#grenfell tower inquiry

[mariacallous]

David Cameron has provoked a wave of indignation from Grenfell fire survivors and housing campaigners after claiming that the inquiry agreed with him that fire regulations had not been part of his government’s “red tape drive” to cut regulations.

But campaigners said the former prime minister’s words were “bollocks” and “total bullshit”, since the inquiry report had explicitly said the effect of the Coalition government’s attack on red tape was that “even matters affecting the safety of life were ignored, delayed or disregarded”.

Ed Daffarn, 62, a Grenfell tower resident who raised multiple concerns about fire safety before the fire, said he was “angry but not surprised”, and said Cameron was “failing to take responsibility”.

After Cameron’s government came to power in 2010, it created a “one in, one out” rule where new regulations could only come into force if another was scrapped, later becoming one in, two out and one in, three out.

Survivors of the Grenfell tower fire in June 2017 believe that the lack of regulations and ministers’ failure to act on a coroner’s report into a fire at Lakanal House, another London tower block, eight years earlier had contributed to the avoidable disaster that killed 72 people.

When the inquiry examined the issue, chair Sir Martin Moore-Bick took evidence from Eric Pickles, the housing secretary under Cameron, who made the claim that his prime minister’s “red tape challenge” had specifically excluded fire safety.

The inquiry report said it was “unable to accept his evidence” on the issue, which was “flatly contradicted by that of his officials and by the contemporaneous documents”.

Cameron’s government had excluded one part of fire regulations, the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005, the inquiry found, but not building regulations and other documents which had a material impact on how construction firms approached fire safety concerns. Pickles’s remarks “served only to reveal the limits of his understanding” about the difference, it said.

In its summary, the inquiry was explicit that “the government’s deregulatory agenda, enthusiastically supported by some junior ministers and [Pickles],dominated the department [for community, housing and local government]’s thinking to such an extent that even matters affecting the safety of life were ignored, delayed or disregarded.”

And it said the government “determinedly resisted calls from across the fire sector to regulate fire risk assessors and to amend the Fire Safety Order to make it clear that it applied to the exterior walls of buildings containing more than one set of domestic premises”.

The former prime minister chose to make his first statement since the report was published last Wednesday in a post on X, formerly Twitter, at 6pm on Friday evening.

Cameron said “all of us who have served in positions of power” had made mistakes and said he wanted to “echo” apologies by Keir Starmer and Rishi Sunak to survivors and the community, saying: “the British state let you down”.

Yet he claimed: “The report is clear that fire safety and building safety regulations were explicitly excluded from the Coalition Government’s greatly-needed ‘red tape reviews’, given the importance we placed on safety and build quality. Indeed, the Coalition and post-2015 governments took steps to increase fire safety regulation.”

Pete Apps, who won the Orwell Prize for his book Show Me the Bodies: How We Let Grenfell Happen, said Cameron’s statement was “demonstrably and very clearly total bullshit”.

“Cameron is making the same mistake Pickles did when giving evidence – conflating the regulatory reform order, which was exempt, with the building regulations, which weren’t,” he said, adding that the failures that contributed to Grenfell related to building regulations.

“Whoever wrote that statement for him either hasn’t read the report, has woefully misunderstood or is lying about its conclusions.”

Ed Daffarn, who survived the Grenfell fire, said Cameron and Pickles were acting in the same way as some of the corporations involved, denying culpability in the face of the inquiry’s findings and the impact of the ministerial drive to reduce regulation.

“I feel angry, but I’m not surprised,” said Daffarn. “The report is a damning indictment of a government that put UK plc before the health and safety of Grenfell. The result is that 72 people die because the regulations didn’t keep them safe.

“Cameron and Pickles are failing to take responsibility in the aftermath, despite the overwhelming evidence put before the inquiry and its findings.”

Giles Grover, co-leader of End Our Cladding Scandal, said “that’s bollocks” when told of Cameron’s comments.

“It was Cameron’s government’s focus on deregulation that played a key part in people’s homes not being safe,” Grover said. “His government wanted to ‘kill off the health and safety culture for good’ amid a ‘bonfire of red tape’, and this culture pervaded throughout government, including housing and building regulations, during his tenure as prime minister, whatever he may now wish to believe.”

