Grenfell Tower fire tragedy - Discussion Thread

[Technics 1210]

It took me a very long time to realise that the Tory message is one of fear - that some Other is trying to take your slice of the pie. Doubly so in these dark Brexit days.

Here is a suggestion. Why not actually listen to Mogg. He said if HE and HIS family were in the situation, he would apply common sense and not listen to the Fire Brigade. He at no point said the people who stayed were stupid.

It's typical Remainer tactic. Twisting anything and everything that is related to Brexit. I mean, where are your cries of anger when Stephen Lawerance's mother stated that the fire brigade are racists because they told coloured people to stay put and saved white people.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/20...mother-claims-firefighters-tackling-grenfell/

Here is an excerpt:

Stephen Lawrence's mother has been accused of making a "disgraceful and unfair slur" after claiming that firefighters tackling the Grenfell Tower blaze were racist.

Doreen Lawrence, whose 18-year-old son was murdered by a gang of racists in south-east London in 1993, said she has "no doubt" the response to the inferno that killed 72 people was motivated by racism.

"Had that been a block full of white people, they’d have done everything to get them out as fast as possible and make sure that they did what they needed to do," she said, in an interview with Channel 4 News last week.

Now remember, she is a Barroness.

But no, carry on attacking Mogg for something he did not say.

 

[Robert]

Here is a suggestion. Why not actually listen to Mogg. He said if HE and HIS family were in the situation, he would apply common sense and not listen to the Fire Brigade. He at no point said the people who stayed were stupid.

It's typical Remainer tactic. Twisting anything and everything that is related to Brexit. I mean, where are your cries of anger when Stephen Lawerance's mother stated that the fire brigade are racists because they told coloured people to stay put and saved white people.

Now remember, she is a Barroness.

But no, carry on attacking Mogg for something he did not say.

If you look up this thread you will see that I have not attacked JRM. You seem to have got me mixed up with KKWC.

Incidentally, “common sense” didn’t work as some residents fled their flats and were overcome by heat and smoke in the corridors and stairwell.

 

[Gabbar Singh]

JRM’s comments were silly imo but the reaction has been way ott. Labour Peer Baroness Lawrence’s comments on the other hand were disgusting yet she wasn’t even challenged by Ch4 when she made them. A large proportion of the fire service who attended Grenfell were black for god sake. Yet THEY were accused of racism.

 

[Robert]

JRM’s comments were silly imo but the reaction has been way ott. Labour Peer Baroness Lawrence’s comments on the other hand were disgusting yet she wasn’t even challenged by Ch4 when she made them. A large proportion of the fire service who attended Grenfell were black for god sake. Yet THEY were accused of racism.

I think she spoke reflexively and in haste through the lens of disadvantages that British Afro-Caribbeans face in accessing services and justice. In this case I think she was well off, as that building could have been full of rich white people and the FB would not have gone in. I believe it has been their doctrine ever since WW2.

 

[The Viper]

Prince William: Grenfell Tower fire support 'wasn't well targeted'

The Duke speaks during the launch of a charity following disasters in 2017, including Grenfell and the London Bridge attack

Prince William says it appears that the "huge outpouring of support" following the Grenfell Tower fire "wasn't well targeted".

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge met victims of the disaster during the launch of a new charity, the National Emergencies Trust (NET).

It has been set up following numerous disasters in 2017, including Grenfell, the London Bridge attack, the Manchester Arena bombing and flooding in Cumbria.

"It takes so long to get back to normal again," William said.

"Following Grenfell there was a huge outpouring of support but it seems like it wasn't well targeted."

The Queen and the Duke made an emotional visit to west London in the days following the fire in June 2017.

The idea behind the NET is to manage fundraising and the distribution of donations more efficiently following emergencies.

In the event of a crisis, it will hold national appeals on TV and social media, and allocate and distribute money to those affected.

It is chaired by the former head of the Army and cross-bench peer, Lord Dannatt

William said he was "impressed about how willing the charity sector has been to learn the lessons from previous responses, and to ensure that the quickest and most appropriate support is offered to those affected".

He added: "It has been humbling to speak to survivors of the London Bridge and Manchester attacks, the Cumbria floods, the Grenfell Tower fire and other disasters here in the UK.

"Their stories are as heartbreaking as they are inspiring."

Victims of some of the disasters in 2017 were at the the launch of the NET.

Natasha Elcock, chairwoman of Grenfell United, was one of the last people rescued alive from the fire.

She told William and Kate: "So many people sent clothes and food, but at the time we had absolutely no place to put them. No home, no cupboard, and no fridge."

Kate observed: "It's not just the support provided at the time, but how it's continued in the future."

Karim Mussilhy, who lost relatives in the fire, said the aftermath was "really chaotic in the early days".

He added: "We had all of these great donations from people all across the country and people were really, really generous, but it wasn't being co-ordinated by anybody."

He also praised the Duke and Duchess, saying: "You can tell they've taken a big interest, not only in our tragedy, but making sure that when something like this does happen again, there is something in place for the survivors."

https://news.sky.com/story/prince-william-grenfell-tower-fire-support-wasnt-well-targeted-11856667

 

[MenInG]

People around the world donated money and goods to help the victims of the Grenfell Tower fire.

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There were many survivors who were left homeless and bereaved by the tragedy that killed 72 people in June 2017.

But following the sentencing of Alvin Thompson on Wednesday, who was jailed after falsely claiming he had survived the fire, Sky News looks back on other fraudsters who took advantage of Grenfell.

Burglar and fraudster Derrick Peters has been jailed for six years. Pic: Met Police
Image:
Derrick Peters
Derrick Peters was convicted and jailed for six years in August 2018.

He had committed a burglary but had initially avoided jail by telling the judge he had lost everything in the Grenfell fire.

The 58-year-old had also lied to Kensington and Chelsea council, claiming he had been living with a friend at the tower who had died in the blaze, although he had not been there himself on the night of the fire.

As a result he was put up at Kensington's Park Grand Hotel between the end of June and January this year at a cost of more than £40,000. It was during that time that he committed the burglary.

He was found out when officials became suspicious - the flat number he claimed to have been staying in did not exist, he was not on any CCTV coming or going from the building and the daughter of his friend said Peters had never stayed with them.


Yonatan Eyob
Yonatan Eyob was a drug dealer who claimed to have been staying with a friend in flat 182 in Grenfell Tower on the night of the fire. The flat was home to five members of the El-Wahabi family, all of whom died.

Eyob, 26, was given £15,918.20 on pre-paid cards, £60,945 in hotel accommodation (at the Holland Park Hilton between July 2017 and June this year) and £9,968.36 for laundry and parking - a total of just over £86,831.

He had the use of a white convertible Mercedes, complained about the hotel's wifi signal and also asked for more money, saying he found it hard to eat the hotel's food.

He was caught when police raided his hotel room and found illegal drugs and his lies were revealed. He was jailed for three years and four months over the fraud and a further three years and four months for five drug offences.

Jenny McDonagh
Jenny McDonagh, 39, took £62,000 from a fund for Grenfell victims while she worked as a finance manager at Kensington and Chelsea Council.

McDonagh was jailed for five and a half years after pleading guilty to fraud, theft and concealing criminal property.

She had used the money for holidays to Dubai and Los Angeles, expensive meals, shopping and around half of the money was spent on gambling.

McDonagh, of southeast London, took the money over a 10-month period.

Anh Nhu Nguyen
Anh Nhu Nguyen, 53, was jailed for 21 months after getting more than £10,000 from the local council and charities by pretending his family had died in Grenfell Tower on the night of the fire.

Nguyen, from Beckenham, said his wife and son had died and he was even pictured shaking hands with the Prince of Wales as the royal met survivors in the days after the tragedy.

He even told Sky News about the "shock" of "seeing dead bodies" as he left the apartment block.

Elaine Douglas and Tommy Brooks
Elaine Douglas and Tommy Brooks claimed they had lived on the tower's 19th floor but had been staying with friends elsewhere on the night of the fire.

The Jamaican nationals were illegally in the UK.

Douglas, 51, was jailed for three years and Brooks, 52, was jailed for three years and three months after it was realised that their flat had not even existed.

Douglas was housed in the Radisson Blu in Kensington for 276 nights at a cost of just over £55,000 to the council and, after complaining about the food in the hotel, she was given a pre-paid credit card, running up charges of more than £11,000.

She was also handed a pre-paid Oyster card so she could travel free of charge.

Brooks also started at the Radisson Blu before being moved to another hotel - 243 nights that cost the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea more than £49,000. He racked up charges of £9,000 on a pre-paid credit card and was also given an Oyster card.

