirmed that this was correct.

Millett asked if Kingspan was doing this to “sow doubts” in
the mind of the MHCLG and about the safety of mineral wool and A2 products.

Pargeter said: “Not about the products themselves, no,
because the products aren’t in themselves unsafe…It’s how they perform in a
system which could be used on a building, as this system that’s outlaid there.”

Pargeter agreed that there was an “element of irony” in this
approach, given that Kingspan K15 had been sold for several years “without an
applicable test” after the chemical process used to make K15 was changed in
2006, following a 2005 BS 8414-1 test.

Millett asked Pargeter: “Did you see the aftermath of the
Grenfell Tower fire as something of a commercial opportunity?”

Pargeter replied: “Absolutely not.”

Millett went on: “And you were going to exploit the
commercial opportunity by…planting the seed of doubt about…the use of
non-combustible and limited combustibility materials by directing attention to
8414 and how those materials, even if they are non-combustible, can perform
badly in a full system test?”

Pargeter said: “No, what we know is, as the government
testing proved, that had that system been subject to an 8414 test under the criteria
of 135, it wouldn’t have passed.”

Sir Martin Moore-Bick then asked Pargeter: “Are we to
understand that the motive for all this testing at Kingspan’s expense was to
benefit the public at large?”

Pargeter replied: “I wouldn’t say it was entirely
altruistic, but it’s part of it.”

The Inquiry continues.