The Grenfell Next of Kin group, which represents immediate bereaved families, said Cameron’s comments were “staggering”. A spokesperson for the group said: “Has he followed the inquiry or listened to the evidence? We heard quite clearly that from 2010 onwards the government pursued a drive that had a disdain for regulations.”

Masoumeh Samimi, 38, whose mother and aunt were killed in the fire on the 23rd floor, said: “David Cameron is talking without thinking, and his statement is ridiculous. They had a bonfire of regulations, with no regard to the lives of people.

“We buried the ashes of his “bonfire of regulation”. Samimi said she was told as recently as a year ago that police had found “another piece of bone” believed to be part of the remains of her mother.

Jennifer Frame, a former resident of Richmond House, which was destroyed by fire two years after Grenfell, said: “It is astonishing to see former prime ministers who held power and responsibility for the deregulatory culture which led to Grenfell trying to rewrite history to say they are blameless.

“This is just a continuation of the buck-passing and blame-shifting culture that was laid bare by the inquiry. If the political class cannot acknowledge their failings, then nothing will change.

“David Cameron boasted of cutting red tape, and he should not be surprised if the culture he presided over and the so-called ‘bonfire of regulations’ contributed to turning people’s homes into actual bonfires.”

[ceevee5]

No report until the summer of 2024. So any criminal prosecutions for manslaughter are unlikely to start until late 2025 or even 2026.

[sztupy]

Bezzeg a portás már nem dolgozhat közintézményekben gondolom

[jaybird1306]

Disability campaigners lose legal fight over Grenfell recommendation

Campaign group Claddag, founded by Georgie Hulme (right) and Sarah Rennie (centre-left), took the government to the High Court

By Hayley Clarke & Nathan Standley

Journalist

Campaigners have lost their High Court battle with the government over its decision not to implement evacuation plans for disabled high-rise residents.

Campaign group Claddag wanted it to be a legal requirement for escape plans to be in place for those who might not be able to get out safely in an emergency.

But a Home Office consultation found the Grenfell Tower Inquiry's recommendations would be too costly and impractical to implement.

It is pursuing an alternative idea.

In October 2019, the chairman of the Grenfell Inquiry recommended that there should be a legal requirement for owners and managers of high-rise residential buildings to prepare "Peeps" (personal emergency evacuation plans) for residents with mobility issues or visual, hearing or cognitive impairments.

In the Grenfell fire, which killed 72 people in June 2017, 41% of the tower block's disabled residents died.

Future of Grenfell Tower still unsure six years on

'I want to escape a burning building not sit and wait'

Disabled Grenfell residents 'had no escape route'

In response to the inquiry's recommendations, the Home Office launched a consultation on whether to implement the Peeps proposals.

In May 2022, the government indicated that it would not be introducing a legal requirement for Peeps amid concerns about practicality and cost.

Claddag, which was founded by two disabled tower-block residents, Sarah Rennie and Georgie Hulme, took that decision to a judicial review at the High Court in December.

During the hearing, the Home Office's legal representative argued that the government was actually still consulting on the proposals and a final decision had not yet been made.

Announcing her judgment on Friday, Mrs Justice Stacey ruled that the government had in fact decided against implementing the Peeps recommendation, but said it was entitled to do so after weighing up the fire-safety implications against the costs of delivering it.

In a joint-statement, Claddag's founders said the government had decided to "prioritise money over disabled people's lives" and "leave disabled and older people living in high-rise buildings without means of escape".

A Home Office spokesperson said: "We are pleased with the court's decision as it allows us to get on with delivering proposals that enhance the safety of residents whose ability to self-evacuate in an emergency may be compromised.

"We are currently analysing responses to our public consultation on Emergency Evacuation Information Sharing Plus, which is an alternative to Personal Emergency Evacuation Plans, to understand how best to achieve this."

[gwydionmisha]

I'm furious. This is shameful.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

This day in history

Today (May 22), I’m keynoting Public Knowledge’s Emerging Tech conference in DC.

Tomorrow (May 23), I’ll be in TORONTO for a book launch for Red Team Blues that’s part of WEPFest, a benefit for the West End Phoenix, onstage with Dave Bidini (The Rheostatics), Ron Diebert (Citizen Lab) and the whistleblower Dr Nancy Olivieri.