Mohammed Syed Rinku
Mohammed Syed Rinku was jailed for 18 months after he claimed to have lived in Grenfell Tower while in a relationship with another occupant.

The illegal immigrant also applied for leave to remain in the UK under the Grenfell Survivors Immigration Policy.

He admitted to fraudulently claiming £5,070.26. He had never lived in the tower.

Abdelkarim Rekaya
Abdelkarim Rekaya was jailed for four and a half years after pleading guilty to fraud by false representation and obtaining leave to remain by deception.

The 28-year-old had claimed to be homeless but living in the tower on the night of the fire.

He was put up in a hotel and given financial support to the value of £88,183.70.

In December he was moved to a home where he was able to live free of rent and bills until July last year, but he was later found to have been lying.

Koffi Kouakou
Koffi Kouakou, 53, was jailed for four years after claiming he had lived in the tower and had been in a relationship with the flat's other occupant, who died in the fire.

He was given two months in a hotel before moving into a council-funded flat with the cost coming out at more than £30,000.

But police found that he had not been in a relationship with the woman and had not lived in the tower.

Antonio Gouveia
Antonio Gouveia, 33, was jailed for more than three years after falsely claiming to have lived with a woman in a flat on the tower's seventh floor.

He claimed assistance, and was given £260 in emergency cash, a £249.99 Google Chromebook laptop and nine months' free accommodation at a £155 a night hotel in Marble Arch, worth a total of £53,456.76.

When the real resident of the flat tried to collect some of the things donated to help victims, she was told a man from her flat had already collected the donated laptop. A similar thing happened when she asked for financial assistance but she flagged up the issue to the council and the police were called.

The woman told the police that nobody had lived in the flat for 20 years apart from her, her partner and her daughter.

He told police he had lied because he was homeless and wanted housing.


Joyce Msokeri
Joyce Msokeri, from Sutton in south London, was jailed for four and a half years after fraudulently obtaining more than £10,000.

She said she had lost her home and her husband in the tower fire and was also given accommodation at the Hilton, clothing and food.

But the 46-year-old was caught when it was proved her mobile phone had never been used near the Grenfell site and that the morning after the fire she had spent an hour on the phone to Sky complaining about being charged an extra £1.50 on an unpaid bill.

Also, she did not have a husband, and had actually been single and living miles away at the time.

on the one year anniversary of the Grenfell Tower fire on June 14, 2018 in London, England. In one of Britain's worst urban tragedies since World War II, a devastating fire broke out in the 24-storey Grenfell Tower on June 14, 2017 where 72 people died from the blaze in the public housing building of North Kensington area of London.
Image:
Seventy-two people died in the Grenfell Tower fire
Mohammad Gamoota was jailed for 18 months after claiming his father had died in the blaze.

Gamoota, 31, said he had been living with his dad in the tower and gave the name of a real victim as being his father. He had got the elderly man's name from a newspaper article about the fire victims.

He got £500 in cash, but was unsuccessful in a bid for a further £4,500. He also received £910 worth of free hotel accommodation over nine days and ran up a £354 room service bill.

Sharife Elouahabi pleaded guilty to fraud after saying he was living in the block of flats at the time of the 2017 fire.

Sharife Elouahabi was jailed for six years for falsely claiming that his uncle and cousins had died in the blaze.

The 38-year-old from Kensington, west London, claimed to be a member of the El-Wahabi family, five of whom died in the tragedy, but he had no connection to them at all.

Elouahabi received around £103,000 in accommodation, travel costs and maintenance.

When police checked CCTV they found no sign of him ever entering the building and could not place his mobile phone signal in the area.

Alvin Thompson claimed he was sleeping in a stairwell on the night of the fire

Alvin Thompson, 51, was jailed for two fraud offences that cost £95,706 after falsely claiming he had survived the Grenfell Tower fire.

He was sentenced to five years and six months for the first count and four years for the second count, to be served concurrently.

Thompson claimed to have been sleeping on the stairwell on the fifth floor and helped people escape, allegedly stepping over bodies as they got out.

As a result of his false claims, Thompson received hotel accommodation, financial assistance and he was allocated permanent housing in March 2018 after living in hostels for eight months.

https://news.sky.com/story/the-fraudsters-who-took-advantage-of-grenfell-11559444

 

[MenInG]

A member of the Grenfell Tower inquiry panel has resigned over links to the firm that supplied the building's cladding.

Benita Mehra had connections to Arconic's charitable arm, the Arconic Foundation.

Spoiler

Tendering her resignation to the prime minister, the engineer said she recognised and respected the "concern" and "depth of feeling" among survivors and the bereaved about her appointment.

Survivors' group Grenfell United said Ms Mehra had done the "dignified thing by resigning" and that her departure "helps lift growing anxiety ahead of phase two".

But it added that the government "should never have put families in this situation" and accused it of failing to "carry out basic checks".

Mayor of London Sadiq Khan said Ms Mehra's resignation was "welcome news" and her appointment should "never have been made in the first place".

The fire in June 2017 claimed 72 lives - the first phase of the inquiry finding that the cladding was the "principal" reason for the flames' rapid spread.

Ms Mehra had been due to replace an academic, Professor Nabeel Hamdi, on the panel for the second phase of the inquiry, due to begin on Monday.

Since her appointment was announced shortly before Christmas, it has emerged she was an immediate past president of the Women's Engineering Society (WES).

According to the society's website, it received funding from the Arconic Foundation for an apprentice conference last year.

Ms Mehra said her role at the WES was unpaid and the grant from Arconic was ringfenced to fund the mentoring scheme.

She wrote to Boris Johnson: "For these reasons, I did not link any aspect of my former role as president of the WES to my panel member role for the Grenfell Tower inquiry. In hindsight, this was a regrettable oversight on my part.

"I am confident that had I continued in my role at the inquiry I would have approached my work with complete independence and impartiality at all times. However, I recognise and respect the depth of feeling among some core participants about my appointment."

The report following the first phase of the inquiry, published in October, said the cladding supplied by Arconic did not comply with building regulations.

Arconic said a "confluence of unfortunate circumstances" rather than the "mere presence" of the panels had caused the spread of the fire.

Boris Johnson said: "I can confirm that Benita Mehra wrote to me yesterday to offer her resignation from the Grenfell Tower inquiry panel and I have accepted.

"I would like to thank Benita for her commitment and I am very grateful for her sensitivity to the work of the inquiry."

https://news.sky.com/story/grenfell-inquiry-member-resigns-over-links-to-cladding-firm-11917882

 

[MenInG]

None of the companies involved in the refurbishment of Grenfell Tower has accepted responsibility for the deadly fire, an inquiry has heard.

Richard Millett QC, the inquiry's chief lawyer, said each claimed what happened was "someone else's fault".

Experts have previously said the work failed to meet building regulations.

The second phase of the investigation into the 2017 disaster at the London high-rise block, which claimed 72 lives, started on Monday.

It is going to look at how the building came to be covered in flammable cladding during its refurbishment.

Mr Millett said that, with the "sole exception" of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea - which accepted that the refurbishment work should not have been signed off - all organisations had denied responsibility in "carefully crafted statements".

"Any member of the public reading those statements and taking them all at face value would be forced to conclude that... nobody made any serious or causative mistakes," he said.

"In every case, what happened was, as each of them would have it, someone else's fault."

'Dangerous' panels
The tower, built in 1974, was extensively refurbished between 2012 and 2016.

Mr Millett stressed that the first part of the inquiry found the work "did not comply with certain key aspects of the building regulations".

The inquiry also heard that employees at the US metals manufacturer Arconic, which supplied the cladding for the west London tower block, knew before the fire that its panels were "dangerous" and should only be used on "small buildings".

A barrister for building contractor Rydon said safety concerns were raised in internal Arconic emails in 2011 and again in 2016.

That's when Arconic manager Claude Wehrle said the Grenfell cladding was "dangerous on [the] facades" and should be replaced.

The first phase had found the cladding was the "principal" reason for the rapid and "profoundly shocking" spread of the fire at the 25-storey building in June 2017.

Families and friends of victims were present in the hearing room in Paddington as inquiry chairman Sir Martin Moore-Bick opened the second phase.

The first part of the Grenfell Inquiry had the task of examining the events of just one night.

Part two could go back years in its search to explain the tragedy.

It will look and feel different. A new hearing centre, closer to the community, replaces the previous unpopular conference room in the heart of London's legal district.

Instead of the harrowing accounts of firefighters and residents, the evidence will emerge from emails, technical specifications and planning documents.

It will be slow going, but it should get to the heart of what went wrong.

