Demands for art school blaze inquiry rejected

Costs for rebuilding gutted historic building now estimated at up to £100 million

Calls for a public inquiry into the fire that gutted Glasgow’s world-renowned School of Art have been rejected as premature.

Both UK Scottish Secretary David Mundell and Scotland’s Culture Secretary Fiona Hyslop said fire service investigations into the cause of the blaze should be allowed to progress before any other decision is taken.

The fire broke out on Friday night, engulfing the Charles Rennie Mackintosh masterpiece and spreading to nearby buildings including the popular music venue the O2 ABC.

The blaze is the second in four years to hit the Mackintosh Building, which was undergoing a multimillion-pound restoration project to return it to its former glory.

Experts have estimated that the cost of rebuilding the gutted building would be at least £100 million, if anything can be salvaged at all.

Ms Hyslop told the BBC’s Sunday Politics Scotland programme that no one had yet been able to enter the building.

She said that once it had been declared safe, building control and Historic Environment Scotland (HES) officials would assess the situation and the exterior of the art school.

On calls for a public inquiry, she said: “The sensible thing to do is to find out what the source of the fire was and how that spread in the initial stages.

“All these questions will be addressed by the fire investigation. We need them to do their job initially.”

On the same programme, Mr Mundell said: “I don’t think there’s a case for a public inquiry unless someone can bring forward some exceptional reason.”

Firfefighters continued to dampen down the remnants of the blaze yesterday.