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

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, with reference to the paper entitled Fire behaviour of modern façade materials – Understanding the Grenfell Tower fire, published in the Journal of Hazardous Materials on 15 April 2019, if he will make an assessment of the implications for his policies of the (a) conclusions published in that paper and (b) finding that high-pressure laminate panels have a higher total heat release than polyethylene-aluminium composites.

Acting on advice from the Expert Panel, the Government has commissioned research from the Building Research Establishment (BRE) to support further understanding of the fire performance of Non-Aluminium Composite Material (ACM) external wall systems. The Department has commissioned the BRE to carry out bespoke medium scale tests on High Pressure Laminate panels. The tests include burning at medium scale large samples of High Pressure Laminates and measure parameters such as heat release rate and temperature. The information gathered during this research program will provide reliable data to undertake an assessment of the heat release of a wide range of cladding panels. A copy of the methodology has been made available in the House Library.