Because although the training and management of the firefighters was criticised in part one, they were not the cause of the fire.

The questions which will be answered are these:

However dry the evidence could become, all those involved know this is about getting justice for those who died, because, at the end of this process, the public inquiry could be followed by a criminal trial.

Opening submissions for the first three parts of the second phase of the inquiry are expected this week.

These include an overview of the primary refurbishment of Grenfell Tower - including the cladding, the testing and certification of the cladding, and the fire safety measures including complaints and communications with the residents.

The inquiry's first phase concluded "many more lives" could have been saved if the advice to residents to "stay put" had been abandoned earlier.

It was highly critical of the London Fire Brigade and fire commissioner Dany Cotton, saying preparations for such a fire were "gravely inadequate".

Ms Cotton retired early after facing calls from victims' families to resign.

She previously told the inquiry she would not have changed anything about the way her crews responded to the blaze, provoking anger from survivors and victims' families.

The start of the second phase of the inquiry comes days after newly-appointed panel member Benita Mehra resigned over her links to Arconic's charitable arm.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-51256738

 

[Robert]

So is the legal blame going to go to the principal contractor who did the refurb, or the client who signed it off, or the supplier of the cladding materials, or some of each?

 

[msaaim89]

So is the legal blame going to go to the principal contractor who did the refurb, or the client who signed it off, or the supplier of the cladding materials, or some of each?

Doubt the supplier can be blamed. The just provide a product and issue a specification with it. It's whatever is ordered by the contractor.

The principal contractor can just say they installed it to design.

The designers can say they built it within ** EN requirements.

I think the building officer may feel the wrath.

 

[MenInG]

Firms involved in the refurbishment of Grenfell Tower are as much to blame for the victims' deaths as if they had "pulled the trigger" of a gun, an inquiry into the tragedy has heard.

Spoiler

The insulation supplier saw the block as a "flagship" for its product and promoted it despite knowing it should have been recalled, one barrister said.

The fire in June 2017 killed 72 people.

The companies deny responsibility and want a guarantee that the evidence they give will not be used in prosecutions.

Sam Stein QC, representing the victims, bereaved and survivors at a hearing on Thursday, said companies "killed" when they "promoted their unsuitable dangerous products in the pursuit of money".

What happened at Grenfell Tower?
Seven key points from first phase of inquiry
Who were the victims?
Another barrister representing victims said that Celotex and Arconic, the manufacturers of the insulation and cladding respectively, "exploited" a lack of knowledge about building regulations in efforts to promote their products.

Stephanie Barwise QC said that both companies knew their products were "highly flammable" and showed "contempt" for safety.

Ms Barwise also said:

The Kensington and Chelsea Tenant Management Organisation (KCTMO), which oversaw the refurbishment, did not question whether reducing costs would compromise safety, and used a fire risk assessor who it had been warned was "prone to make unjustified statements"
In an internal email in 2014, an Arconic sales manager said she was "working on" projects including "Grenfell Towers" - despite the firm previous saying that it wasn't necessarily aware where cladding would be installed
Fire safety consultancy Exova made a "seriously misleading" statement when it said in reports that the proposed changes "will have no effect on the building in relation to external fire spread" - which it added would be confirmed by analysis in a future report. Exova knew about proposals for new insulation and cladding by November 2013, but the risk assessment was not updated
Building contractor Rydon failed to obtain advice from Exova on external fire spread
The government was holding a "ticking time bomb" by not rewriting its fire safety guidance despite knowing as far back as 2000 it was inadequate.
The inquiry also heard that residents had asked the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea (RBKC) three months before the fire for an assessment of the tower block by an independent health and safety inspector.

An RBKC official wrote to the then-chief executive of the KCTMO that they were "not minded to agree to this request" and that the KCTMO's work had been "more than sufficient".

The inquiry's first phase found the cladding was the "principal" reason for the rapid and "profoundly shocking" spread of the fire at the 25-storey building in June 2017.

Its second phase, which began on Monday, is looking at how the building came to be covered in flammable cladding during its refurbishment between 2012 and 2016.

The inquiry heard that - with the "sole exception" of the RBKC, which accepted that the refurbishment should not have been signed off - all organisations involved in the work had denied responsibility.

The following day, emails disclosed to the inquiry suggested that companies knew a planned cladding system would fail in the event of a fire.

On Wednesday, firms asked for a guarantee that anything they say in the hearings will not be used as part of future prosecutions.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-51313349

 

[Robert]

Doubt the supplier can be blamed. The just provide a product and issue a specification with it. It's whatever is ordered by the contractor.

The principal contractor can just say they installed it to design.

The designers can say they built it within ** EN requirements.

I think the building officer may feel the wrath.

Suppliers have responsibility under case law going back a century and can be held liable if someone is harmed. Additionally they have a responsibility under statute: Construction Products Regulations 2012.

Designers must do their best to ensure H&S even beyond the end of the construction project by designing out risk.

Principal Contractors only have liablility during the construction phase so I think you are right on that point.

By "building officer" do you mean whoever owns and controls the building?

 

[MenInG]

The prime minister and Labour's leader have marked the third anniversary of the Grenfell Tower fire with video messages as part of a virtual service.

Seventy-two people died as a small kitchen fire in the west London tower block turned into the most deadly domestic blaze since World War Two.

Boris Johnson said the country was working to ensure it never happened again.

Sir Keir Starmer pledged to do "everything" to make sure it did not.

The messages will be relayed to a virtual service later as the commemoration moves online due to coronavirus. It will be hosted by the Bishop of Kensington.

In tribute to each person who died, bells of London churches will toll 72 times and green lights will glow from tower block windows.

Mr Johnson said: "We can all remember where we were three years ago today when we saw this tragedy unfolding on our screens and across the London skyline."

He added: "As a nation, we are still dealing with the consequences of what happened and working to make sure it never happens again.

"While those affected by Grenfell are not able to gather in person, all of us in this country are with you in spirit."

Labour has estimated 56,000 people were still living in homes wrapped in the same flammable cladding as Grenfell.

"In the midst of their suffering, the Grenfell community came together to campaign for justice, safe homes and change. Because no one should ever go through the loss and pain they experienced," said Sir Keir.

"But three years on and, unbelievably, tonight people will go to bed in unsafe homes.

"Three years on and there has been little justice or accountability. Three years on their campaign continues.

"I support Grenfell United. We can all learn from their strength and determination."

In a written statement, London Mayor Sadiq Khan said he would be relentless in ensuring the Grenfell community get justice and that Londoners would feel safe in their homes.

"While struggling with their own personal grief and recovery, they have continued to campaign for building safety and are demanding change to keep others safe in their homes."

Conservative MP Theresa May, who was prime minister at the time of the fire, tweeted that Parliament, "must do all we can to help them. Their loved ones must not be forgotten".

'Been left behind'
It comes as many Grenfell Tower victims have said they feel "left behind" by the government.

Karim Mussilhy, whose uncle Hesham Rahman died in the blaze, said "there's not a lot of compliments right now" for the government.

A Parliamentary committee has warned cladding, like that which helped the flames spread, could cost up to £15 billion to remove nationwide.

Mr Mussilhy, vice chairman of support group Grenfell United, said: "It never feels like there's any urgency with the emergency that this country is in with the whole cladding situation."

Joseph John, who escaped the fire by climbing out the window of his second floor flat with his then-partner and child, has said he feels "disgusted" about where victims still find themselves.

"I feel like I've been left behind since Grenfell, I haven't been supported."

A Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government spokeswoman said it had set up the Building Safety Programme and testing process to identify all high-rise buildings with aluminium composite material (ACM) cladding and had worked with councils to ensure buildings at risk were made safe.

"We will ensure everyone affected by the Grenfell Tower tragedy continues to receive the support they need with over £158m committed to supporting the community so far," she added.

The Fire Brigades Union said high-rise residents faced a "postcode lottery" concerning how many firefighters would be sent to their building in the event of a blaze.

It said "many brigades would not be able to mobilise anywhere near the scale" that was needed to tackle the Grenfell Tower fire.

Faith leaders will conduct sermons and reflections online throughout Sunday and from 22:30 BST, people in homes across the UK have been asked to shine a bright green light from their screens to show solidarity with the bereaved and survivors.

The public inquiry into the disaster was paused in March because of the pandemic and is due to restart on 6 July.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-london-53040194

 

[MenInG]

Joseph John was about to get into bed in the early hours of 14 June 2017. He heard noise coming from outside the second-floor apartment he shared with his partner and 14-month-old son in the Grenfell Tower.

He looked through his curtains and saw a fire engine. He then caught a bright red reflection in the window of a parked car.

