With a heavy heart

[Bulletguy]

Violet1956 - 2021-11-15 7:13 PM

 

We’ve come to the decision that the van’s got to go. Height restriction in most car parks together with the lack of provision for short stops make motorhoming in the UK rather tedious and at times stressful. Brexit and all the attendant red tape that now is involved in European travel perhaps the last straw.

 

Veronica

All the best Veronica and understandable for the reasons mentioned.

[Bulletguy]

mtravel - 2021-11-16 12:12 PM

 

John52 - 2021-11-16 12:46 PM

 

mtravel - 2021-11-16 11:27 AM

I have always appreciated your calm and sensible comments.

 

...Brexit restrictions, like not being able to take any food across the border - such as fresh milk for tea....

 

 

Tea is already disgusting on its own, with milk it is like French snails.

More than that. Smile.

I agree but i've no choice and have to drink decaf tea now.....worse still after 60 years of bean coffee i've had to give that up (used to live on espresso!). I could have decaf coffee but that's just piling on the misery so I avoid it. :-(

[Brian Kirby]

Bulletguy - 2021-11-16 7:06 PM.................................

I agree but i've no choice and have to drink decaf tea now.....worse still after 60 years of bean coffee i've had to give that up (used to live on espresso!). I could have decaf coffee but that's just piling on the misery so I avoid it. :-(

If you haven't yet tried it, have a go at just one pack of Tesco's own brand decaf, and see what you think. We use an ordinary filter machine, but we do drink it with milk.

[laimeduck]

We decided many years ago that we wouldn't sell Mabel our motorhome, so we have adapted her to our needs and will continue to do so. She's a 2004/5 lady, so not so complicated and with hardly any electrical gizmos to go wrong (Motorhome matters is now full of electrickery items that don't work?!) We also use her more as a caravan to get us to places we want to explore, which we do on our Sachs Madass 125 motorbike.

When that has to go - I'm 72 soon, then we'll downrate Mabel to 3500 Kg so I don't have to risk the "C1" licence medical and probably get a trailer to put a car on, so we can continue to tour. We'll continue to use the bike for as long as we enjoy it & " I can get my leg over"!

So Mabel is written off financially in my head, we have parking space for about 10 cars, we'll just carry on with her!

 

Whatever you do Veronica I'm sure it will be right for you, so good luck!

 

Jeremy

[mtravel]

Brian Kirby - 2021-11-16 7:35 PM

 

The pandemic swirls around, and among, us to such an extent that I'd hesitate even to buy a ticket at present.

 

 

Covid and travel ...

 

Last year, after having checked the state of the pandemic in all countries, we decided to visit a little bit of Germany, a county that was one of the safest at that stage.

We took a trip of about thirty days.

A thematic one, we visited most of the towns that were part of the Hanseatic League that we still lacked.

 

This year the same thing.

Having discarded Ireland as we would have had to cross the United Kingdom with the risk of quarantine and Spain due to a resurgence of the pandemic, we decided to return to Norway.

Which with the other Scandinavian nations was little affected by the virus.

 

In both cases the common use of face masks, accurate checks of the Euro Covid Passport accepted in all the countries crossed (forth and back thirteen borders) made us find well and safe.

 

Max

[Brian Kirby]

Violet1956 - 2021-11-16 6:58 PM.....................................I do hope that you'll get abroad in your van next year Brian. i've so enjoyed your considered contributions to the debates on here although I must admit I became a bit lost when you gave your opinions on the intracacies of the Grenfell disaster. From my simplistic perspective it was an example how the rich will always shaft the poor. Oops I have strayed into a political debate which was not my initial intention when starting this post. ;-) ;-)

Thanks Veronica. We'll see how it works out.

 

On Grenfell, IMO, it was first and foremost a technical failure.

 

The Building Regulations stipulate the requirements for external cladding in considerable detail. Had they been complied with there is no doubt in my mind that that the type of cladding installed, and the way in which it was installed, would have been rejected in response to the initial application for approval.

 

The question then arises how did non-compliant cladding gain approval? The approval process requires the applicant to submit details, in the form of drawings and descriptions, sufficient to demonstrate compliance. Approval was a formal process involving a notification of approval or rejection. No ifs no buts, no half-way houses. If work commenced in anticipation of approval, and was later found not to conform with what had been approved, the offending work had to be removed and replaced with compliant work or the whole of the work would be halted.

 

I have seen some of the drawings that are alleged to have been submitted (relating to window surrounds) and they clearly show, at large scale, that the design did not comply with the fire resistance and spread of fire requirements.

