A flood forced residents out, but the warning signs go back years

A flood forced residents out. The warning signs go back years

There is water in the basement of Miller Heights. There are residents in temporary accommodation, essential belongings still trapped upstairs, and a prohibition notice on the door. But the real story of this Maidstone tower block does not begin with last week’s flood. It begins years earlier, with an office conversion, fire safety warnings, water ingress, and a question that now hangs over 122 flats: Who is actually responsible when a building fails?

For now, the answer is not much comfort to the people who live there.

Residents of Miller Heights, on Lower Stone Street, still do not know when they will be allowed home. The block cannot currently be occupied after flooding damaged electrical systems and created safety risks. A prohibition notice remains in place, meaning residents cannot live or sleep in the building.

Maidstone Borough Council says there is no confirmed timeline for residents to return.

People living in the block have been told they have until tomorrow to collect essential belongings. Access is being allowed daily between 10am and 11am, and again between 4pm and 5pm. Residents have also been warned that any food left in fridges or freezers after that point should be treated as unsafe. Anyone with pets still inside has been told they must collect them before the deadline.

The official explanation is simple enough. A flood in the basement affected the building’s electrical systems. A major incident was declared last Monday, before being stood down two days later. The council says that only refers to the initial emergency response. A longer-term recovery operation is now underway.

A welfare centre was set up at Mote Park Leisure Centre for displaced residents, but it closed due to low demand. The BBC reported that 10 people stayed overnight, with a further five seeking support the following day. The council says help remains available to anyone affected, including those who are homeless or at risk of homelessness.

Cllr Stuart Jeffery, the leader of Maidstone Borough Council, said, “We understand how distressing this situation has been for residents, and while the Major Incident has now been stood down, our focus remains on ensuring everyone is safe and supported.”

“The prohibition order is a necessary step while we complete all safety checks. Residents will not be able to return until we are confident the building is safe.”

Kent Fire and Rescue Service said its building safety inspectors identified “a number of fire safety concerns” after the incident.

Daniel Noonan, the service’s head of building safety, said that “following an incident at Miller Heights in Lower Stone Street, Maidstone, our building safety inspectors identified a number of fire safety concerns.”

“As a result, a prohibition notice was issued on Tuesday (12 May 2026), which prevents anyone from living or sleeping at the premises, or entering the premises for anything other than remedial works.”

“The safety of the public is paramount, and we will continue to work with those responsible for the building to ensure any issues are resolved.”

The council has also told residents to disregard a text message from UK Power Networks, which suggested the issues at Miller Heights had been resolved. They have not. Work is still ongoing.

So far, so familiar. An emergency, a council response, fire service warnings, and residents displaced.

Then comes the more awkward part.

Miller Heights is not owned by Maidstone Borough Council. It is a private residential block, operated by Centrick, with 122 flats. Centrick has acknowledged that this was not the first time water had been an issue.

In a statement reported by KentOnline, Centrick said Miller Heights had experienced “recurring water ingress issues in the basement area”, which had “historically been managed as and when they have arisen.”

Centrick said the situation escalated after a fresh incident, which initial investigations suggested was caused by a burst water pipe in the basement. It said the flooding affected parts of the building’s electrical infrastructure and required immediate emergency action.

Cllr Jeffery has said the situation had been allowed to escalate, and that Centrick must “get its act together.”

The flood was the immediate cause of last week’s evacuation. It was not the first warning sign at Miller Heights.

Fire safety concerns at the block were already public by 2021, when flat owners were unable to sell or remortgage their homes after the building received a B2 rating on its EWS1 form. That rating, issued in August 2020, meant an adequate standard of safety had not been achieved.

A report prepared for the then freeholder warned that cavity barriers were missing throughout parts of the building, creating a risk that fire could spread through concealed gaps. Cavity barriers are designed to close gaps in walls, roofs and ceilings, helping to stop fire and smoke spreading through a building. They are not decorative extras. They are there because fire is very good at finding hidden routes through badly protected buildings.

Leaseholders were left stuck with flats that were difficult to sell unless they accepted heavy losses or found cash buyers willing to proceed without a clean EWS1 form.

Helen Grant, then MP for Maidstone and the Weald, contacted the block’s managing agents for answers about delays to fire safety works, saying residents had been dealing with problems at Miller Heights since the flats were first occupied.

By then, Miller Heights was already a very modern kind of housing problem.

It began life in the 1970s as Miller House, an office block. Its conversion into flats began around 2014, with most of the homes created under permitted development rights. In plain English, that meant full planning applications did not have to be submitted for much of the conversion.

