Residents to protest at Greenwich River Gardens development over cladding issues

A nationwide protest is to be held this Saturday by residents living in buildings with flammable cladding.

One location will be River Gardens sales office in Greenwich. Residents will be complaining about issues at New Haddo estate.

Campaigners state:

“These defects were caused by either insufficient regulation, developers cutting corners, or by blatant non-compliance with regulations at the time of build.

The government, freeholders (actual owners of the buildings) and developers are shirking responsibility, leaving the leaseholders, who are effectively long-term tenants and do not actually own the properties, to cover the gigantic cost of external and internal wall systems remediation, interim measures such as the ineffective waking watch, or retrospective fire alarm fitting.

These costs run into tens of thousands of pounds per flat and the bills are usually payable within 28 days.”

A resident of Royal Artillery Quays in Thamesmead stated:

“I bought a riverside flat in Royal Artillery Quays in Woolwich, buying into the dream of a Barratt Home offering me a safe future. That dream has turned into a nightmare. We are all terrorised with a £31,000 bill per flat to replace cladding, unknown potential bills for defective internal fire
stopping and a developer that turns up, investigates, finds serious issues with our fire break system and then goes silent on us for two months.

This crisis has taken over my life. I haven’t worked on my business for over six months and I really fear for my future. Lack of sleep and fighting 12-15 hours a day, non stop, has taken its toll.”

End Our Cladding Scandal are behind the protest, which is to be held from 11am this Saturday the 5th June. Fourteen locations across the country will take part.