#20yrsago Dear Hollywood: neener neener neener https://web.archive.org/web/20030524173415/http://www.instapundit.com/archives/009672.php

#20yrsago EFF on Total Info Awareness https://web.archive.org/web/20030528233343/https://www.eff.org/Privacy/TIA/20030523_tia_report_review.php

#15yrsago Villagers from three continents will confront Chevron execs at annual meeting https://web.archive.org/web/20080520120807/https://www.chevrontoxico.com/

#10yrsago How London cops use social media to spy on protest movements https://www.itnews.com.au/news/police-tap-social-media-in-wake-of-london-attack-344319

#10yrsago Vermont passes anti-patent-troll law https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/vermont-enacts-1st-u-s-law-against-patent-trolling-1.1372639

#10yrsago RIAA losing money, firing employees, giving execs raises https://torrentfreak.com/riaa-makes-drastic-employee-cuts-as-revenue-plummets-130522/

#10yrsago Forging £1 coins is apparently profitable https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-london-22612487

#5yrsago 500,000 home routers have been infected with VPNFilter, malware that steals data and bricks devices https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2018/05/hackers-infect-500000-consumer-routers-all-over-the-world-with-malware/

#5yrsago The FBI’s mountain of uncrackable crimephones was nearly entirely imaginary https://www.emptywheel.net/2018/05/23/did-the-fbi-have-a-chance-to-fix-their-lies-about-encryption-in-2016/

#5yrsago A free internet is a configurable internet https://www.oreilly.com/content/cory-doctorow-on-the-fight-for-a-configurable-and-free-internet/

#5yrsago The Democratic candidate for the Georgia governorship is a Black woman running on an “unapologetic progressive” platform https://web.archive.org/web/20180523065423/https://politics.myajc.com/news/state--regional-govt--politics/georgia-election-stacey-abrams-wins-democratic-primary/eNWNZU440VRD1tQsZ0XY2K/

#5yrsago A hard look at the wastefulness of “proof of work,” the idea at the core of the blockchain https://davidgerard.co.uk/blockchain/2018/05/22/bitcoins-stupendous-power-waste-is-green-apparently-bad-excuses-for-proof-of-work/

#5yrsago Charlie Stross on the “soft genocide” of eugenics-tainted, alt-right climate dystopia https://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2018/05/happy-21st-century.html

#5yrsago The Computer History Museum just published the sourcecode for Eudora https://computerhistory.org/blog/the-eudora-email-client-source-code/

#5yrsago The company that made Grenfell Tower’s flammable, poisonous insulation used dangerous lies to make hundreds of sales https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/grenfell-tower-fire-latest-inquiry-london-cladding-building-safety-uk-celotex-a8362186.html

#5yrsago Court rules that Trump can’t block people on Twitter https://www.eff.org/press/releases/victory-first-amendment-court-rules-government-officials-who-tweet-public-cant-block

#1yrsago SPACs were hugely successful (for banks) https://pluralistic.net/2022/05/23/you-got-spacced/#the-house-always-wins

Catch me on tour with Red Team Blues in DC, Toronto, Oxford, Hay, Manchester, Nottingham, London, and Berlin!

[tirsynni]

Campaign group Claddag wanted it to be a legal requirement for escape plans to be in place for those who might not be able to get out safely in an emergency.

But a Home Office consultation found the Grenfell Tower Inquiry's recommendations would be too costly and impractical to implement.

...

In the Grenfell fire, which killed 72 people in June 2017, 41% of the tower block's disabled residents died. (X)

If anyone wants to know where the UK is currently at, disability campaigners have lost a battle over making it a legal requirement for high-rise flats to have an evacuation plan for disabled residents.

