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Sheffield Telegraph article from 1962 on the opening of Netherthorpe tower blocks.

Robertshaw is a 15 storey tower block, built in 1962, located in the Netherthorpe district of Sheffield, England. It contains 56 twin bedroomed flats. It is one of a group of 4 blocks located on a hillside below the Arts Tower at Sheffield University. The block was named after Jeremiah Robertshaw printer and bookbinder, originally there was a street named after him and his wife Sarah (Robertshaw Street and Sarah Street) before redevelopment of the area. Jeremiah Robertshaw can also be found on the original opening plaque at the Northern General Hospital Sheffield.

The others are Adamfield, Crowshaw, and Cornhill.The blocks were refurbished in 1994/5 by fitting external insulation and overcladding with modern rainscreen system cladding, and internally refitted, with new kitchens. The old balconies were closed off and the space used to enlarge the living rooms.

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Sheffield Telegraph article of Friday, 16th February 1962 was as about the very fist tenants to move into Robertshaw Tower Block which is one of three similar  type tower blocks that were constructed during 1960/1 on the Hillside Netherthrope Estate in Sheffield. As of writing these notes in late September 2022 there is only one of the original tenants still living at Robetshaw block she is 95 and still going strong. 

Below is an introduction of my live audit of Robertshaw tower block and it’s surrounding environment that is a record/paper trail of ongoing concerns and issues impacting upon its tenants and residents:

Robertshaw Block Tenants Live Audit Last Updated October 2022 This is an individual tenant’s live audit of Robertshaw tower block and its surrounding environment, along with 34 years of experience and campaigning about a wide range of tower block safety issues. This audit began in December 2017. Over time, each of the main headings in the contents list will be written up as individual reports. The contents list highlights relevant research material - some of which I have used in this audit, whilst other material may be useful to other interested tower block tenants and residents, along with housing professionals tasked with the responsibilities of managing this type of housing stock. The contents list, reports and research material will be periodically updated, thus acting hopefully as a live document for our landlord, Sheffield City Council’s housing department and its tenants and residents. It is acknowledged that not all tower blocks share the same issues because of their particular type of construction, age, location, letting policies, mixed tenure, social economics, tenant engagement, appropriate financing and effectiveness of management etc..

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The above is Cllr Douglas Johnson's letter that was in the Sheffield Telegraph’s letter column on the 1st October 2020 whereupon he criticises Sheffield City Council’s Housing Department’s whitewash report about Grenfell type flammable cladding installed on officer instructions on the Hanover tower block. Cllr Douglas Johnson outlines the full 10 year horror story here https://yorkshirebylines.co.uk/sheffield-residents.../ Council Johnson became the chair of Sheffield Housing Policy Committee in May 2022 whereupon he has chosen not to publicly criticised the appalling conditions of Sheffield’s public sector housing in which he has been responsible for over the last three years. But yet this hasn’t prevented him on several occasions from publicly criticising appalling conditions within Sheffield’s private housing sector!

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The above is Cllr Douglas Johnson's letter that was in the Sheffield Telegraph’s letter column on the 1st October 2020 whereupon he criticises Sheffield City Council’s Housing Department’s whitewash report about Grenfell type flammable cladding installed on officer instructions on the Hanover tower block. Cllr Douglas Johnson outlines the full 10 year horror story here https://yorkshirebylines.co.uk/sheffield-residents.../ Council Johnson became the chair of Sheffield Housing Policy Committee in May 2022 whereupon he has chosen not to publicly criticised the appalling conditions of Sheffield’s public sector housing in which he has been responsible for over the last three years. But yet this hasn’t prevented him on several occasions from publicly criticising appalling conditions within Sheffield’s private housing sector!

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The Sheffield Star Monday, 1st July 2019 Zero tolerance on poor landlords in Sheffield

