In the chaotic aftermath of the Grenfell fire, the response on the ground was disastrous and only served to reinforce the disconnect between authorities and institutions and the people they were in theory supposed to be serving.
When Ed Daffarn, who lived on the 16th floor of Grenfell Tower, raised complaints about the ongoing refurbishment with a worker from the main contractors Rydon, he said the man replied:
“I wouldn’t mind if I were getting it for free.”
The refurbishment Ed Daffarn was “getting for free” was to kill 72 of his friends and neighbours. He was lucky to escape with his life.
This week’s inquiry found Rydon had to bear “considerable responsibility“ for the tragedy.
The no doubt, throw away comments from the company worker – the inference, ”take what you get and be grateful” – sums up so much about the Grenfell story.
How Ed Daffarn and the other residents from Grenfell Tower were viewed, played almost as fatal a role as the deadly cladding and insulation.
The inquiry report this week painted a picture of a council refurbishing one of its properties but taking no account of the people who lived in it.
Their landlord, Kensington and Chelsea Council and the Tenant Management Organisation charged with looking after the tower, bulldozed the refurbishment through, driven by a desperate desire to keep costs down, their approach for years, the report noted, “marked by a persistent indifference for fire safety, particularly the safety of vulnerable people.”
Add in a government department so in thrall to deregulation it too was ignoring questions about the safety of life – yes, ignoring questions about the safety of life – and then cladding and insulation firms operating with dishonesty as a company strategy, well then you have the roadmap to this tragedy.
In the chaotic aftermath, the response on the ground was disastrous and only served to reinforce the disconnect between authorities and institutions and the people they were in theory supposed to be serving.
There was the painfully awkward sight of a panicked looking Theresa May, the then Prime Minister, being bustled into her car having gone to Grenfell but initially not even met with survivors.
The shaming acknowledgement in the inquiry report that the chief executive of Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, Nicholas Holgate, didn’t ask for help from neighbouring authorities because he was afraid it would look like he couldn’t cope, and he had an “undue” concern about reputation.
The Cambridge educated former judge, the chair inquiry Sir Martin Moore-Bick – a man many had feared wouldn’t be able to ”understand” the people of Grenfell – hit the nail so perfectly on the head when he wrote, the Tenant Management Organisation couldn’t even “relate” to its own tenants.
When I spoke to the deputy prime minister, Angela Rayner, who grew up in social housing herself, she said the story of Grenfell had made her angry, that there was still a stigma around being a social tenant and, “We have to put a mirror up to ourselves and say about treating people with common courtesy and dignity and respect.”
Cllr Elizabeth Campbell, Leader of Kensington and Chelsea Council responded to the inquiry findings with an open letter to the bereaved and survivors of Grenfell:
“On behalf of the Council, I apologise unreservedly and with all my heart to you, and to the local community, for our failure to listen to residents and to protect them. Put simply, we could, and should, have done more to keep people safe in their homes and to care for all of our residents in the aftermath of the fire.”
The government now has many priorities after the Grenfell inquiry – making sure the thousands of homes still clad in dangerous materials are made safe, reviewing regulations and tackling the corporate dishonesty and greed that led to so many people dying unnecessarily.
But changing the culture around social housing should also be on that long list… lazy assumptions and indifference the survivors at Grenfell say cost them so much.
Hanan Wahabi escaped the tower with her family but her beloved brother, his wife and their children all died. While she navigated the grief and shock, the pain was exacerbated by the initially hopeless response from the authorities.
She told the inquiry she wondered if things would have been different if they’d been “a different class, less ethnic” she told the inquiry.
It’s not an easy thought to be left with – what difference might it have made, if their lives were lived just a few streets away in the richest part of the borough, instead of in the poorest.
