Grenfell Tower report says Irish firm Kingspan 'knowingly created a false market in insulation'

Irish building materials company Kingspan has come in for criticism in the final report on the Grenfell Tower fire.

Seventy-two people - ranging in age from an unborn baby to an 84-year-old woman - died in the fire at the west London tower block in June 2017.

The report published on Wednesday is the second of a long-running inquiry. It found 'decades of failure' contributed to the tragedy.

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said the government would write to all companies found by the inquiry to be part of the “horrific failings” at Grenfell Tower “as the first step to stopping them being awarded government contracts”.

Those affected by the Grenfell Tower disaster were “let down very badly before, during and in the aftermath of the tragedy”, the Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said as he offered them an apology on behalf of the state.

Kingspan acknowledged what it said were "wholly unacceptable historical failings" in the industry, insisting these were “in no way reflective of how we conduct ourselves as a group, then or now”. The firm said it was committed to providing safe and sustainable building solutions.

Kingspan is also the main sponsor of Ulster Rugby. That two decade long relationship is to end in June 2025.

The company said its K15 insulation product made up 5% of the insulation in the tower block and was used without its knowledge.

But the report found that Kingspan “knowingly created a “false market in insulation” from 2005 onwards for use on buildings over 18metres tall.

It claimed its K15 product had been part of a system that had been successfully tested under the BS 8414 cladding fire safety test, meaning it could be used in the wall of any building of that height regardless of its design or other components.

The inquiry branded this a “false claim”, adding: “As Kingspan knew, K15 could not honestly be sold as suitable for use in the external walls of buildings over 18metres in height generally, but that is what it had succeeded in doing for many years.”

ITV News Correspondent John Ray breaks down the key findings of the long-awaited report.

Kingspan relied on the results of a single cladding fire safety test performed in 2005, on a system whose components were not representative of a typical external wall, the report said, and found that the firm continued to rely on that test despite changing the composition of K15 in 2006.

Further tests on systems incorporating K15 in the following two years were “disastrous”, the report said, but Kingspan did not withdraw the product from the market, “despite its own concerns about its fire performance”.

In 2009, Kingspan obtained a certificate that “contained false statements about K15”, the report said, and on which it relied “for many years to sell the product”, adding that it made a “calculated decision” to use the certificate to “mask, or distract from, the absence of supporting test evidence”.

The report said Kingspan “cynically exploited” the industry’s lack of detailed knowledge about insulation and cladding fire safety tests, and “relied on the fact that an unsuspecting market was very likely to rely on its own claim about the product”.

Responding to the report, Kingspan said it had “long acknowledged the wholly unacceptable historical failings that occurred in part of our UK insulation business” but said these were “in no way reflective of how we conduct ourselves as a group, then or now”.

It said it remains “committed to playing a leading role in providing safe and sustainable building solutions, including continuing to work with government and industry partners”.

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