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Golding Homes residents at risk of serious harm after 100 fire safety actions left undone

By: Luke May

Published: 09:44, 20 February 2020

Updated: 16:22, 26 February 2020

Hundreds of people living in Golding Homes' properties have been living with fire risks and faulty electrical installations.

The Maidstone-based housing provider left 100 high-risk actions arising from fire risk assessments undone for "a number of months," according to the Regulator for Social Housing.

Midhurst Court, Mote Road, Maidstone

In a report published this week, the RSH wrote: "The regulator has learned that Golding Homes has failed to complete over one hundred high risk actions arising from Fire Risk Assessments (FRA) and these have been outstanding for a number of months."

The actions had been identified by Golding Homes, but the work was left undone.

The report continues: "Regarding electrical safety, Golding Homes is required under the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985 to ensure that electrical installations are in working and safe condition both at the start of any tenancy and throughout that tenancy.

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"Golding Homes has identified a large number of remedial actions arising from electrical safety checks which had not been completed.

"The overdue actions were potentially dangerous and should have been completed at the time of the electrical safety check to remove any potential risk."

Golding Homes has around 7,000 homes in and around Maidstone, some of which are for vulnerable mums or elderly people.

At its RSH inspection in 2018, the housing provider was told it met all of the necessary standards.

A year ago it removed doormats from all of its communal areas amid safety concerns.

Golding Homes has been found to have breached the Home standards, writing: "The regulator has concluded that Golding Homes did not have an effective system in place to allow it to meet its statutory health and safety responsibilities in relation to fire and electrical safety."

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Despite this, the RHS is not taking further action "as it has assurance that the breach of the standard is being remedied."

Golding Homes says it is a responsible landlord, adding it referred itself to the regulator.

Chair Chris Cheeseman said: "Golding Homes takes the safety of our residents extremely seriously and we have acted quickly to put this right, engaging with the regulator and getting independent expert advice on the work needed to ensure our homes remain compliant in all areas.

"We have also invested in resources to deliver this work in a timely manner, led by new operations director, Anne-marie Roberts.

"We wish to apologise to our residents and reassure them that their safety remains our top priority, now and always and we will be working to deliver on our action plan as swiftly as possible."

Read more: All the latest news from Maidstone

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