[itsrattysworld]

Without Prejudice Mervelee Myers Is At Computer Therapy Writing Phone At Ears Silverlock Medical Centre Notification To Contact Mr Sarwari Physician Associate Blood Test Results Almost Hour Trigger Chronic Anxiety OCD I Was Kicked Out Of Decima Road Surgery By Dr. Joanna Pennack Richard Harty UEL Panic Call Mobile 27/9/2021 Barclays Stole Money At Counter Patterns Of Misogyny 1/10/2021 Locked In Bank Hour+ Police Came Account Closed 5/10/ Got To UEL Rescued By Security From Tania Cottier Cohorts Devastated Life Disrupted Sorting Out Carer For Husband Open Joint Account Nationwide Explain Happenings Of Staying With Barclays Not Expecting Same Discrimination 13/12/ Debbie Gilchrist Broke Glass Communal Door Police Came To Accuse Me Of Locking Her Out May 2022 Invited ASB Samantha Gibbs Ms. DG Open Letter From Housing For Women Broke Glass Again Complaint Reach Stage 2 Data Wiped 24/12/ Barricade In Brother On Phone Until Police Arrive I Am Victim Of HMCTS CPS CJS BSB SRA IOPC JCIO CCMCC MOPAC HMPPS CLCC Party To Miscarriages Of Justice Taken Some To Small Claims Court The Unlawful Injunction Threats Of Imprisonment Eviction Contempt Of Court Gag By Devonshires LLP Breach Eviction Act 1977 Amend Housing Act 1988 Must Be Treated Like Grenfell Tower Panel Inquiry Barrister Samantha Jones Brag To Michael Carter Judge Freer Gave Her Reference To Be On The Panel Am Up To Caller Number 2 Queue Reasons Dr. Phil Gregory Will Face Inquiry For Breaches Of Mental Health Act Trick His Way Into My Home Sat On Sofa Claim I Made Up Stories About 23 Years Of Hate Crimes At 16 Alma Grove Bermondsey London SE1 5PY Got As Domestic Violence Victim Joe Hooper Kicks My Door Police Come To Support Them Is This Why African Maxine Sahadeo Southwark Older Adults Team No Longer Works There Southwark MHOAD Team Admin Have To Answer Questions For The 300+ Pages Defamation Requested Data Candy Smith Mediated Trina Philbert June 2022 Met Parents Of Key Child Ethan Sundar At Kings Signed Up For Lottery Wife Of 101 Year Old Arnold Ebenezer Tomlinson Traumatize By Systemic Discrimination Lost Dignity By Santander Nationwide County Court At Clerkenwell Shoreditch District Judges Sterlini Richard Hayes Pigram Bell Naidoo Rest On Shoulders Of DJ Beecham To Get Tenants Views About Housing Ombudsman Service Failures To Act About Legitimate Concerns Raised Of Landlords Breaching Tenancy Agreement H4W Change When Zaiba Qureshi Became CEO I Was The Minute Taker Scrutiny Panel Ms Presley See Hermoine Cameron Advocating On My Behalf Online World Must Wake Up To Windrush Scandal That Will Not Go Away When Despite Proof Of Attending Windrush Vigil Before I Was Taken From Tom's Bedside 6/4 Attended A&E 7/4 Died 8/4 King's Took 6 Hours To Inform Me Of Death PALS Gayle Lewis Kings Team Can Respond 4/11/2024 Further Blemishing My Name Character Risperidone Recommended To Render Me Unable To Function Mimi Owusu 12 Pages Witness Statement Used To Label Me A Violent Nuisance Is NHS Paying To Get Me Out Of The Way Or Is It LEYF To Cover Up MIC Paedophile Rings Abuse Reviews Online During ET/EAT Is It A New Met For London Attempts Made Section Murder Kidnap Between 30/10/2017-9/8/2024 I Was Locked Out On 23/10/ Police Refuse To Attend Social Media Harvested Intellectual Property Copyright Images CPPDP Left Me Without A Voice YouTube All I Have Left Am Victim Of Cyber Crimes To Take Away Channels I Have Written To Prime Ministers Rev Rose Hudson-Wilkin Desmond Jadoo To Mediate On My Behalf I Was In HCT Group Impact Report 2016 Where Barrister Ryan Clement Use Statistic 1 In 5 Of All Suicides Are Associated With Unemployment Groom Winsome Duncan To Target Me I Have Taken Out Claims That HMCTS Must Make Sure I Get Justice This Time This Is Too Big For Them To Get Away Am Bipolar Schizophrenic I Don't Need Maudsley Behavioural Psychological Entrapment Am On Kings College London RADAR-CNS With Dr. Faith Matcham Mental Health Research A Graduate Of Open University I Will Challenge Those Target Children Young People Adults Made Vulnerable

Without Prejudice Mervelee Myers Put On Record The Roles Of Kings College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust In Gaslighting Misogyny In Breaching Equality Act 2010 Protected Characteristics Starting At Mapother House Day Nursery Where I Worked 2003-2008 Had A Nervous Breakdown After Death Of 56 Year Old Brother With Colon Cancer Neglect Of Husband 101 On Byron Ward Where I Was Removed From Bedside…

[collymore]

The insolence and prejudices which vilely envelop the murderous, Grenfell Inferno!

