Auburn apartment block declared a ‘fire risk’ but remains occupied

Eighty western Sydney apartment owners living in a “fire risk” remain in limbo because of a bureaucratic fight over who will fix the building.

The Rawson Square apartment complex in Auburn, known as Aria, is covered in flammable cladding.

Eighty western Sydney apartment owners living in a building declared a “fire risk” remain in limbo because of a bureaucratic fight over who will fix the building.

The Rawson Square apartment complex in Auburn – known as Aria – is covered in flammable cladding as well as being riddled with fire safety issues.

The situation is so bad NSW Fair Trading had considered evacuating the more than 150 residents who live there, a source said.

But the developer claims they have fixed problems immediately, the cladding was compliant at the time of installation and that owners have been covering up smoke detectors and removing fire alarm speakers.

While the NSW Building Commissioner has inspected the property numerous times, Cumberland Council has been told they must fix the problem.

The Aria apartment complex in Auburn.

Former Cumberland mayor Steve Christou.

The council has served orders on the building requiring attention to the immediate fire safety issues and those that will take longer to rectify.

Local councillor and former mayor Steve Christou has blasted the situation, calling for the matter to be resolved.

“There is a standoff between the council and the state government and these residents – who are trying to put food on the table and pay the rent or a mortgage – are left in the middle,” he said.

“It’s a significant fire risk. There are leaking fire stairwells. This just highlights the unacceptable situation residents are in.”

Mr Christou said the state government originally promised to complete a report into the building’s defects.

Now, he says the council has been asked to carry out (and foot the bill for) the report and has been pressing for the council to issue fines to the developer.

“They are asking the council to fix the problems yet the council does not want to go near it without the assistance of the Building Commissioner’s office,” he said.

“The situation is not helped by the sudden and mysterious resignation of the Building Commissioner.”

NSW Fair Trading said they inspected the building on 4 July as part of a program to remove flammable cladding from buildings, called Project Remediate.

During that inspection they “confirmed serious defects were present including passive and active fire issues relating to fire stairs, emergency warning systems and fire doors”.

The Aria apartment complex in Auburn.

“With this property, the owners corporation, Council, Fire and Rescue NSW (FRNSW), NSW Fair Trading and the Building Commissioner have worked to urgently improve the level of safety in this building and to enable its continued occupation,” a departmental spokesman said.

The company which sold the apartments was Rawson Square Pty Ltd.

A Rawson Square spokesman said: “Fire and Rescue NSW inspected Rawson Square on June 28 and identified issues with owners covering up smoke detectors and removing fire alarm speakers”.

“The safety and wellbeing of residents is the highest priority, and we implored the owners corporation and their strata managers to remedy their issues immediately,” he said.

“Rawson Square takes great pride in its work, and where issues have arisen through exceptional circumstances, they have been addressed as soon as they have been brought to our attention.

“With record rainfalls, we had water coming in through the fire stairs and as soon as we were notified, we fixed the problem. Where any building issue is identified, we are committed to ensuring its remedied promptly.”

The spokesman said they installed fully compliant cladding that was certified by the Government and CSIRO, “and now the building is part of the government’s voluntary flammable cladding replacement program, Project Remediate”.

That project is designed to provide cladding remediation support to approximately 215 buildings.

Currently 150 owners corporations are actively involved in the program.

The first of the remediation works will commence this month, with 90 buildings triaged and are in various stages of design and procurement.

A spokesman for Cumberland Council said they “will not be commenting on specific regulatory and compliance actions taken by it or other authorities other than to say issues brought to the attention of relevant authorities are examined and acted upon”.