"I saw the building was on fire," Joseph, 29, recalls.

He woke his partner and rushed out of the flat to seek help. Joseph's partner is disabled and he needed help in evacuating his family from the 24-storey tower. A firefighter told him to go back inside the flat and someone would assist them in getting out.

But after an hour, as flames engulfed the tower's upper floors, he and his partner realised they couldn't risk waiting any longer. Joseph passed their baby over a large gate to a stranger downstairs before carrying his partner through the window and over the gate himself.

They managed to get out just in time. Seventy-two people did not. Joseph is still struggling to process the trauma he experienced. He suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder, depression and anxiety.

A few months after the fire, Joseph heard about a new local football team that had started up. A keen player, he eventually decided to check out a training session.

Finally, he could take his mind off what had happened that night.

"I tried cooking, I tried working, I tried everything," he says. "Nothing seemed to work for me, other than football."

Joseph wasn't the only one. This is the story of a very special Sunday league team, Grenfell Athletic.

The Grenfell Tower fire in North Kensington, west London, was one of the worst disasters in British modern history. It began on the fourth floor of the tower just before 01:00 BST on 14 June. By 04:30 more than 100 flats were on fire. The blaze did not burn itself out for 24 hours.

Rupert Taylor was born and raised on the streets surrounding Grenfell and used to play on football pitches beneath the tower. He started volunteering as a youth worker in 2005 and at the time of the fire was manager of the local youth centre. Nine children from the youth centre died in the tower.

Rupert was on holiday in Gibraltar when he received a phone call in the early hours of 14 June.

"I turned on the news. My heart sunk, it was horrific," he recalls. "We didn't know who was alive."

He got the first plane back to London and got straight to work in helping people affected by the fire. "When I got back I drove in… the smell of burning was real," he says. "I was trying to get support for the residents who were wandering the streets trying to find out about their loved ones."

A few days later, Rupert noticed a young man wandering outside the youth centre looking lost. He asked the man if he was OK and if he wanted to come in and get some supplies. He politely declined but they exchanged phone numbers. The man later came into the centre and they started to talk. He told Rupert he was a resident of the tower.

"He seemed like a very lonely chap," Rupert says. "He told me that he'd lost both his parents a few years ago. A couple of weeks in, we were building a relationship and I noticed he was really struggling. I asked what helped him get through the time when he lost his parents and the first thing that came out of his mouth was 'football'.

"I said: 'Right, we're going to create a team.'"

Grenfell Athletic was born barely a month after the fire. Rupert started to put word around the local community and training sessions were set up.

Because it was so soon after the fire, he wanted it to be as open as possible. Many were still recovering mentally and physically, and he wanted residents to feel able to pop in for training sessions without fully committing to the team.

Grenfell Athletic joined the Middlesex County Football League for the 2017-18 season. The early days were turbulent.

"It was the strain of the shadow of what we were all walking out for," Rupert says. "The 72 lives that were lost. Every time we went out to the pitch, we did a minute's silence. It starts to wear you down and it's quite heavy on the soul.

"Children lost their lives. You're seeing their faces when you get out on the pitch and you say you're doing this for them. You're trying to build something greater than your bog-standard Sunday league team."

Grenfell Athletic soon started to gel and finished fifth out of 12 teams in their first season - a solid start for a new team founded under such tough circumstances.

At the end of the season, the team went on a tour of Italy where they played semi-professional Lanciano from the Italian fifth tier. The trip was an important part of the healing process for a lot of the players, many of whom hadn't properly left the area since the fire. It was, Rupert says, "a time for them to be away from the shadow of this area and the tower".

Bonded after their Italian tour, the team fully found their stride in the second season. They lost just one game and won both the league - gaining promotion - and League Cup.

After the fire, Joseph and his family had to spend the first few days living in a local church, before eventually being given a room in a hotel - where they stayed for a year. They have been in temporary housing since.

As time went on, Joseph struggled to come to terms with the night of the fire. He knew people who lost their lives. He recalls a family he would chat to and help out in the tower's lift. They didn't make it out.

"For me, it was super difficult, even now. Every day I feel like I am living back in 2017," he says.

Joseph, who moved to the UK four years ago, is from a family of footballers and grew up playing in his native Trinidad and Tobago - even representing his country at under-17 level.

The team soon helped him escape the trauma in ways he hadn't been able to before. He also started opening up to some of his team-mates about the fire.

"It helped me grow bonds with them, it helped me be open. I can discuss anything with some of my team-mates," he says. "We can chat one to one - man to man - it makes me feel comfortable.

"I don't like being around people, I don't like meeting people, I don't like being in people's space - I like to be around myself. But in football you can't have that.

"You have to be respectful, you have to be considerate to your team-mates, you have to be uplifting. It's different rules - being part of the team."

By mid-March of this year, Grenfell Athletic were joint second in the table, and then coronavirus hit.

"Right now my mental health is going down badly with no football and just staying at home," he said in April. "I can't go to my physio, I can't go to my therapist. It's hard."

Many of the team did not live in Grenfell, but the tower had been a constant in their lives.

Boxer Dan-Dan Keenan, 23, grew up in the area and started training at the Dale Youth Boxing Club inside Grenfell Tower aged 10.

Dan-Dan was outside the tower on the night of the fire, speaking to his best friend's father, Tony, on the phone. Tony was trapped on the 23rd floor and never made it out.

"I rang him when I first got there to tell him there was a fire and he said 'thanks for making me aware but I already know,'" Dan-Dan recalls. "We were watching it, so it's pretty bad."

Dan-Dan soon heard about Grenfell Athletic from local friends he grew up with playing football.

"I wanted to get involved in remembrance of Grenfell and especially in remembrance of Tony. But also, besides that, I just wanted to play football," he says.

"It means that everyone is still talking about Grenfell, which is always a good thing. Obviously we want to remember them and not just let it get swept under the carpet."

While the club is still in its infancy, everyone you speak to from Grenfell Athletic is dreaming big.

Rupert is eyeing up a plot of land in Greenford, west London, that could one day be the team's official home (they currently play around six miles away in Chiswick).

Dan-Dan says that a home ground of their own would help build the team's profile.

"I see a lot of Sunday league clubs - YouTube teams, for example - and they've got hundreds and hundreds of people watching and supporting them," he says.

"If we can get a home pitch which is local to Grenfell I'm sure people - whether they like football or not - will come and support us just because we are representing Grenfell."

Joseph agrees that a real home and top-quality coaching is needed for the team to take the next step up and bag more silverware.

But the importance of Grenfell Athletic goes far beyond titles and trophies for Joseph.

"I have no family here, I'm here on my own with my kids and my partner. Football is my family, football is my community," he says.

"They're like my brothers. Well, they are my brothers."

https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/52904023

 

[MenInG]

Builders behind the disastrous Grenfell Tower refurbishment are finally set to face public questioning over the June 2017 fire that killed 72 people, as the delayed public inquiry resumes on Monday with strict social distancing rules that have angered the bereaved.

Hundreds of survivors, families and residents are among those who will be prohibited from attending the hearings, which will be conducted with only the inquiry panel, led by Sir Martin Moore-Bick, witnesses, their lawyers and cross-examining inquiry counsel present in the Paddington hearing room. Everyone else is being invited to follow proceedings online.

“For us, a part of the justice process is being able to be in the room when people who are responsible for what happened to our loved ones face questions,” said Karim Mussilhy, the vice-chair of the families group Grenfell United, whose uncle Hesham Rahman died in the fire.

“It’s hard to understand why people are allowed back into pubs, but we’re not allowed back into the inquiry. They told us we would be at the heart of this inquiry and now they are saying we’re not allowed in.”

Some survivors, including Nabil Choucair, who lost six members of his family in the fire, wanted the inquiry to resume only when it could reassemble more fully. But the inquiry said a consultation showed most of the more than 600 participants who responded wanted the inquiry to restart sooner with limited attendance. A plan to run the inquiry entirely by Zoom was ditched amid concerns witnesses could be coached by lawyers off screen.

The inquiry said it “acknowledges the importance of allowing the bereaved, survivors and residents to be present in the building as soon as that is possible”. But given the inquiry was about building safety, it stressed “the particular importance of taking health and safety guidance extremely seriously”.

First under cross-examination under the new conditions will be executives from Exova, the fire engineers accused of playing down non-compliance of the cladding system. They will be followed next week by staff at Rydon, the main contractor that oversaw the selection of the plastic-filled panels that spread the fire.

It will be the first time that Rydon executives – including the project manager, Simon Lawrence – have been questioned in public about their role in the £10m works that broke building regulations and contributed to the greatest loss of life in London since the second world war.