By Stanley Collymore

How dare it be suggested that MPs actually care about common people! Since they only need them when it's election time, for in between such elections these distinctly and quite irrefutably common people simply don't matter. So candidly let's really be both literally and perfectly honest about this that governments and big businesses effectively don't basically crucially care about truly ordinary people so your MPs aptly taking their cue from them simply thoroughly likewise do effectively behave accordingly! And anyway, what's being undertaken literally evidently, relative to the Grenfell Tower Inferno situation, is really actually simply virtue signalling!

And that's undoubtedly so, because any crucial fight for justice, and the true workings, of an authentic criminal inquiry will be actually purposely drawn out over several and most likely, over ten years; actually by which time the same companies undeniably literally responsible for this obviously devastatingly Grenfell Tower Inferno, simply will have changed their names and ownership, and the actual culprits, distinctively involved in this quite unwarranted and clearly catastrophic deaths, of these luckless 72 persons, will crucially have retired, died or predictably conveniently and rather callously and similarly unflustered opportunistically taken up residence obviously in significantly safe locations outside the United Kingdom! (C) Stanley V.  Collymore 7 September 2024.

Author's Remarks: Self-evidently some lives and ethnicities are obviously and unquestionably regarded as undoubtedly far superior to others; and it doesn't require a Mensa IQ to ascertain who those favoured individuals are! Significantly too, justice needs to be administered quickly in order to have any genuine effect!

And haven't you got it yet? Not only in the case of the Grenfell Tower tragedy but also generally; the UK's parliament is a joke, and in essence nothing more than an institution stuffed with largely self-serving sycophants; and as the evident bunch of leeches that they unquestionably are, clearly with their snouts stuck in the requisite financial troughs. So the Grenfell Tower catastrophe and clearly who the victims are wouldn't matter much, if at all, to the majority of them. As discernibly quite clearly, these casualties don't look like them!

[ztremx]

00:00Open/ Trump this week; The decline of marriage in Iran; Grenfell Tower disaster official report; Remembering Sergio Mendes

04:52'Mais Que Nada' by Sergio Mendes & Brasil '66

07:33Tucker's journey

08:51News of Forever Chemicals: Trifluoroacetate levels in Denmark's groundwater have steadily increased since the 1960's

11:30News of AI: Artificial intelligence is worse than humans at summarizing information

15:19Smart World: Telegram CEO arrested in France; New Mexico sues Snapchat over alleged child sextortion; Selfie-tourism is destroying the world's best landmarks

22:16News of Bees: A novel pesticide has lethal consequences; Ingestible hydrogel microparticles improve bee health after exposure to pesticides

26:36Remembering James Darren

27:26'Gidget, Still The One For Me' by Harry Shearer

29:55Grenfell Tower fire inquiry released its final report

40:40News of the Atom: France's newest nuclear reactor shuts itself down; TEPCO may resume fuel debris extraction from Fuk reactor; Japan requests research funding for nuclear waste final disposal

46:05The Apologies of the Week: Royal Canadian Mounted Police in Nova Scotia, Canadian Medical Association, Orland Park trustee, Lynnwood Police, Massachusetts doctor, British PM Keir Starmer, UK's National Healthcare System

55:34'My Swan Song' by Dave Frishberg /Close

[ceevee5]

Short summary - everyone failed and 72 died, with 70 injured.

[eaglesnick]

“Capitalism is about exploitation, its about putting money before people. There is no humanity in the dictionary of capitalists” – Mwanadeke Kindembo

Passing the political buck is an age-old technique for denying personal responsibility when things go badly wrong. Another strategy is to remain silent. Nowhere are these two strategies  more evident than in relation to the findings of the Grenfell Inquiry.

