FOI release

Freedom of Information Request – Bureau Veritas Report and Related Fire Safety Assessment

Case reference FOI2026/00587

Received 26 May 2026

Published 11 September 2026

Request

I write under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 to request disclosure of records relating to the fatal fire at Old Kent Road, SE15 on 1 January 2023, which resulted in the death of [X] and injuries to multiple other occupants.

Accordingly, please provide:

1. The full and complete Bureau Veritas report(s), including:

* all appendices;

* photographs;

* diagrams;

* technical findings;

* internal notes;

* conclusions;

* recommendations;

* draft versions;

* and any supplementary or follow-up reports.

2. Any instructions, terms of reference, or scope of work provided to Bureau Veritas by the London Fire Brigade, including clarification of:

* whether Bureau Veritas was instructed only to investigate the cause of the fire;

* or whether it was also instructed to investigate:

* fire progression;

* compartmentation;

* means of escape;

* smoke spread;

* fire safety compliance;

* HMO fire risks;

* operational response;

* survivability;

* and/or rescue opportunities.

3. Any correspondence between the London Fire Brigade and Bureau Veritas concerning:

* limitation or restriction of the investigation scope;

* decisions not to investigate fire safety matters;

* decisions not to produce a fire progression analysis;

* decisions relating to post-fire audits;

* or discussions concerning responsibility for reviewing the Fire Risk Assessment (FRA).

4. Any documents recording:

* whether the FRA obtained on or around 3 January 2023 was reviewed or scrutinised;

* whether any post-audit review was conducted;

* whether any enforcement considerations arose;

* and whether any fire safety failings were identified in relation to the premises.

5. Any documents explaining why no further fire safety findings or recommendations appear within the Bureau Veritas material disclosed to date, despite:

* the premises being a multi-occupancy residential building above commercial premises;

* one fatality and multiple injuries occurring;

* and ongoing concerns regarding means of escape and fire safety management. If any exemptions are relied upon, please:

* identify the specific exemption(s);

* explain why they apply; * and disclose all reasonably severable material.

Where information is held but considered exempt in part, I request disclosure of redacted versions where possible. This request is made in the public interest due to ongoing concerns regarding fire safety oversight, investigative transparency, and lessons learned following a fatal residential fire.

Response

Thank you for your request for information concerning the fire that occurred on 1 January 2023 at Old Kent Road, London.

Section 12(1) Freedom of Information Act 2000

London Fire Brigade estimates that the cost of complying with your request would exceed the appropriate limit prescribed by the Freedom of Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004.

For local authorities and fire and rescue authorities, the appropriate limit is £450, calculated at a statutory rate of £25 per hour, equivalent to 18 hours of work. The estimate is limited to the activities permitted by regulation 4(3), namely:

  • determining whether information is held;

  • locating information;

  • retrieving information; and

  • extracting information from records.

Breadth of the request

Your request is exceptionally broad and seeks information spanning numerous subject matters and record categories relating to a single incident.

The request encompasses, amongst other things:

  1. Bureau Veritas reports and all drafts, appendices, photographs and supporting material.

  2. Investigation instructions, terms of reference and scope documents.

  3. Correspondence between LFB and Bureau Veritas.

  4. Fire Risk Assessment material.

  5. Post-fire audit records.

  6. Fire safety enforcement considerations.

  7. Internal discussions about fire progression.

  8. Internal discussions about means of escape.

  9. Internal discussions about smoke spread.

  10. Internal discussions concerning survivability and rescue opportunities.

  11. Documents explaining decisions taken during the investigation.

The request is also not confined to final documents. It expressly seeks drafts, internal notes, emails, correspondence, discussions, supporting material and supplementary records.

Consequently, information potentially falling within scope may be held across multiple business areas, including Fire Investigation, Fire Safety Regulation, Operational Policy, Legal Services, senior management records, email systems, document management systems, shared drives and case management records.

Cost estimate

To comply with the request, London Fire Brigade would need to identify all officers, teams and repositories potentially involved with the incident and undertake searches across multiple systems and locations.

As part of assessing the request, London Fire Brigade carried out a preliminary information-gathering exercise to understand the scale of information potentially falling within scope. This exercise identified a substantial volume of potentially relevant records held across a range of systems and business areas.

Whilst many of these records are likely to be duplicates or otherwise fall outside the precise scope of the request, the remaining volume of material is still considerable. Identifying which records fall within the request, locating them, retrieving them and extracting the requested information would require the examination of a significant number of records.

London Fire Brigade estimates that the time required to undertake those activities would exceed the statutory appropriate limit of 18 hours (£450 at £25 per hour) by a substantial margin.

The estimate does not include any time that may subsequently be required to consider exemptions, undertake consultations, apply redactions or prepare information for disclosure, as these activities cannot be taken into account for the purposes of section 12.

Accordingly, London Fire Brigade estimates that the cost of complying with your request would exceed the appropriate limit and is therefore not obliged to comply with the request in accordance with section 12(1) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

Advice and assistance

In accordance with section 16 of the Act, you may wish to refine the request to a small number of specific categories of recorded information.

For example, you may wish to limit the request to:

  • the final Bureau Veritas report;

  • the final terms of reference provided to Bureau Veritas; or

  • the final post-fire audit report.

A request framed in this way would be more likely to fall within the appropriate limit.

We should also explain that records concerning a fatal fire investigation commonly contain personal data, confidential information, witness evidence, investigatory material and information relating to the exercise of regulatory and enforcement functions. Such information may be subject to exemptions under the Freedom of Information Act 2000. Accordingly, even where information can be located within the appropriate limit, some or all of that information may be exempt from disclosure.

Your right to appeal

If you are dissatisfied with this response, you may request an internal review by writing to the Information Access Team within 40 working days of the date of this response.

If you remain dissatisfied following the outcome of an internal review, you have the right to apply directly to the Information Commissioner under section 50 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

Documents

There are no documents for this release.

This is London Fire Brigade's response to a freedom of information (FOI) or environmental information regulations (EIR) request.

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