No decision will be taken for a month on whether cladding will be removed or replaced on a Sutton tower block that failed fire safety testing.

Samples taken from Chaucer House in Chaucer Gardens were taken for investigation following the Grenfell Tower fire and last week residents were informed the cladding had failed tests.

Sutton's council, fire and housing chiefs met residents on Thursday (June 29), to try to convince them their building was safe.

Fire borough commander Steve Green told residents: "Grenfell and Chaucer couldn’t be any more different. This is so much safer. To call it dangerous couldn’t be further from the truth.”

The meeting was told it could take a month to find out whether cladding should be removed or replaced.

The chief executive of Sutton Housing Partnership, Steve Tucker, said: "We are not fire safety engineers. We are looking for expert assessment whether it is safe. That could include removing the cladding. I believe this cladding is safe.”

Sutton Housing Partnership promised to demonstrate to residents how their fire sprinkler system worked over the coming days while security guards would be monitoring the building 24 hours a day.

Fire commander Green strongly urged residents to get an individual free fire safety visit.

He said: “They are ninety minutes each and if everyone can get those done it massively reduces the risk of a fire starting. If that fails, there’s a fire system that informs people there’s a fire and then there’s a sprinkler system to attack the fire.

“Then we are six minutes away. There’s a lot here ensuring your safety.”

The fire commander was pressed on how high London Fire Brigade’s ladders reach.

“In Sutton we have a 13.5 metre ladder which reaches the fourth floor,” he said.

One resident explained that she was on the seventh floor to which Mr Green responded: “Our plans aren’t based around that. Grenfell was an exception incident, it had never happened before and there’s a reason for that”.

After the meeting, one resident, Vicky Bryden, remained concerned for her safety.

She told Sutton Guardian: “There was far too many questions that they had no response for. It was very scripted and I don’t think they expected the level of questioning that they received. If this was a meeting to put people at ease the relevant people should have attended like a representative that worked for the sprinkler company.

“We are now having to wait, I’m sure they said a month, where we don’t know what they are going to do and there was no confirmation that the cladding would be removed or replaced.

“I hope the relevant bodies act quickly and efficiently and bring more information to the next meeting.”