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Wates lands £90m fire safety contract for Chalcots Estate
Wates has been picked for a new £90m contract to replace the cladding on the 717-home Chalcots Estate in Camden, among the biggest fire safety contracts awarded since the Grenfell Tower tragedy in 2017.
Camden Council confirmed that Wates had been approved by the council for the deal, which will see the contractor install new cladding on the estate’s five blocks.
Wates will also be responsible for the replacement of windows and curtain walls across the estate, as well as the replacement of brickwork on the bottom floors and replacement of roof parapets.
Wates was selected as the preferred contractor for the deal before Christmas but was officially approved by council leader Georgia Gould last week.
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The Chalcots Estate hit the headlines a week after Grenfell when thousands of its residents had to evacuate the building after a number of fire safety issues including the cladding were discovered.
Work is set to start on the estate in the summer and will not be finished until the summer of 2021 – four years after the evacuation.
Wates has already been working on the estate over the past year providing fire stopping works for two of the blocks.
In November it took control of all the five blocks after Mulalley and Kier, which were providing similar works, saw their contracts come to an agreed end.
The work will be part-funded by the government’s £400m remediation fund for social housing blocks found to have aluminium composite material cladding, which Camden secured £80.6m from the fund.
The council has so far spent £16m of this money, meaning it will need to find £26.5m of its own money to cover the rest of the costs.
Wates said it could not comment on the deal while in the standstill period.
