A COUNCIL leader’s warnings of getting involved in costly recladding work “fell on deaf ears” as the project is set to soar to nearly £30m.

Slough Borough Council is embracing itself to lend a further £5m for safety works at Nova House in Buckingham Gardens to continue.

The local authority bought the owner of the renovated office block in Slough, Ground Rent Estates 5 Limited, in 2018 for £1 after the 68-flat development failed two inspections after the Grenfell Tower disaster in 2017.

The government encouraged the council to sort the problem out after no one else was taking the liability. The council is currently taking legal action against Nova House’s warranty provider – with a court date expected sometime this year.

READ MORE: Slough Council could lend £5m to continue cladding removal works

Costs to replace the cladding and install other safety measures at the residential block were originally estimated to be £4m, however, the latest projections show that is expected to spiral to £28.4m after further defects were discovered.

The council has already loaned £10m and Homes England, which has already put forward £9.2m, is prepared to loan a further £4m for the paused works to continue.

Speaking at a cabinet meeting, council leader James Swindlehurst (Lab: Cippenham Green) said ‘they are where they are’ despite warning the previous cabinet of the financial risk-taking this project could have on the local authority.

He said: “There are lengthy cabinet minutes when I spoke to the previous cabinet and said ‘I don’t think we should do this and get involved with it because we will rue the day we did because it will cost us more than we thought’.

“Perhaps, rather unsurprisingly, we are in that place now and I hate to be an ‘I told you so’ but I certainly did and I’ve got minutes to prove it.

“It fell on rather deaf ears from the then cabinet, but I had my arm twisted up by the back by Neil Wilcox [council’s previous finance chief] to sign the final deal at the end of it, which offended me somewhat as one of my first decisions when I was here as leader because I didn’t want to do it in the first place.

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“But we are where we are. So, the only thing we can do is find ourselves out of the woods and get out.”

Senior councillors were told on Monday, March 20, that the recladding works have been completed but the central spine of the building “wasn’t strong enough” to take the weight of the replacement cladding, resulting in increased costs.

Cllr Rob Anderson (Lab: Britwell & Northborough), lead member for financial oversight, said Nova House should “never” have gotten a completed building certificate even without the cladding issue.

Cabinet members agreed to increase its loan facility by £5m in order to allow the works to continue in advance of any recovery funds coming in via legal proceedings or a future grant.