WORK to replace flammable cladding on two of Oxford’s tower blocks will drag on until next summer.

Oxford City Council said removing and replacing the dangerous material would have been completed by next February but work is set to be finished in July 2018, five months longer than planned.

The cost of the work is also set to increase by £150,000 - possibly totalling £1m - but as it stands the Government has offered no cash towards the cost despite claims funds were available following the Grenfell Tower blaze in June which killed about 80 people.

Blackbird Leys Parish Council chairman Gordon Roper has welcomed news work is being done but accused Whitehall of 'moving the goalposts' on fire safety.

The council was told in August the Vitrabond rainscreen cladding it installed on Evenlode and Windrush Towers in Blackbird Leys as part of £20m renovations was a fire risk following tests ordered by the Government.

The council has discovered new fittings will need to be installed on the towers to fix new aluminium rainscreen and that will delay work.

Council officers told some of the towers' residents of the delays last week.

Mr Roper said: “We’ve heard there is going to be a long delay to take it all off and we feel for them [the residents], we do. We just want them to get it done as soon as possible.

“People have to understand that you can’t do these things overnight. It comes back to the Government – they have moved the goalposts on fire safety so they should be covering the cost.”

Oxfordshire Fire and Rescue Service and the council have insisted residents in the tower blocks are safe, saying any repeat of the Grenfell Tower disaster would be prevented in Oxford because all 120 flats are fitted with sprinklers, which would contain any fire to a flat.

But some have been left concerned that it will be over a year since Grenfell before the work will be done.

A mother-of-two who lives in Windrush Tower but asked not to be named said: “Something needs to be done sooner rather than later to put residents’ minds at ease.

"You think about what would happen if it was a real fire and whether you’d be able to get your kids out."

No legal action will be taken by the council against Fortem, which installed the Vitrabond cladding, because it met building regulations at the time set by the Government. The company is currently undertaking improvement works on Evenlode Tower.

The chairman of the Oxford Tower Leaseholders’ Association and Windrush Tower landlord, Darren Hazell, said: “Whether it’s the council or the Government, someone somewhere has made a schoolboy error and in the end it’s the little man that has to pay for it.

"Anybody living in a tower block is feeling quite nervous, I’m sure. I gave my tenant the option of moving if she was so concerned but she couldn’t because there’s not really anywhere for her to go.”

The Local Government Association believed the Government had told them in June that any replacement of cladding on council-owned tower blocks around the UK would be covered.

But since then the government has said councils will need to foot the bill.

Oxford City Council’s executive board member for housing Councillor Mike Rowley said: “The position (on the council paying the money) remains the same. The safety of our tenants comes first and we will pay upfront and pursue the (government for) costs later.”

A Department for Communities and Local Government spokesman said: “Building owners are responsible for ensuring their buildings are safe for residents and we expect them to fund fire safety measures."