Legal

Contractors and designers working on the Grenfell Tower refurbishment knew the cladding would quickly fail in the event of fire, it has been alleged at the inquiry into the June 2017 blaze. Emails between four companies at the centre of the refurbishment have revealed knowledge of the cladding system’s weakness…

The lawyer representing Rydon at the Grenfell Tower inquiry revealed internal emails from the cladding manufacturers that discussed safety concerns over their materials years before the Grenfell Tower fire. Materials supplied by two companies, Celotex and Arconic, were focused on by Marcus Taverner QC, who is representing the contractor whose…

Payroll company Hudson Contract Services has launched an advertising campaign encouraging SMEs to vote against three more years of the operation of the Construction Industry Training Board (CITB) levy. All companies in the sector pay a proportion of their wage bill of either 0.35 per cent or 1.25 per cent to…

A former Lakehouse director has been jailed for six years after taking £800,000 in bribes from subcontractors. Lee Wylie (pictured), 48, took the payments between 2007 and 2012 in exchange for work with Hackney Homes. Lakehouse was in charge of managing fire-safety works for Hackney Homes, a company set up…

The High Court has granted permission for a homeowner to bring legal proceedings against HS2 to obtain full details of its ‘three tunnels’ design just north of Euston station, which she claimed could endanger the lives of residents. Hero Granger-Taylor had been granted permission to proceed, following a seven-month campaign,…

A 22-year-old has been charged with a murder that allegedly took place at a London construction site. Elton Sefa has been extradited to the UK from Albania and charged with the murder of John Woodward, 47, who died in April 2018 while working on a roof extension at a building…

Changes to off-payroll tax rules are to be reviewed but will still be introduced in April, the Treasury has announced. The rules, known as IR35, were introduced in 2000 to combat tax avoidance by people working like an employee but arranging to be paid through a company. Reforms announced by…

Camden Council is pursuing a liquidated consortium and a number of subcontractors for damages over fire-safety remediation that the local authority has had to carry out. The Chalcots Estate was evacuated in June 2017, days after the Grenfell Tower fire, amid fears over the aluminium composite material (ACM) cladding used…

Kier is set to be pursued for £1.2m by Cornwall Council after it missed its completion date for works on the £40m A30 roadworks scheme at Temple, near Bodmin. The council is seeking the sum in damages for what it said are over six months of delays on the three-and-a-half-mile…

Atkins has been told to pay £500,000 in legal costs, on top of £800,000 it had already been ordered to pay to a VolkerFitzpatrick/Hochtief joint venture over design flaws on a Kent bridge. In August, the Technology and Construction Court ruled that Atkins was liable for design flaws which caused…