Nearly half of the borough’s council-owned tower blocks pose a “substantial” fire risk to residents, assessments have revealed.

Nine out of 22 tower blocks in Waltham Forest with six-storeys or more were found to have the worst safety ratings with inspectors stating “improvements should be undertaken urgently”.

Information from fire risk assessments undertaken in 2018 was gathered by the Waltham Forest Echo through Freedom of Information (FOI) requests.

“Cluttered corridors”, “faulty doors” and “damaged electrical wires” were among the dangerous faults listed, according to the Echo.

Only four of the tower blocks in the borough have been installed with sprinkler systems, despite Waltham Forest Council promising to install these in every building more than six-storeys high back in 2017 – after the fatal Grenfell Tower fire.

The council had set aside £500,000 of tax payers’ money to complete this work.

Some of the older buildings in the borough, built during the 1960s, were found to have fundamental design flaws that meant they do not meet modern safety standards.

Only one of the borough’s tower blocks was found by inspectors to have “tolerable” safety standards in place, with some residents unsure of emergency procedures.

None of the council-owned blocks in the borough were found to have the same cladding as that which was wrapped around Grenfell Tower.

St George’s Court in Wood Street, Walthamstow, which had 91 faults listed by inspectors in its fire risk assessment, and Rayner Tower in Albany Road, Leyton, which had 88 faults listed, do not currently have effective emergency plans in place in case of fire.

An inspection at St George’s Court found flat doors were not compliant with the 30-minute fire safety standard and communal doors had inadequate fire resistance with “excessive gaps” and self-closing devices that did not properly operate.

The two blocks with the highest number of faults identified in their assessments and therefore the most dangerous in the borough were the Fred Wigg and John Walsh towers in Leytonstone.

Fred Wigg tower was found to have 118 fire risks identified and John Walsh tower has 104. Both buildings were built in the 1960s when fire safety regulations were less stringent.

In a statement to the Echo, Cllr Louise Mitchell cabinet member for housing at Waltham Forest Council, said: “All of the council’s buildings over seven storeys, as well as our sheltered housing schemes, houses in multiple occupation, and hostels, undergo thorough fire risk assessments annually.”

The cabinet member did not state what the council does with the findings of these annual assessments.

She added: “All council residential buildings have been constructed in accordance with the prevailing building control regulations [at the time of their being built] and managed in compliance with the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005, and we are developing our approach to implement the recommendations of the Hackitt Review following the Grenfell fire tragedy, expected to become law in 2020.”

The cabinet member cited a lack of additional funding from central government and said in spite of this, the council is “exceeding regulatory requirements”.

Cllr Mitchell added there are six sprinkler instalments currently in progress in the council-owned tower blocks across the borough; meaning 10 of the 22 blocks will have working sprinkler systems in the future.