“This next phase of the inquiry process is vital,” said Mussilhy. “We’ll hear from the council, our landlord and all the companies that had a hand in turning Grenfell into a death trap. And we’ll start to unpick the corruption, negligence and indifference that led to the death of 72 of our loved ones. Ultimately we’ll start to see where the blame lies.”

The pause in March triggered by the coronavirus pandemic added to delays caused by legal wrangling over the status of evidence from construction industry executives. They sought and received an undertaking from the attorney general that their testimony would not be used to bring criminal charges against them that could include gross negligence manslaughter.

Survivors are also frustrated that the inquiry will break again for the whole of August and is still only sitting for four days a week. It means the inquiry is unlikely to report back until the end of next year at the earliest, meaning no criminal charges would come until 2022.

The testimony of the main contractors is keenly awaited by the Grenfell residents, many of whom were angered by what they saw as disdainful treatment by contractors during the works between 2014 and 2016.

Before the hiatus, the inquiry heard claims that Lawrence, a key executive, failed to respond during planning to concerns that the cladding might be dangerous and could lead to a repeat of a fire at the Lakanal House tower block in south London in 2009 that killed six people.

Project emails showed Rydon, Exova and the architects Studio E discussing the fire safety of the cladding before its installation, including warnings it might fail. Tony Pearson, of Exova, who will be cross-examined next week, told the architects: “If significant flames are ejected from the windows, this would lead to failure of the cladding system, with the external surface falling away and exposing the cavity.”

In November 2014, an official at the Kensington and Chelsea Tenants Management Organisation asked Lawrence to clarify the “fire retardance of the new cladding”, adding: “I just had a ‘Lacknall [sic] moment,” referring to the earlier fatal fire. Lawrence did not reply, the inquiry has heard.

“This was perhaps the last chance to avert disaster,” lawyers for the bereaved and survivors said. “And it was not taken.”

This week there will also be final evidence from Bruce Sounes, the lead architect from Studio E, who admitted he did not read building regulations aimed at preventing cladding fires and had no idea that panels used to insulate buildings could be combustible. The inquiry also heard that Studio E manipulated its fees to avoid the contract being put out to open tender.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news...y-resumes-but-distancing-rules-anger-families

 

[MenInG]

A senior fire engineer did not think putting cladding on Grenfell Tower would pose any "issues" for safety, the inquiry into the disaster has heard.

The hearing was also told Clare Barker was under "huge time pressure" when a safety strategy was produced in 2012.

Sitting for the first time since March, the inquiry is looking at how cladding came to cover the west London building.

The inquiry has concluded that cladding fuelled the fire in June 2017 that killed 72 people.

Warrington-based Dr Barker said she was involved with the refurbishment project only between July and August 2012, and that she then passed on the project to her London-based colleague, Terry Ashton, who was off ill during her involvement.

Dr Barker, the former principal fire engineer at materials testing company Exova, told the inquiry she did not raise the need for any proposed cladding system to have a separate fire safety assessment during a meeting in July 2012.

The inquiry's chief lawyer, Richard Millett QC, asked Dr Barker: "Given that you knew Grenfell Tower would be overclad, although not the details, did you raise the need to carry out a fire assessment specifically in relation to the proposed cladding system as the proposal then stood?"

She replied: "No."

Mr Millett also asked: "At the time, did you consider that cladding this building would present any particular issues or problems with regard to fire safety?"

She replied: "No, I didn't."

An early fee proposal by Exova for a fire assessment of Grenfell Tower in 2012 also assumed a "detailed appraisal" of the building's fire compartmentation was unnecessary because it was a "concrete building", she told the hearing.

Exova has previously said criticism of it is "unjustified" because it was not consulted about the flammable materials that eventually coated the building in North Kensington.

The firm's counsel, Michael Douglas QC, has told the inquiry the company had been "left out" of planning discussions and had been effectively sidelined after Rydon became the main contractor in 2014.

Dr Barker's evidence came as a group representing victims, survivors and the bereaved called for the inquiry to "investigate the extent of institutional racism as a factor" in the tragedy.

The Grenfell Next Of Kin group also called for "inclusive and full participation" in plans for the memorial site and a "proper and independent recovery and support plan" for those directly affected by the disaster.

After considering the night of the fire during the initial stage of the inquiry, the second phase is looking at the refurbishment of the building.

The hearings were resuming after being halted in March over coronavirus restrictions.

But survivors and those bereaved by the blaze have criticised the inquiry for holding limited attendance hearings to comply with social distancing, with only witnesses, some lawyers, and panel members allowed in the inquiry building.

Nabil Choucair, who lost six relatives in the tragedy, said: "We should be allowed to see their faces.

"We are the families that have had our families taken from us."

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-53305733

 

[MenInG]

The Grenfell Tower fire, which led to the deaths of 72 people in 2017, was "inextricably linked with race", an inquiry into the disaster has heard.

Leslie Thomas, representing bereaved families and survivors, said the issue was the "elephant in the room".

And he urged the inquiry to be on the "right side of history" when considering the impacts of both race and poverty on the tragedy.

The inquiry returned this week after a four-month break due to coronavirus.

"The Grenfell fire did not happen in a vacuum," said Mr Thomas in his opening statement.

"A majority of the Grenfell residents who died were people of colour.

"Grenfell is inextricably linked with race. It is the elephant in the room.

"This disaster happened in a pocket of one of the smallest yet richest boroughs in London.

"Yet the community affected was predominantly working-class. That is the stark reality that cannot be ignored."

He added that the inquiry "must not ignore" what he described as the impact of race and poverty on the disaster that unfolded.

The Grenfell Next of Kin group has called for the inquiry to "investigate the extent of institutional racism as a factor" in the fire in June 2017.

Legal submissions made to the inquiry explain there were four visitors to the tower among the dead and also stillborn Baby Logan Gomes and then adds: "Of the remaining 67, 57 were from BAME (black, Asian and other ethnic minority) communities.

"In the English Housing Survey 2017-2018, it was found that 40% of those living in high-rise buildings in the social rented sector are black, Asian or other. This, compared to the per cent of the population (14%), is high."

Mr Thomas told the inquiry chairman Sir Martin Moore-Bick: "This is your time of action to break the cycle of disengagement with the issue of race and inequality.

"What will this inquiry be remembered for? You will undoubtedly want it to be on the right side of history."

On Monday, the inquiry heard how a senior fire safety engineer did not think putting cladding on Grenfell Tower would pose any "issues" for safety.

In its first phase, the inquiry concluded that cladding fuelled the fire in June 2017. The second phase is examining how it could have happened in the first place.

https://www.bbc.com/news/amp/uk-53320082?__twitter_impression=true

 

[Firebat]

Grenfell Tower inquiry: Lead fire consultant 'ignored' cladding email

The lead fire safety consultant of the Grenfell Tower refurbishment ignored documents outlining proposed cladding and insulation materials, the inquiry into the fire has heard.

Terry Ashton said he did not read an email from project architects detailing a planned cladding system because he was not the "primary recipient".

The hearing was told he also failed to read the architect's progress report.

The inquiry returned this week after a four-month break due to coronavirus.

In its first phase, the inquiry concluded that cladding fuelled the fire in the west London residential block in June 2017, in which 72 people died.

This second phase of the inquiry is looking at the refurbishment of the block.

Mr Ashton, of fire engineering firm Exova, ignored an email from architecture firm Studio E on 23 October 2012 which included attachments containing details and drawings of a planned cladding system.

Asked why, he told the hearing on Wednesday that he was not among the email's "primary recipients", adding that people are often copied into emails on big projects in "a sort of scattergun approach".

The Inquiry's counsel, Kate Grange QC, asked him: "Wasn't that a really important document prepared by the architects that would inform your work on the outline fire safety strategy?"

Mr Ashton said he would not have read it unless "specifically asked to do so".

He added: "To just send me a link ... without any instruction as to what I should do with it, then I would ignore it, which is what I did."

The inquiry also heard that he did not read the architect's progress report which he was sent on 31 October, and failed to mention plans to cover the tower block in cladding at all in his first fire safety report published on the same day.

He said: "It was not on my mind at that time, I guess.

"Had we had some sort of preliminary details of the cladding for us to consider then we might have incorporated it in the list."

Mr Ashton, a fire consultant of 25 years and with no formal training as a fire engineer, said his main focus was on the refurbishment of the lower four floors of the 24-storey tower block at the time

Ms Grange showed Mr Ashton the architect's 2012 Stage C report - which he was seeing for the first time - that included drawings and proposed cladding and insulation materials.

She asked him whether he agreed that it contained "specific information" about what was proposed, including the type of insulation to be used in the tower block's outer cladding.