Keir Starmer, apologising on behalf of the State from Parliament said:

“The country failed to discharge its most fundamental duty to protect you and your loved ones, the people that we are here to serve, and I am deeply sorry."

Many people and professions are highlighted as being responsible for the tragedy that is Grenfell but let us look at some of the politicians implicated by the Inquiry findings.

The Inquiry found that David Cameron’s government, was so obsessed with continuing the Thatcher legacy of deregulation, that within the Department of Communities and Local Government, headed by Eric Pickles:

“…even matters affecting the safety of life were ignored, delayed or disregarded.”

David Cameron’s response to this dreadful indictment?  Silence.

“Former PM David Cameron was glaringly quiet after the public inquiry criticised his Government’s drive to slash red tape and regulation in the lead up to the 2017 Grenfell fire.”  (Mirror: 05/09/24)

What of Conservative minister Eric Pickles, the man in charge of the department responsible for building regulations?

At the Inquiry itself Pickles showed a callous and contemptible attitude to the tragedy. Not only did he not know how  many had died in the fire but he told the investigators:

“to hurry up because he has a ‘very busy day meeting people' including lunch with an 'international guest'. “  (MailOnline:04/09/24)

 The Inquiry found that:

“Lord Pickles delayed improvements to the building regulations that were recommended following a previous fatal fire in south London. The changes had not been made by the time of the Grenfell disaster in June 2017."  (BBC News:07/05/24)

In reward for his services to the nation and to the Conservative Party Pickles was elevated to the House of Lords where he still sits. Calls for his resignation have been rising. There have been no calls for Lord Cameron to resign.

Another champion of Thatcherite deregulation was Tony Blair and like Eric Pickles, Blair has been contemptuous of the Grenfell findings. Despite the Inquiry being very exact in their apportioning of blame, Blair refuses to accept their findings. He said:

"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."  (Tony Blair: 04/09/24)

No admission that his support, his deliberate support, of deregulation had any bearing regarding the Grenfell disaster. And a total failure to recognise that far from being an unintended accident, the tragedy was entirely avoidable and resulted from systematic failures rather than mere mistakes

The man who gave us the unlawful Iraq War and who heads a global think tank advising and influencing governments worldwide had his attitude towards the Grenfell Inquiry findings described as “despicable” by the Fire Brigades Union. (FBU)

Matt Wrack, chairman of the FBU said:

 "Tony Blair's despicable comments are the remarks of a multi-millionaire who has lost touch with the reality of people's lives. "Every single person has the right to a safe, decent home. Every single one of the deaths at Grenfell Tower were unnecessary and wholly avoidable.

"The Grenfell fire was not the result of a well-intentioned people making mistakes, but of a systematic disregard for the safety of residents - and the prioritisation of private profit over human life.” (Sky News: 05/09/24)

There you have it! “The prioritisation of profit over human life”. This is what deregulation is all about. Grow the economy at ALL cost.

Despite Keir Starmer’s apology for Grenfell on behalf of the nation, his mantra is no different to that of his predecessors: grow the economy.

In perusing that goal let us hope he doesn’t forget his own belief that the first duty of government is to protect its citizens from deliberate harm and that sometime in the future we don't find him passing the buck, being in denial or remaining silent over deliberate injustice caused by his economic policies.

[allthenewzworld]

"The simple truth is that the deaths that occurred were all avoidable."

The Grenfell Inquiry, looking into how 72 people died in a fire in a block of flats in London in 2017, has delivered its final report.

It sets out how a chain of failures across government and the private sector led to Grenfell Tower becoming a death trap.

The inquiry's chair, Sir Martin Moore-Bick, said in his statement: "Not all of them bear the same degree of responsibility for the eventual disaster. But as our report shows, all contributed to it in one way or another.

"In most cases, through incompetence, but in some cases, through dishonesty and greed."

#Grenfell #AlltheNews

[sa7abnews]

Grenfell inferno 'culmination of decades of failure': UK inquiry

New Post has been published on Sa7ab News

Grenfell inferno 'culmination of decades of failure': UK inquiry

A report on the 2017 fire that killed 72 people in Grenfell Tower has found that it occurred due to gross failure by government and construction bodies.

... read more !