By 
Warwick District Council still has 1,321 fire safety jobs to finish in its flats and community centres, and the biggest building projects won’t be done until March 2029. The figures on Warwick council flats and fire safety are in a report going to the council’s Housing Scrutiny Committee at the Town Hall in Leamington on Tuesday 3 November at 6pm.
On this page
The report covers council flats across the district and doesn’t name individual blocks. In July, the committee raised concern about slow progress on fire safety and asked for this closer look.
Where the work stands
Fire risk assessments carried out from 2022 to 2025 on 268 buildings produced 5,670 risk actions, and 4,349 are complete. Of the 1,321 left, 1,239 are in low-rise blocks and one is in a high-rise block.
A separate performance report gives a snapshot from 1 October, when 1,410 actions were overdue, down from 1,961 in April. None was rated high priority; 571 were medium, 835 low and four were management reviews. In all, 510 had been overdue for more than a year.
When the jobs should finish
- Flat front doors: 1,986 fire doors across 245 blocks are being reviewed. So far 509 have been installed and 997 still need a decision. Due by the end of September 2027.
- Complex building work: 50 high and medium-risk buildings, including sheltered blocks and large historic houses converted into flats. Five are finished, and the rest are due by March 2029.
- Other blocks: block-by-block repairs to low-risk flats are due between December 2026 and June 2027. Alarm work in some blocks runs to December 2027.
- Cladding: four properties with defective cladding are being handled separately through the Building Safety Regulator. One has its first approval, with a second decision expected by November. Applications for the other three are due by April 2027.
Assessments running late
Fire risk assessments themselves are overdue on 48 of 272 buildings, including all seven rated high risk. None is more than six months late. The council says a new contract with an outside assessor was held up by quality problems in a pilot and by checks on assessors’ competence, and should start in December. In the meantime its own qualified staff have carried out documented reviews of the six high-rise and five sheltered schemes.
What the council is doing
The council now aims to close 200 actions a month, double its previous average, after bringing in three more staff since December. A wider restructure adds 29 roles, with recruitment starting in October. The council also says an outside audit of its fire safety work has returned a draft finding of “reasonable assurance”, though that report isn’t final.
The papers also record smoke alarm checks at 100% of homes and carbon monoxide alarm checks at 99.98%.
The work follows a September 2024 judgement by the Regulator of Social Housing, which found serious failings in the council’s landlord services and gave it the C3 grade. The council keeps updates for tenants and leaseholders on its website. Tuesday’s committee is scrutinising the progress, not making a new decision.
