Arun council cancels meeting over asbestos fears

A council meeting has been cancelled over fears that builders may have uncovered asbestos in the council chamber.

Arun District Council has been forced to postpone tonight’s full council meeting for health and safety reasons after builders working in the civic suite in the Civic Centre, Littlehampton drilled into a wall to uncover a potentially harmful substance.

Council officials say that tests have so far proved inconclusive but, due to the age of the building, there is the possibility it could be asbestos.

As a precautionary measure, the meeting scheduled for tonight and for the rest of the week have been cancelled.

Leader of the council, Councillor Gillian Brown said: “This is totally beyond our control.

“We know that many people had made arrangements to attend tonight’s meeting but we have no choice other than to postpone the meeting.

“There is every chance the substance is not asbestos but it would be irresponsible to continue with tonight’s meeting without knowing for sure.”

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Comments(2)

RottingdeanRant says...
3:05pm Wed 20 Mar 13

I thought that every commercial property was required by law to have had an asbestos survey done so why has this happened?

mimseycal says...
8:37pm Wed 20 Mar 13

They don't know whether it is Asbestos yet according to the article. They should have known!

Considering this building was erected in 1986, there should be a record of the location and condition of asbestos containing materials to anyone liable to work on or disturb them. So someone somewhere has certainly failed in their legal duty. Most likely to be the owner, manager or whomever has overall responsibility for the building.

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