Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, whether the cladding used at Grenfell Tower was approved for use when the tower was refurbished; and whether standards changed after that refurbishment.

The Government cannot release information specific to the Grenfell Tower, as this would cut across the police investigation currently underway.

The Department wrote to local authority and housing association landlords on 18 June, setting out immediate actions that should be taken to identify residential tower blocks over 18 metres in height with aluminium type external cladding. The Department wrote again on 19 June to set out the process they should follow to submit samples of aluminium composite material cladding for testing.

On 30 June, we published a note at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/explanatory-note-on-safety-checks-and-testing. This note confirms the advice in those letters to local authorities, with further specific information about the tests being carried out.

On 6 July we published details of further tests to be carried out as the next step in helping landlords to ensure the safety of their buildings. These large scale tests will help establish how different types of Aluminium Composite Material (ACM) panels in combination with different types of insulation behave in a fire. Further detail about the next testing stage can be found at https://www.gov.uk/government/news/expert-panel-recommends-further-tests-on-cladding-and-insulation.