That system was supposed to help quickly turn redundant offices into homes. Sometimes it did. It also created a generation of flats in which the usual planning scrutiny was narrowed, local councils had less control, and residents later discovered that speed and housing supply do not always make for good buildings.

At Miller Heights, the conversion itself had already raised questions. No publicly available documents for the conversion or associated applications set out fire safety provisions, according to KentOnline’s 2021 reporting. It also reported seeing a fire strategy report for the redevelopment, which stated that cavity barriers would be included in large cavities where there is a potential for unseen fire spread.

Maidstone Borough Council said at the time that because the owners had used a private approved building inspector, the council’s own building control team would not have been involved in previous inspections of the building.

All of which leaves Miller Heights in the middle of several overlapping failures that have become grimly familiar across England. An older commercial building converted into flats, fire safety concerns, a managing agent under pressure, residents struggling to get answers, and now an emergency evacuation after basement flooding hit essential systems.

Then there is the ownership trail.

Land Registry documents list the freehold owner of Miller House, 43-51 Lower Stone Street, as Tuscola (199) Limited, a company incorporated in the British Virgin Islands. The register shows Tuscola bought the freehold in April 2021 for £850,000.

UK filings for Tuscola identify Michael Gubbay as a registrable beneficial owner of the company.

Kent Current has identified at least 149 companies linked to Gubbay, the majority of which are involved in property management. Most have since been dissolved following compulsory strike-off action. Across those filings, Gubbay’s declared nationality and country of residence vary, with records listing combinations of British and Israeli nationality, and residence in England, Cyprus and Israel.

The filings do not show wrongdoing. They do show how quickly a local housing story can disappear into a web of companies, addresses, jurisdictions and historic appointments.

To residents, Miller Heights is home. To documents, it is a freehold owned by a British Virgin Islands company, operated through a management structure, sitting inside a wider property network linked to a businessman whose name appears across dozens of companies.

Gubbay has previously faced fire safety enforcement action.

In 2023, West Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Authority brought a successful prosecution against him as director of Tuscola (109) Limited after he failed to provide requested information about fire safety management arrangements at Austin Hall in Leeds.

Gubbay pleaded guilty at Leeds Magistrates’ Court to failing to respond to an Article 27 request for information under the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005. He was fined £666, with a £266 surcharge and ordered to pay £1,878 in costs.

Chris Kemp, senior fire protection manager at West Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service, said: “This case highlights how important it is for people with fire safety responsibilities to take them seriously.”

The BBC has also previously reported on another residential block case involving a Gubbay-linked property interest. Last year, it reported that a firm run by Gubbay had acquired the head lease of two tower blocks in Kirkby, Merseyside, in 2011. Residents at those blocks were later forced out over fire safety problems, and leaseholders faced large repair bills. The head lease had since passed to another offshore-owned structure.

Kirkby is not Maidstone. The circumstances are different. But the world is the same one, with unsafe blocks, complicated ownership structures, managing agents, service charges, fire safety works, and residents trying to work out who is actually responsible.

That is the world Miller Heights now sits in.

The council says no resident will be left without help. Centrick says safety and communication have been prioritised. Kent Fire and Rescue Service says the building cannot be occupied until the risks are resolved.

Those statements are important, but they do not answer the deeper question.

Miller Heights is now a building that people are not allowed to live in. It is owned through an offshore company, operated through a management structure that residents do not control, and has years of warning signs behind it. The people who live there have been given limited windows to retrieve their belongings, but no date for returning home.

The flood may have filled the basement. The questions now reach much higher.

The big read

This week’s big read comes from the i, which visited Margate to look at Kent one year after Reform took control of the county council. The paper found residents split over the party’s first year in charge, with potholes, council tax, councillor allowances, 20mph zones, prayers at County Hall, and pressure on local services all feeding into how people feel about the new administration. It is a useful snapshot of Reform moving from insurgent campaign to governing party in Kent, and of how residents are beginning to judge it not just on what it says it will change, but on the roads, bills and council decisions in front of them.

Inside the Reform-run seaside town with ‘potholes everywhere’ as tax goes up

In Kent, where Reform UK won control of the county council last year, locals say the government is wasting time and money

The i PaperAlannah Francis

Council matters

Meetings this week:

• Tonbridge & Malling: Housing and Planning Scrutiny Select Committee will consider a report on blocking development rights for HMOs in the borough.
• Kent: Annual Meeting of the County Council is on Thursday, where councillors will debate the strategic statement, water resilience, farmers, and tourist travel in the county.
• Dartford: Cabinet will meet on Thursday to discuss a number of housing issues, walking and cycling provision, and Gravesham's Local Plan.
• Maidstone: Planning Committee will decide on a 435 home development in Allington on Thursday.