He replied: "I can see that now, yes."

Exova has previously said criticism of it is "unjustified" because it was not consulted about the flammable materials which eventually coated the building in North Kensington.

The firm's counsel, Michael Douglas QC, has told the inquiry the company had been "left out" of planning discussions and had been effectively sidelined after Rydon became the main contractor in 2014.

The inquiry heard on Monday that Dr Clare Barker, the former principal fire engineer at Exova, did not raise the need for any proposed cladding system to have a separate fire safety assessment during a meeting in July 2012.

On Tuesday, a lawyer representing survivors told the inquiry that it "must not ignore" the impact of race and poverty on the disaster.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-53336670

 

[MenInG]

The main contractor on the Grenfell Tower refurbishment overlooked a key fire safety document, the inquiry into the blaze has heard.

It included requirements regarding the fire hazards of certain cladding materials and had to be kept on-site.

But Simon Lawrence, contracts manager at building firm Rydon, said the "sheer amount of information" involved in the project led to it being missed.

The inquiry's first phase found that cladding fuelled the June 2017 fire.

Hearings in the second phase of the inquiry returned last week after a four-month break due to coronavirus.

This second phase is examining the refurbishment of the 24-storey residential block in North Kensington, west London, in which 72 people died.

The inquiry heard on Thursday that a copy of the Standard for Systemised Building Envelopes, compiled by the Centre for Window and Cladding Technology, had to be kept on-site under National Building Specifications.

The document states that "the building envelope shall not be composed of materials which readily support combustion, add significantly to the fire load, and/or give off toxic fumes".

Asked about the guidance by inquiry lawyer Richard Millett QC, Mr Lawrence said: "We wouldn't have had a copy on site.

"It obviously wasn't picked up in all the documents we had to go through... it obviously wasn't noticed."

Mr Lawrence said the "sheer amount of information" led to it being missed, but said he was familiar with the "principle" of the guidance but not the "technical part".

Asked about what steps Rydon took to supervise the overall project and ensure the works were being completed with safe materials, he said: "I think it would be using a competent design team, competent specialist contractors, backed up by building control and all the layers within."

He said it was up to Rydon's sub-contracted design team including architects Studio E and external wall firm Harley Facades to check that any materials being used on the tower block refurbishment were safe and complied with the regulations.

Mr Lawrence, who was involved in the project between June 2014 and October 2015, agreed that this boiled down to Rydon being "reliant on others".

He said in his witness statement that "at no point" did he "have any reason to believe" materials were to be used which did not meet legal requirements.

Thursday's appearance before the inquiry was the first time that Rydon, the company at the centre of the refurbishment, had given evidence.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-53429808

 

[The Viper]

A company that made insulation used on Grenfell Tower was "stretching the truth" by claiming its product was appropriate for use on high-rise buildings, a former employee has said.

Kingspan fire-tested its cladding product in 2005, but changed the insulation's formulation the next year.
The new version of the product failed to repeat the same performance.

Ex-technical director Ivor Meredith told the inquiry into the fire this was "common knowledge" at Kingspan.

The first phase of the Grenfell inquiry concluded that cladding put on the west London tower block during its refurbishment fuelled the fire in June 2017 in which 72 people died.

The inquiry is now examining how the blaze could have happened in the first place.

 

[Firebat]

Grenfell Tower cladding less safe than classification indicated, boss tells inquiry

A French managing director who has taken seven months to agree to give evidence at the Grenfell inquiry has agreed it was "false" that the combustible cladding used on the Grenfell Tower was under the same fire classification as other types of cladding.

The inquiry has begun hearing long-awaited evidence from Claude Schmidt, managing director of Arconic Architectural Products, the French firm that made the combustible cladding, after he originally refused to co-operate with the inquiry.

When asked if he agreed the type of flammable cladding never achieved the Class B fire classification published in its specification, he answered "yes".

Mr Schmidt said that until after the Grenfell fire "we were not aware of what was written within the fire test" about the type of cladding used on the tower block.

When asked if Arconic as a company accepts responsibility for selling the cladding on a "false basis", he replied "yes on incomplete information yes".

He said the information about fire classification was not false but it "didn't go into detail, it didn't mention according to European standards the different reactions to fire".

Mr Schmidt said there would be a "basic understanding" of the rules in countries that the company were selling products to, but he said "Arconic's approach is that we didn't have a detailed knowledge of the regulation".

The senior executive then accepted that as a manufacturer Arconic should know how its product would perform in a fire.

When asked why new fire classification tests that complied with English standards were not carried on the type of cladding used on Grenfell Tower when it began being produced in France, Mr Schmidt said "frankly I have no idea".

Mr Schmidt then agreed fresh tests would have been a "good idea". He added: "I do think potentially some extra tests would have been merited."

Mr Schmidt said he did not accept personal responsibility as managing director and president of Arconic Architectural products for the "false sale" of the cladding.

He said: "I felt the product was suitable and in accordance with British legislation as I understood it at the time," but added he was "sorry" he "didn't know" the English legislation.

Mr Schmidt said: "What I understand now is that there were different ways of being in agreement with English legislation."

Mr Schmidt was one of four witnesses from the firm who cited a rarely-used French law designed to protect commercial secrets, to avoid giving evidence.

The other three, Claude Wehrle; Peter Froehlich and Gwenaëlle Derrendinger, have not yet agreed to co-operate with the inquiry.

The second phase of the Grenfell inquiry, which looks at how the building came to be covered in combustible cladding, resumed last week after being paused before Christmas because of COVID-19.

72 people were killed after the 24-storey building caught fire in June 2017.

Mr Schmidt is due to give evidence all week.

https://news.sky.com/story/grenfell...ication-indicated-boss-tells-inquiry-12219903

 

[James]

<b>BBC — Cladding: More flat owners to be freed from bills.</b>

Flat owners will not have to pay to remove dangerous cladding from lower-height buildings under new government plans, BBC Newsnight understands.

It means leaseholders in buildings of between 11 and 18.5m will no longer be expected to take out personal loans to cover the cost of the work.

Instead, the government will try to secure up to £4bn from developers towards the costs.

It had already promised to pay to remove cladding in taller buildings.

If ministers are unable to secure the funding from developers it may come out of the housing department's budget.

In the wake of the Grenfell fire, which killed 72 people in 2017, flammable cladding and other fire safety defects were discovered in hundreds of blocks of flats across the UK.

Removing cladding can cost millions of pounds per block, with the cost often being borne by individual flat owners, under the leasehold system in England and Wales.

Hundreds of thousands of people are still living in dangerous blocks more than four years on from Grenfell - while many flat owners have been left with spiralling insurance costs, service charges, and requirements for expensive 24-hour "waking watch" patrols in case of fire.

In a new package of measures to be announced next week, Michael Gove, Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, will tell the Commons that if developers choose not to pay for cladding removals voluntarily the government will threaten them with legal compulsion.

The BBC understands Mr Gove will warn them next week that he is putting them "on notice".

Previously, the government had committed up to £5bn for the removal of dangerous cladding for buildings taller than 18.5m.

Cladding campaigners have long asked that the government accept both the principle that buildings under 18.5m ought to be covered and that leaseholders should not have to pay.

Newsnight has seen documents from Chief Secretary to the Treasury Simon Clarke to Mr Gove where he says:
— That no new Treasury funding will be available to pay for this extra work
—That the cost of the extra cladding removal must not exceed £4bn
— That this new provision will cover cladding only, rather than other fire safety defects
— That if Mr Gove is unsuccessful in persuading or compelling developers to pay for the costs that it must be paid for from existing housing budgets and that "safety should be prioritised over supply"

Experts question whether £4bn will be sufficient to cover cladding in buildings under 18.5m.

And cladding is not the only or even main problem in thousands of buildings across the country.

It is unclear how those leaseholders will pay their bills, and how quickly any money that does come from developers will appear.

Developers have largely insisted that their developments were built to regulations and that they are therefore not liable.

Without immediate compulsion this process threatens to continue to be drawn out with leaseholders stuck in properties they cannot sell.

Stewart Baseley, chairman of the Home Builders Federation - which represents developers, said the largest house builders had already spent or committed to spending £1bn to remediate affected buildings and said the most urgent action was for the government to define guidance on what work actually needed to be done to resolve issues for residents.

He said while house builders were "committed to playing their part" there were other organisations involved in the construction of affected buildings which should also be involved in remediation costs, "not least material manufacturers who designed, tested and sold materials that developers purchased in good faith that were later proved to not be fit for purpose".

Hundreds of thousands of leaseholders have already received bills for fire remediation works or will in the coming months.

