High Court gives green light to fire solutions manufacturer for legal challenge to council ban on use of its products

A manufacturer of passive fire solutions has been given permission to bring a judicial review challenge over the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea’s decision to bar use of its products.

The council decided on 11 December 2024 to prohibit the use of Siderise’s products in its construction and maintenance projects.

This was over claims the firm was implicated in the Grenfell Tower fire in 2017, having supplied cavity barriers for the tower’s refurbishment.

Siderise, which criticised the council’s decision as “without foundation or justification”, is advancing two grounds:

• the decision was made in breach of the local authority's own policy and/or that it was irrational and premised on a mistaken reading of the Grenfell Tower Inquiry reports; and
• the decision was unlawful in that it was inconsistent with the then applicable Public Contracts Regulations 2015.

In granting permission for the legal challenge, Mr Justice Pepperall said in Siderise Insulation Ltd, R (On the Application Of) v Mayor and Burgesses of the Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea [2025] EWHC 1178 (Admin) in relation to the first ground: “In my judgment, it is clear that Siderise was criticised in the Phase 2 report and that, while acquitted of any dishonesty, the report concluded that the company's marketing had been misleading. There was, however, no finding that the cladding contractor had in fact relied on the misleading datasheet when designing the external wall at the Grenfell Tower. Further, the Phase 2 report [of the Grenfell Tower Inquiry] concluded that it was unlikely that any competent designer reading the datasheet would have been misled about the suitability of Siderise's cavity barriers.

“It is, in any event, properly arguable that the council's stated policy required a further matter to be established, namely that Siderise's misleading conduct had contributed to the Grenfell Tower fire or its spread, and that such further finding is not supported by the Phase 2 report. Accordingly, it is properly arguable that the council failed to follow its own policy, alternatively that it acted irrationally, in prohibiting the use of Siderise as a supplier and its products in the absence of any finding in the Phase 2 report that its misleading statements had contributed to the fire or its spread.”

On the second ground, the High Court judge said it is “properly arguable that the council erred in law in concluding that it had the power to exclude Siderise from supplying products in future procurement exercises. That question is not straightforward and should, in my judgment, go forward to a full hearing for more detailed consideration.”

Kensington & Chelsea meanwhile sought permission to amend its Acknowledgement of Service to include a limitation argument.

Mr Justice Pepperall said: “At first blush, there is an obvious tension between [counsel for RBKC’s] primary submission that this challenge is premature and his limitation argument. Inevitably the argument proceeds, however, on the basis that the court rejects the prematurity argument as a ‘knockout blow’.

“The complication in this case is that the challenge is not to a specific procurement decision but rather to a broader policy decision by Kensington & Chelsea as to its approach to future procurement exercises. Given Coulson LJ's conclusion that a challenge under the former Regulations could only be brought by a bidding party, I consider that it is at least arguable for present purposes that this claim for judicial review is not therefore subject to the strict 30-day limit applicable to challenges to specific procurement decisions and that the local authority's limitation argument does not provide the ‘knockout blow’ to Siderise's otherwise arguable public-law challenge.

“I should, however, make clear that the only issue at this stage is whether Siderise has established arguable grounds for judicial review with a realistic prospect of success that are not subject to a discretionary bar or other knockout blow. Accordingly, I do not purport to decide either Kensington & Chelsea's limitation argument or Siderise's argument that the court should in any event extend time. If such issues remain live, they should be decided at the final hearing on the basis of evidence and full legal argument.”

The judge concluded: “I grant Siderise permission to apply for judicial review on both grounds. I allow the council's application to amend its summary grounds of defence although that is to some extent academic since it will now have the opportunity to reconsider the issue and serve its detailed grounds for contesting the claim.”

The council said it would not comment on ongoing proceedings.