New planning applications:

• Maidstone: Plans for 115 new homes in Marden.
• Maidstone: Creation of three 'pocket parks' in the town centre.
• Medway: Conversion of Royal Function Rooms in Rochester into eight homes.

In brief

➡️ Michael Hadwen, the man Reform at Kent County Council created the role of political assistant for, has been selected to run Suffolk County Council for the party.

🪧 The far right is planning to protest in Maidstone for the umpteenth time this year.

🟢 Linden Kemkaran, the Reform leader of Kent County Council, had an awkward time on BBC's Politics South East show.

🥀 Canterbury MP Rosie Duffield says she would be 'keen to rejoin' Labour under a new leader.

🏥 Darent Valley Hospital's water supply issues appear to be partially resolved, with handwashing and showering facilities restored, though they are very clear to point out that you definitely shouldn't drink water on the site.

🚰 South East Water has been criticised for its failures in providing an alternative supply to those who needed it during last year's failures.

🌊 Meanwhile, South East Water have failed to fix a leaking manhole six months after it was reported.

🪦 On the other hand, Southern Water wrote to one of their customers to tell her that she was dead.

♻️ A new waste collection schedule in Thanet meant some homes went without rubbish collection for five weeks.

🌾 Kent County Council will give up control of eight historic windmills around the county.

🚄 Southeastern has launched a new timetable that appears to add a few more services.

🚗 The 70mph speed limit on the Sheppey Crossing has been restored.

🚧 Operation Brock will be put back in place on the M20 ahead of the bank holiday weekend.

🏘️ The University of Kent is pressing on with a plan for 2,000 new homes north of its Canterbury campus.

🏗️ Infrastructure for 10,000 homes at Otterpool Park near Hythe has been approved.

🗄️ Plans have been submitted for a new cinema, restaurant, and retail building in Tunbridge Wells.

🚢 The Port of Dover has welcomed four cruise ships in one day for the first time.

🪖 Ashford Borough Council has committed £300,000 to repair a tank, allowing it to remain in the town.

🪻 A rare Kent plant has made a comeback from being on the brink of extinction a decade ago.

⚽ Whitstable Town FC are not impressed that their manager have moved to Margate days after signing a new two year contract.

🎛️ Look Mum No Computer, from Ramsgate, who represented the UK at Eurovision over the weekend, has remained upbeat despite coming last in the contest with one point.

Property of the week

This week’s property is basically Whitstable doing what it does best, but on a larger budget. It’s a modernist, glass-heavy house on a private sea-facing road, with uninterrupted views across Whitstable Bay and access to Seasalter Beach, and the whole layout is built around light and the outlook, from the first-floor sitting room framed in floor-to-ceiling windows to the top-floor principal suite with its own sea-facing terrace and dressing area. Downstairs, it goes firmly into serious-house territory, with a bespoke kitchen and big sliding doors to the garden, a cinema room, study, utility and a ground-floor double bedroom with an en suite, then a south-facing garden set up for low-effort entertaining with a granite terrace under a pergola that comes with a louvred roof, blinds and heating. It is the kind of place where you can sit inside, watch the weather roll in over the bay, and still tell yourself you live an outdoorsy coastal life.

Check out this 5 bedroom detached house for sale on Rightmove

5 bedroom detached house for sale in Preston Parade, Seasalter, Whitstable, CT5 for £1,850,000. Marketed by Christopher Hodgson, Whitstable

Rightmove.co.uk

Events this week

🪖 19 - 23 May - Operation Mincemeat // Acclaimed musical and unbelievable true story about a stolen corpse. Marlowe Theatre, Canterbury. Tickets from £36.

🎤 Sat 23 May - Ania Magliano: Peach Fuzz // Recent star of Taskmaster delivers new show of jokes, confessions and unhinged observations. Marlowe Studio, Canterbury. Tickets £22.50.

🍲 23 - 25 May - Chatham Maritime Food and Drink Festival // Annual event with stalls and dragon boat racing. Chatham Dockside. Free.

🎸 Sun 24 May - Willy Mason // Oxygen singer-songwriter goes back on the road. Forum, Tunbridge Wells. Tickets £28.

Footnotes

Follow us on social media! We’re on Facebook, BlueSky, and Instagram for now.