It is also not clear whether these measures will be enough to restore market and lender confidence in new-build properties.

Campaigner Steve Day told BBC Radio 4's Today programme he and his neighbours were facing a £31,000 per flat bill for cladding costs, as well as about £5,000 per flat in non-cladding costs and an extra £3,000 a year service charge, which he said was huge for south-east London.

"People are facing arrears, and high levels of stress," he said.

He said he was concerned voluntary contributions will "just not be deliverable", and called for a scheme where the government made developers pay if they breached regulations.

Conservative MP Sir Peter Bottomley, chairman of the all party parliamentary group on leasehold and commonhold reform, said the government needed to tell the insurance companies to "come to the table" with £8bn - "then innocent leaseholders will live in homes which are safe and saleable".

Matthew Pennycook, Labour's shadow housing minister, tweeted the new measures "appear far less significant than they sound", with "nothing on non-cladding defects, no new developer levy and the position on leaseholder liability unchanged".

Many leaseholders have found their properties effectively worthless and unmortgageable.

In November, Mr Gove questioned why flat owners should have to pay anything for dangerous cladding to be removed from their buildings.

He said the government had a responsibility to help leaseholders - who were "innocent parties" - with the huge costs.

The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities declined to comment.

— — —

 

[silentkiller187]

Grenfell Tower inquiry: Government has 'failed to complete a single recommendation', Sadiq Khan says

The London mayor accused the government of "failing the Grenfell community, putting lives at risk and leaving residents feeling unsafe in their homes" by not acting faster on recommendations made in the first phase of the inquiry into the 2017 fire, which claimed 72 lives.


The government has "failed to complete a single recommendation" from the public inquiry into the Grenfell Tower fire, London mayor Sadiq Khan has said.

Mr Khan questioned whether the government and housing sector are taking steps to move forward with the recommendations made in the first phase of the inquiry into the 2017 fire, which claimed 72 lives.

Its first phase looked at how the fire spread through the 24-storey west London tower block.

Mayor of London Sadiq Khan attends the launch of the Wandsworth Food Bus, at South Thames College in south-west London. Picture date: Friday November 26, 2021.
Image:
Sadiq Khan urged the government to 'act now'
Mayor 'extremely concerned' by lack of progress

Mr Khan said he was "extremely concerned" by the lack of progress made by the government since the report's recommendations were published in October 2019.

The Inquiry's Phase 1 report included 12 recommendations aimed primarily at the government. None have been completed so far and the government had not provided a date for when they will be, according to Mr Khan's office.

It said the recommendations include vital changes to legislation and national guidelines on building regulations, including those that relate to fire safety.


Mr Khan announced that the London Fire Brigade (LFB) has completed 26 of the 29 recommendations directed at them and other fire rescue services

The LFB has introduced smoke hoods to aid in the rescue of people in smoke-filled environments and 32m and 64m ladders to help tackle fires in high-rise buildings, as well as an extensive training programme to put in place changes in how the brigade responds to high-rise fires.

The first phase of the inquiry looked at how the fire spread through the tower block
Mr Khan said the LFB has made "significant changes" and appears to be committed to putting the recommendations in place "as swiftly as possible".

He added: "However, I am extremely concerned the government has failed to complete a single recommendation from the first phase of the inquiry.

"It is vital that the government and the housing and building industries act now and do not wait for the inquiry's next report to take action on such an important issue.

"Without faster action, the government is failing the Grenfell community, putting lives at risk and leaving residents feeling unsafe in their homes. The government, housing and building industries must not wait to implement the wholesale reforms that are needed to fix a broken system."

The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities said that Mr Khan's claim was "unfounded".

A spokesman said: "The government is making progress towards implementing the Grenfell Tower Inquiry's Phase 1 recommendations.

"We're introducing the biggest improvements in building safety for a generation - with tougher regulations that will give more rights and protections for residents and make homes safer.

"Our new building safety regulator will enforce a more stringent regulatory regime for high-rise residential buildings, and oversee the safety and performance of all buildings."

https://news.sky.com/story/grenfell...ingle-recommendation-sadiq-khan-says-12571898

 

[MenInG]

On 14 June 2017, a small flat fire spread rapidly up a west London tower block and engulfed the building in a raging inferno.

The Grenfell Tower fire left 72 people dead in what is remembered as one of the worst tragedies in the history of modern Britain.

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Feelings of despair turned into anger in the days after the fire when it emerged there were serious problems with the safety of the building.

Tuesday marks the fifth anniversary of the tragedy, and a wide-ranging public inquiry into the disaster is due to end next month as activists continue to fight for justice.

The Metropolitan Police has been investigating the fire but cannot bring any criminal charges, such as corporate manslaughter, until the public inquiry has been completed.

Here, we take a look at the main things that have been learned in the inquiry so far.

The cladding firm knew of the fire risk

The reason the fire was able to spread so quickly up the 24-storey block was because it had been covered in flammable cladding during the refurbishment project that took place between 2012 and 2016.

The cladding had been provided by a firm called Arconic, whose former UK sales manager admitted to the inquiry in February 2021 that she knew the cladding could burn but did not warn customers.

Debbie French, who was sales manager between 2007 and 2014, said the company's more flammable options were cheaper and therefore sold as part of a market strategy to increase the chance of securing contracts.

It was not just the cladding that burned

In September 2020, the inquiry heard combustible materials had been packed around the new windows during the refurbishment that "contributed to the speed at which the fire spread from the flat... to a multi-storey external fire".

It emerged Mark Dixon, who ran the subcontracting firm SD Plastering that installed the material, had complained the works were giving him a "headache" and he needed to "find ways of making it easier and quicker".

The gaps around the windows were supposed to be packed with non-combustible Rockwool insulation fibre. However, SD Plastering used combustible Celotex foam boards.

Insulation manufacturer cheated fire safety test

There were two types of combustible plastic foam insulation used on the outside of Grenfell Tower.

In November 2020, the public inquiry heard Celotex, which made the majority of the insulation, added a non-combustible material to its product to ensure it would pass a fire safety test in 2014.

It hid the material's use from the fire test report, official certification bodies and even the company's sale staff.

The material was also not mentioned in the marketing of the product that was advertised as "suitable for use" on high-rise buildings.

Meanwhile, the second company that provided insulation was Kingspan, which sold its products for use on high-rise buildings without a relevant large-scale fire test.

Its insulation passed a test in 2005 but Kingspan changed the product a year later.

The inquiry heard subsequently tested products turned into a "raging inferno" but Kingspan continued to sell its insulation using the 2005 test on the old material.

Shoddy workmanship

The refurbishment project that took place on the Grenfell Tower was undermined by "shockingly poor workmanship", the inquiry heard in July 2020.

Fire barriers in the cladding system were installed upside down and the wrong way round.

Some were roughly cut and gaps were left.

Building control officer lacked relevant experience

The local authority building control officer responsible for inspecting the Grenfell Tower refurbishment had no previous experience of an overcladding project on an occupied high-rise residential building, the inquiry heard in September 2020.

John Hoban described himself as "heartbroken" over the disaster and accepted he made "serious failings" in his work.

He didn't notice that cavity barriers had not been designed around the windows to stop flames spreading to the outside wall.

Mr Hoban also failed to recognise the cladding materials on the building were not suitable for use together on high-rise buildings.

Firefighters who attended the blaze did not have training on how to best combat a cladding fire, the inquiry heard in 2019.

A report released after the first phase of the inquiry found there was a lack of training in how to "recognise the need for an evacuation or how to organise one" and incident commanders "of relatively junior rank" were unable to change strategy.

Sir Martin Moore-Bick, the inquiry chairman, also criticised the London Fire Brigade for how it implemented a "stay put" strategy, where firefighters and 999 operators told residents to stay in their flats for nearly two hours after the blaze broke out.

The strategy was rescinded at 2.47am, with Sir Martin saying lives would have been saved if the advice had ended about an hour earlier.

SKY

 

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Firefighters are attending a blaze at a high-rise block in Shepherd's Bush, west London.

London Fire Brigade said eight engines and around 60 firefighters were at the scene of the tower block in Queensdale Crescent.

The brigade said half of a flat on the 12th floor of the building was on fire, and added that the person who reported it sent live stream videos of the incident to the Brigade's 999 call centre.

The blaze was reported at 9.23am and was under control by 10.55am. The cause is being investigated.

Station Commander David Bracewell said from the scene: "Three people from the affected flat left before the brigade arrived. A number of other residents evacuated the building.

"Firefighters led six residents to safety via an internal staircase. Further residents who were not affected by fire, heat or smoke were advised to remain in their flats."

