Shane Lowry has ended his partnership with construction firm Kingspan in the wake of the official report into the Grenfell fire. Lowry, who will be playing this week in the Irish Open at Royal County Down, released a brief statement to the media this morning confirming that his partnership with Kingspan, which had dated back to 2017, was now at an end.
“Kingspan and I have mutually agreed to discontinue our sponsorship relationship, which we believe to be the right decision for all concerned at this time. Neither party will be commenting further.”
Kingspan have been the subject of huge criticism from survivors’ groups over the years and were one of three firms who were singled out in last week’s report into how the 2017 disaster came about. Although the report exempted the Cavan firm from responsibility for the spread of the fire on the night, it variously found that Kingspan had “knowingly” created “a false market for insulation”, had used “dishonest strategies” and had shown “a complete disregard for fire safety”.
In that context, it comes as no surprise that Lowry has moved on from his association with the company. Ahead of the report’s release last week, the 2019 Open champion was the subject of the story in The Guardian newspaper in which a spokesman for Grenfell United criticised Lowry for ignoring their entreaties to ditch Kingspan.
“We’ve been writing to him for years, saying get this sponsorship off your arm,” said Ed Daffarn. “It’s deeply upsetting and deeply offensive, and he doesn’t reply to us.”
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