Haringey Labour misled Grenfell-era regulator over fire risk in council estates

Hi all 

I wanted to share this video of Mark Blake, Green leader of Haringey Council, on today’s damning report from the Regulator of Social Housing, giving Haringey's council housing a C4, the lowest possible grade. The Regulator found that the Labour-run council had a substantial backlog of overdue repairs, including damp and mould, and significant failings in how it treated tenants.

In 2023, the Regulator said that Haringey’s Labour-run council had “put thousands of tenants at potential risk by failing to meet health and safety requirements for fire and electrical safety.” In November 2025, the council wrote to the Regulator stating that it had fixed all high risk, overdue fire safety issues. 

Today’s report reveals that this was untrue. In fact, Haringey’s Labour administration failed to disclose thousands of overdue fire safety remedial actions to the Regulator, despite these risks being known by the Council. 

Staggeringly, Labour didn’t tell the housing regulator about thousands of fire safety risks which they had done nothing about. There are currently almost 8000 serious fire safety risks – one for every other council house.  

Overdue actions include repairing and replacing fire alarms, structural fixes to stop fires starting or spreading, and – particularly concerning – changes to external cladding. The Regulator of Social Housing was given greater powers after Grenfell to prevent further deadly fires in council housing. Councils are obliged to report fire safety issues to the Regulator.

In response, we’ve announced a major overhaul of the Council’s housing services. We have taken the unprecedented step of releasing files that detail our engagement with the Regulator about fire safety. We will also launch an independent investigation into the events that led to the C4 grading and appoint an external expert to oversee the changes to Haringey’s housing services. Our promise to council tenants is that we will always tell you the truth and we will overhaul a housing service that has let you down.

In addition to the video there is more information in the press release. 

Best wishes 

Cllr Jo Kuper

Green Councillor
Harringay Ward, Cabinet Member for Resident Services and Tackling Inequality