We have zero tolerance with poor landlords. That’s the message from Sheffield Council’s housing director, who says she will use every power she has to ensure tenants are safe. Janet Sharpe, director of housing and neighbourhoods service, said: “Homes need to be safe, well maintained, and habitable and we have zero tolerance with landlords who don’t comply. “As a council we have a statutory responsibility to make sure tenants are safe and free from intimidation and to make sure they are okay in these properties. “If landlords do that, the council will support them, but we will pursue at all costs any landlords who fail to do right by their tenants and make them live in unsafe and poor accommodation. “If landlords have not fulfilled their duty, ultimately we will serve notice and that could mean, in extreme cases, that everyone has to leave the property.” In Page Hall, Selective Licensing – where landlords are forced to bring properties up to a good standard – led to around £1m of investment in 350 properties. The Selective Licensing has now come to an end, but Ms Sharpe said the council still had powers to protect tenants. She added: “It’s about having officers on the ground to be able to make sure that we are spotting things at the earliest point. They won’t walk away; they will deal with these households. “I will use my private sector housing powers against any landlord that fails to keep their property maintained and I have a whole range of powers that can be used on an individual property basis.” Poor quality housing can affect people’s health, wellbeing and ability to work. Ms Sharpe added: “The fabric of our homes starts to impact on our health; it stops us from living that quality of life. Children need to be able to go to school with dry clothes and no health issues that have come from a cold, damp home. “Tenants need to know their responsibilities as much as landlords and if we get that right and take the appropriate action, people will be healthier, hold down jobs and have a good quality of life.” Ms Sharpe called on the Government to raise housing standards too and said Sheffield had been lobbying. “Nationally the standard of housing before a council can legitimately intervene is quite low. The property has to be watertight with a working cooker and running water but when we as a council think of what is a decent standard, we think it goes beyond the most basic amenities,” she added. “The legal requirements of what is a suitable home is very different to what we would all want to see. “The regulations that we have to work to are quite rigid. We can take action, but we do have limits in terms of what we can legitimately regulate, and we have been working with the government because the time has come to raise those standards. I think that would help lots of local authorities when they are trying to regulate the private sector. “They should be aligned with modern day standards. The government was going to look at a decent homes' standard for both council and private homes and that work is overdue because we want consistent standards to help us regulate more effectively.

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The chair of Sheffield City Council’s Housing Committee, Councillor Douglas Johnson said: "The length of Nilendu Das’ banning order reflects the seriousness of his actions and his flagrant disregard for fire safety and the safety of his tenants. We are very happy to see his name on the Rogue Landlord Database.

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The Sheffield Star Monday, 3rd April 2023 Hanover Tower Sheffield: Resident calls for police to investigation into council’s feelings’over fire safety. A tenant in a Sheffield tower block believes Sheffield Council put his ‘life in danger’ when a piece of fire safety equipment was temporarily removed. ‘Remedial work’ at Hanover Tower, on Exeter Drive, Broomhall, saw the dry riser removed for a number of days from floors 13 to 15 of the 118-flat tower block. A dry riser is a system of pipework and valves that runs up through a building. The system allows firefighters to easily access water from each individual floor of the building. Residents at the tower block were given a letter on March 24 by Sheffield City Council alerting them of the ‘essential’ fire safety work being undertaken on the dry riser until March 28. However, resident Jeremy Fisher has criticised the removal of the dry riser, which could have left residents in danger in the case of a fire. He said: “Several hundred people live in Hanover. What would have happened if there had been a fire? People could have died because of this. “Did South Yorkshire Fire & Rescue know before we told them that the dry riser pipe had been sawed off so it would not work?” In an email addressed to Sheffield City Council on Friday, March 24, Mr Fisher wrote that he had alerted SYFR of the works and said: “We believe Sheffield Council is putting our lives in danger.” A spokesperson for SYFR said they visited the building on March 24 after being “notified of concerns regarding the dry riser and smoke control arrangements”. SYFR advised Sheffield Council to review the evacuation strategy at the building “with immediate effect”, and a waking watch was instructed at the property while the work was carried out. Janet Sharpe, director of housing services at Sheffield Council said “additional fire safety support to reassure residents” was put in place to ensure that the safety and security of the tower block was maintained during the “essential work” on the dry riser. Attached to Mr Fisher’s email was his draft report calling for a police investigation ‘into the failings of fire safety at Hanover’, which also made reference to the use of cladding with ‘no flame-retardant properties’ that was removed from the block in 2017. https://www.thestar.co.uk/news/people/hanover-tower-sheffield-resident-calls-for-police-investigation-into-councils-failings-over-fire-safety-4089533

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The above is Cllr Douglas Johnson's letter that was in the Sheffield Telegraph’s letter column on the 1st October 2020 whereupon he criticises Sheffield City Council’s Housing Department’s whitewash report about Grenfell type flammable cladding installed on officer instructions on the Hanover tower block. Cllr Douglas Johnson outlines the full 10 year horror story here https://yorkshirebylines.co.uk/sheffield-residents.../ Council Johnson became the chair of Sheffield Housing Policy Committee in May 2022 whereupon he has chosen not to publicly criticised the appalling conditions of Sheffield’s public sector housing in which he has been responsible for over the last three years. But yet this hasn’t prevented him on several occasions from publicly criticising appalling conditions within Sheffield’s private housing sector!