 

Some years back only local authority building control departments (BCDs) could grant approval, and had the power, under the Building Act 1984, to halt any work that they saw proceeding for which approval had not been granted. They also had the power to enter sites and inspect whether work complied with the approval. They also had to "sign off" work before occupation of a building would be authorised.

 

The construction industry (mainly the developers) complained to government that local authorities had become bottlenecks in progressing projects because they were understaffed, resulting in approvals taking longer that the stipulated turnaround period. Ultimately, Government permitted private companies, designated Approved Inspectors (mostly surveyors), to also grant approvals. As with the local authorities, the applicant had to pay a fee for the service. The fee was left to the Approved Inspectors to fix, so putting them in competition with with the Local Authorities and each other. The value in the service lies not just in the formal approval, but also in the speed, and degree of flexibility, with which it is granted.

 

We'll have to await the conclusion of the enquiry to get at the truth about how this progressed at Grenfell, but it is already clear that RBKC did not use their own BCD, but allowed Rydon (who IMO, being house builders, were completely out of their depth technically as design and construct contractors on a re-cladding project of the magnitude of Grenfell) to appoint their own choice of Building Control company.

 

Plainly, due to the number of non-compliant cladding installations since discovered, whatever "get around" formula had been "discovered" prior to Grenfell had become common knowledge among the Approved Inspectors and, due to the competition element, I would expect Rydon to have sought out whoever granted the quickest approval at the lowest cost.

 

The terminology of the regulations regarding the various aspects of fire-proof building methods and materials is complex, and I expect the enquiry to show that someone got it round their neck, didn't fully understand what all the terminology meant, and stretched a point or two too far to grant the approval to keep Rydon happy. It seems approval was granted as the design progressed, which no Local Authority BCD would do, precisely because subsequent variation to the design might conflict with what had already been approved.

 

You had a system that was designed to work with the poacher (the developer) having to pay to gain approval from a gamekeeper (the Local Authority BCD) for a licence to proceed, and which had become a system in which the poacher became the client of the gamekeeper, who then had to negotiate his fee with the poacher. This was all done in the interests of eliminating delays and costs in the construction process, which were expected to allow faster completions and lower priced homes. The fault clearly lies with government, IMO, but MPs and ministers lack the detailed knowledge to understand the dangers in what they had allowed.

 

If your objective is safety, you prioritise that at every stage, if it is speed and gaining more work, you tend to prioritise those considerations. My expectation is that this is all an unforeseen (though not entirely unforeseeable) consequence of the "war on red tape", and the adoption of "light touch" regulation. But, we shall see how well the enquiry investigates.

 

Apologies for the digression, but I still think this is much less about the politics than about technicalities and human fallibility.

[John52]

Brian Kirby - 2021-11-17 9:37 AM

 

Violet1956 - 2021-11-16 6:58 PM.....................................I do hope that you'll get abroad in your van next year Brian. i've so enjoyed your considered contributions to the debates on here although I must admit I became a bit lost when you gave your opinions on the intracacies of the Grenfell disaster. From my simplistic perspective it was an example how the rich will always shaft the poor. Oops I have strayed into a political debate which was not my initial intention when starting this post. ;-) ;-)

Thanks Veronica. We'll see how it works out.

 

On Grenfell, IMO, it was first and foremost a technical failure.

 

The Building Regulations stipulate the requirements for external cladding in considerable detail. Had they been complied with there is no doubt in my mind that that the type of cladding installed, and the way in which it was installed, would have been rejected in response to the initial application for approval.

 

The question then arises how did non-compliant cladding gain approval? The approval process requires the applicant to submit details, in the form of drawings and descriptions, sufficient to demonstrate compliance. Approval was a formal process involving a notification of approval or rejection. No ifs no buts, no half-way houses. If work commenced in anticipation of approval, and was later found not to conform with what had been approved, the offending work had to be removed and replaced with compliant work or the whole of the work would be halted.

 

I have seen some of the drawings that are alleged to have been submitted (relating to window surrounds) and they clearly show, at large scale, that the design did not comply with the fire resistance and spread of fire requirements.

 

Some years back only local authority building control departments (BCDs) could grant approval, and had the power, under the Building Act 1984, to halt any work that they saw proceeding for which approval had not been granted. They also had the power to enter sites and inspect whether work complied with the approval. They also had to "sign off" work before occupation of a building would be authorised.

 

The construction industry (mainly the developers) complained to government that local authorities had become bottlenecks in progressing projects because they were understaffed, resulting in approvals taking longer that the stipulated turnaround period. Ultimately, Government permitted private companies, designated Approved Inspectors (mostly surveyors), to also grant approvals. As with the local authorities, the applicant had to pay a fee for the service. The fee was left to the Approved Inspectors to fix, so putting them in competition with with the Local Authorities and each other. The value in the service lies not just in the formal approval, but also in the speed, and degree of flexibility, with which it is granted.

