We’re still waiting for reassurance on estate gas safety

Published: 27th May, 2011

• STEPHEN Kirrage, Homes for Islington (HfI) director of property services, acknowledges that gas safety can be worrying and that he wanted to set the record straight (Safety comes first when replacing gas pipes, May 20). 

I, perhaps misguidedly, believed he would go on to reassure residents with at least some facts. Worryingly, what he said was “On the Spa Green estate, National Grid will have risk assessed the need to replace gas pipes there.”

Now, I would have thought, given the importance of the worrying issue of gas safety and the recent history of failing gas riser pipes on Spa Green estate, that HfI would have requested some confirmation and details.

Is it safe to assume that, had HfI confirmed with National Grid it had in fact risk assessed the gas pipes, that Mr Kirrage would have been more definite and reassuring?

Surely he would have offered some factual details, including when this assessment was carried out, what were its conclusions, the life expectancy of the risk assessment itself and the gas pipes to which it refers? Wouldn’t he?
Lucinda Bowers
Tenant Management Organisation committee member
Spa Green Estate, EC1

• I READ with total amazement the letter from Stephen Kirrage. Is this the same Stephen Kirrage who, when attending meetings with National Grid, HfI and Popham 1 Estate Tenants’ and Residents’ Association, did not say a single word, did not say any words of support in residents’ favour, did not argue any points against National Grid?

Is this the Stephen Kirrage who argues in emails to myself, when I point out facts about gas mains renewal, and ignores official links to prove these points?

Is this the Stephen Kirrage who ignored the fact that National Grid says the gas mains on Popham 1 do not pose any threat to residents, yet says they do?

All of this points to one fact: HfI relies on the words of contractors and sub-contractors. When Islington Council ran the services, you would phone the gas department and speak to an expert. Now it seems we are stuck with people who make phone calls and trust the responses of others. After all, a contractor can never be wrong, can they?

HfI wants to stay in charge of housing management. The problems on Popham 1 and other estates over the past few years prove it has learnt little.
Martin Rutherford
Chair, Popham 1 Estate Tenants’ and Residents’ Association