London Ambulance Service said paramedics were treating "a number of patients" at the scene.

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The BBC is to make a TV drama telling the story of the Grenfell Tower fire.

The three-part series, titled Grenfell, will dramatise the events surrounding the night of 14 June 2017, when 72 people died as a result of the blaze.

It will piece together the stories of survivors, bereaved family members and firefighters, using interviews and evidence from the public inquiry.

Writer and director Peter Kosminsky said he hoped the show would "reach the heart of this catastrophe".

He said he wanted the series to examine "how such a thing can have happened; [and] how we can avoid it ever happening again".

"Occasionally, events occur in our national story which touch us all," he said in a statement.

"The fire at Grenfell Tower is such an event. We remember what we were doing when we heard about it, remember the pictures, the saturation coverage.

"And yet, despite this, despite the many newspaper pages and TV hours devoted to the story, we may be left with a less than clear sense of exactly what happened, what went wrong."

The BBC said the series would provide "a comprehensive account of the events leading up to, during, and after the devastating fire".

It is not yet known how the drama will depict the night of the fire itself in the London tower block.

BBC

 

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UK inquiry finds ‘dishonesty and greed’ behind Grenfell Tower fire deaths​

Incompetence, dishonesty and greed were behind the 72 “avoidable” deaths in the Grenfell Tower fire in London, a report into the 2017 tragedy has concluded.

Delivered on Wednesday following a six-year inquiry, the final report stated that decades of failure by United Kingdom governments, indifference to safety by authorities, dishonest and incompetent manufacturers and installers of building materials, and a lack of strategy by firefighters were the main contributors to the shocking death toll.

Those in the 24-storey block were “badly failed” over many years, said the inquiry chairman, Martin Moore-Bick, speaking at a news conference on Wednesday. “The simple truth is that the deaths that occurred were all avoidable.”

He added that the two-phase inquiry, which has convened more than 300 public hearings and examined about 1,600 witness statements, took longer than hoped due to its broad scope and because “many more matters of concern” had been discovered than originally expected.

The long-awaited report said the elements identified contributed to varying degrees to the rapid spread of the blaze and failure to rescue residents. This was largely due to incompetence, the chairman said, but in some cases “dishonesty and greed”.

The first phase of the inquiry had found that the fire had been fuelled by the cladding used on the building, which was made of aluminium composite material (ACM), a mixture of aluminium and plastic.

The highly combustible cladding was used on the building because it was cheap and because of the “incompetence of the organisations and individuals involved in the refurbishment” – including architects, engineers and contractors – all of whom thought safety was someone else’s responsibility, the report said.

The government and authorities failed over decades to assess the dangers of such cladding, Moore-Bick said.

The tenant management organisation of the local authority is accused of manipulating the process of appointing the architect who oversaw the installation of the cladding.

The report reserved particular criticism for the companies that manufactured the cladding, accusing them of engaging in “systematic dishonesty,” manipulating safety tests and misrepresenting the results to claim the material was safe.

The London Fire Brigade was also criticised for a “chronic lack of effective management and leadership”.

The report said firefighters were not adequately trained to deal with a high-rise fire and were issued with old communications equipment that did not work properly.

The report made multiple recommendations, including the introduction of tougher fire safety rules, the establishment of a national fire and rescue college and a single independent regulator for the construction industry to replace the current mishmash of bodies.

London Mayor Sadiq Khan said the report was a “gut-wrenching” read. He said that “more must now be done to hold those responsible to account, including banning any of the companies held responsible by the inquiry from receiving any public contracts as the police and CPS look into bringing criminal prosecutions”.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer apologised to the relatives of victims and survivors on behalf of the state following the report, saying they had been failed for years.

“It should never have happened. The country failed to discharge its most fundamental duty, to protect you and your loved ones,” he said in a statement to parliament.

“Today is a long awaited day of truth, but it must now lead to a day of justice,” he added.

The lapses and mistakes detailed in the report could trigger criminal charges. Nineteen organisations and 58 individuals are currently under investigation.

Charges could include corporate manslaughter, gross negligence manslaughter, fraud, health and safety offences and misconduct in a public office.

However, police have said charges will not be filed before 2026.

Survivors and bereaved families expressed concern that the report may spread blame too widely to see anyone punished properly.

“We were denied justice for seven years and now told there will be several more years,” the Grenfell Next of Kin group said in a statement on Wednesday. “Our realistic concern is that the ‘web of blame’ presented through the inquiry will be a barrier to our justice.”

Relatives of victims blamed the inquiry for delays, saying they were not consulted on whether it should be set up.

“None of the direct kin families were informed about an inquiry,” said Hisam Choucair, a member of the group, who lost six family members in the blaze.

The inquiry, he said, had been ordered the morning after the fire when survivors were “looking for our families in hospitals and in shock”.

“Our voices were robbed. We were not given the choice, and we did not know the consequences and the impact on our right to justice.”

The disaster has left many people living in buildings covered in similar cladding, fearful of a repeat tragedy.

Moore-Bick said warning signs emerged as early as 1991 that some kinds of materials, in particular ACM panels with unmodified polyethylene cores, were “dangerous”.

However, the authorities had failed to amend statutory guidance on the construction of external walls.

“That is where the seeds of the disaster were sown,” he says.

In the wake of the fire, the UK government banned metal composite cladding panels for all new buildings and ordered similar combustible cladding to be removed from hundreds of tower blocks across the country.

But due to the expense, work is yet to be carried out on some apartment buildings because of wrangling over who should pay.

A fire in Dagenham, East London, just over a week ago illustrated the continuing risks.

More than 80 people had to be evacuated in the middle of the night after waking to smoke and flames in a block where work to remove “non-compliant” cladding was partially completed.

According to UK government data up to July, 4,630 buildings standing at 11 metres or higher still have unsafe cladding, with work on replacing the material yet to start on half of them.

All those who died in the building had been “overcome by toxic gases produced by the fire,” said Moore-Bick. The fire was above all a “human tragedy”, he added, referring to lives lost, families torn asunder, homes destroyed and a community shattered.

The victims came from 23 countries and included taxi drivers and architects, a poet, an acclaimed young artist, retirees and 18 children.

It prompted soul-searching about inequality in Britain. Located in one of London’s richest neighbourhoods, Grenfell was a public housing building and many of its inhabitants were working-class people with immigrant roots.

UK inquiry finds ‘dishonesty and greed’ behind Grenfell Tower fire deaths

The six-year inquiry condemns ‘decades of failure’ by governments, incompetence, dishonesty and greed.

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Tragedies like Grenfell cannot be completely avoided, says Sir Tony Blair​

Sir Tony Blair has warned that tragedies such as the Grenfell Tower fire cannot be completely avoided.

The former prime minister, who left office in 2007, said it was a "difficult thing to say", but that even when systems work well and are "well intentioned", people are "going to make mistakes".

"This is a difficult thing to say, but it's the honest truth - however good your system is and however well intentioned it is, and however hard people work, they're going to make mistakes," he replied.

"It's important that you hold people accountable for those mistakes, of course - but I don't think you're ever going to get a situation where decisions are perfectly taken in perfect circumstances and there aren't accidents or tragedies that occur.

"It's just important every time they do occur to try and learn the lessons of them."

Sir Tony was speaking just a day after a landmark report into the tragedy by Grenfell Inquiry chair Sir Martin Moore-Bick concluded the government was "well aware" of the deadly risks posed by combustible cladding and insulation a year before the fire broke out but "failed to act on what it knew".

Seventy-two people died after flames engulfed the 24-storey tower block in Latimer Road, west London, on 14 June 2017.

Sir Martin's report also said "systematic dishonesty" from cladding and insulation companies and a "toxic" relationship between the tower's residents and the Tenant Management Organisation (TMO), which was responsible for running services, were contributing factors to the tragedy.

Sir Martin also concluded that government officials were "complacent, defensive and dismissive" on fire safety, while cutting red tape was prioritised.

Grenfell residents who raised safety concerns were dismissed as "militant troublemakers", he said.

The report's findings prompted an apology from Sir Keir Starmer, who told bereaved families he was "deeply sorry" for the actions of the British government.

Asked what he believed his "biggest mistake" was while in government, Sir Tony said: "I always say to people, it's for me to know and others to find out - but I'm sure there's a lot of people who would say it's over post 9/11 and Afghanistan and Iraq and so on.

"But, you know, I've debated that issue many, many times."

Tragedies like Grenfell cannot be completely avoided, says Sir Tony Blair

The former prime minister tells the Politics Hub with Sophy Ridge that no matter how effective a country's systems are, "people are going to make mistakes".

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