 

We'll have to await the conclusion of the enquiry to get at the truth about how this progressed at Grenfell, but it is already clear that RBKC did not use their own BCD, but allowed Rydon (who IMO, being house builders, were completely out of their depth technically as design and construct contractors on a re-cladding project of the magnitude of Grenfell) to appoint their own choice of Building Control company.

 

Plainly, due to the number of non-compliant cladding installations since discovered, whatever "get around" formula had been "discovered" prior to Grenfell had become common knowledge among the Approved Inspectors and, due to the competition element, I would expect Rydon to have sought out whoever granted the quickest approval at the lowest cost.

 

The terminology of the regulations regarding the various aspects of fire-proof building methods and materials is complex, and I expect the enquiry to show that someone got it round their neck, didn't fully understand what all the terminology meant, and stretched a point or two too far to grant the approval to keep Rydon happy. It seems approval was granted as the design progressed, which no Local Authority BCD would do, precisely because subsequent variation to the design might conflict with what had already been approved.

 

You had a system that was designed to work with the poacher (the developer) having to pay to gain approval from a gamekeeper (the Local Authority BCD) for a licence to proceed, and which had become a system in which the poacher became the client of the gamekeeper, who then had to negotiate his fee with the poacher. This was all done in the interests of eliminating delays and costs in the construction process, which were expected to allow faster completions and lower priced homes. The fault clearly lies with government, IMO, but MPs and ministers lack the detailed knowledge to understand the dangers in what they had allowed.

 

If your objective is safety, you prioritise that at every stage, if it is speed and gaining more work, you tend to prioritise those considerations. My expectation is that this is all an unforeseen (though not entirely unforeseeable) consequence of the "war on red tape", and the adoption of "light touch" regulation. But, we shall see how well the enquiry investigates.

 

Apologies for the digression, but I still think this is much less about the politics than about technicalities and human fallibility.

 

So it was privatisation of the inspection process, profit over safety.

Isn't that political, corruption, or both?

[Brian Kirby]

John52 - 2021-11-17 10:49 AM...............................So it was privatisation of the inspection process, profit over safety.

Isn't that political, corruption, or both?

That is how it looks to me, pending the findings of the enquiry. It was inevitably political, 'though not party political, as governments of all colours have been involved.

 

I don't think it was as simple as you suggest, because I think the changes were introduced by people who were largely ignorant of the building control system and its workings. The regulations themselves are incorporated into the Building Act 1984 as performance standards.

 

The complexity arises in determining how those standards can be met. The documents entitled the Building Regulations 2010 etc. merely re-state the regulations as set out in the Act, but then go on to cite forms of construction that are accepted as compliant, with the option to have alternative methods tested for compliance by approved testing stations.

 

In the case of fire performance, this is expressed in terms of fire resistance, flammability, combustibility, and surface spread of flame, each of which are different properties of materials, and apply to different elements of the construction, sometimes individually, sometimes in conjunction with other properties.

 

Ultimately, I think various ministers, in trying to streamline and simplify the approvals system, allowed approval to be given by people who were inadequately equipped and trained to do so safely, without being aware that they were inadequately equipped and trained to do so safely. It seems to have been no-one's job to disabuse them.

 

So, rather than seeing this as some great political plot, I see it, at present, as the tragic consequence of naïvety, ignorance, and incompetence. No great plot on behalf of the rich to shaft the poor, as Veronica said, because the same outcomes have arisen throughout the country, in areas controlled by councils of all colours.

 

I also think the true culprit, if one is ever discovered, will be someone working for one of those Approved Inspectors, who misunderstood which aspect of fire protection should have been applied where and, possibly under pressure to grant approval for the developer's fee, decided to approve what s/he disastrously thought complied, when, in fact, it didn't. Then imagine what that person might have done if, later, someone explained why that interpretation was wrong. By then, others will have spotted how the approval was justified and will have followed suit, or have had to exclude themselves from approvals work involving cladding.

 

It has yet to be proved, but I think it is an unintended consequence of change in pursuit of one goal, that was introduced without consideration of its possible consequences for safety. Call me naïve if you wish, but I cannot believe that anyone could have, or did, foresee the "towering inferno" consequence of those decisions and then proceeded regardless. Notwithstanding that, I'm fairly sure several people, in a number of places, must have questioned the logic and either been sacked for pushing it, have resigned their jobs in preference to acquiescing, or have acquiesced on the basis that "he's the boss, so its on his shoulders".

 

Further apologies to Veronica for the hugely off topic - even if she did introduce it! :-D