London Fire -2

As you were it seems to disolved into a total b------g shambles!!

Guardian and other media have won an order preventing Kensington holding the meeting in private

Good

Here's an interesting article.
I said earlier about the fact that people in Newcastle are wanting the cladding taken off their blocks with no idea of what is to go in its place.
This is about blocks in London being torn down with no thought about where to house the residents being displaced.

inews.co.uk/explainers/iq/a-book-on-uks-housing-problem-sheds-light-on-the-grenfell-disaster/

From Huffpost.

'Back in 1960, a recently elected Tory backbench MP called Margaret Thatcher made history by getting a private members bill turned into law. It gave the press and public the right for the first time to attend council meetings. Tonight, 57 years later, Conservative-run Kensington and Chelsea council will hold its first (yes first) meeting on the Grenfell Tower disaster – and the public and press will be excluded. “The public minutes of this meeting will be published, in due course, on the council website,” it states.'

Thanks, GracesGran. I thought so, too.

There is a link to the agenda of the meeting about the Grenfell fire, which starts at 18.30 tonight on that Guardian link.
There is nothing on it apart from the fire.

I have a feeling that there will be lots of unhappy residents shouting very loudly outside the meeting.

Can I thank you for the link www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jun/28/grenfell-tower-fire-was-tory-austerity-to-blame-or-do-problems-date-back-to-blair too Jen. It was a very well researched piece and unravelled some of the politics.

ZNUJ issued a statement saying that it is deeply disturbed about the meeting.

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jun/29/grenfell-survivors-barred-from-council-meeting-about-fire

I hope this is the meeting at which Paget-Brown resigns.

www.24housing.co.uk/news/ministers-pulls-crucial-cih-speech/

Housing minister has cancelled his speech to the Chartered Institute of Housing.
That gives a lot of confidence in the government's housing policy.
Another thing that gives a lot of confidence in the housing policy is May saying that councils have to assume their cladding will fail.
That means that every block with cladding on it will have to be emptied of residents and repaiired.
But nobody has said with what.

The BRE has said that it will not test Newcastle's because it is not the same as that at Grenfell. However, the residents don't believe the council and are demanding it be replaced.
Again, with what?

Replace it with the same fireproof cladding that is already there?

Hopefully all the other councils will get their fire safety sorted out before any of them have to resign for causing manslaughter by negligence.

No Straw Man required daphnedil.

The evacuation of the hundreds of people from the 4 Tower Blocks on the Chalcots Estate Camden was due to the general poor fire/maintenance standards similar to Grenfell Tower being found e.g the fire brigade discovered shocking fire safety failures, including exposed gas pipes, inaccessible stairways, missing internal walls, fire doors not fitted. Then there is the cladding issue on top of course.

At least Camden Council have acted ASAP but only because the Grenfell Tower Fire forced the inspection and the repairs. Apparently it will be funded by using council reserves and apparently will not affect existing budget plans according to the council spokesperson.

What if Grenfell Tower were not the story but one of the Tower Blocks in Camden, perfectly logical question.

I don't understand why it is viewed nobody should be held to account for the evacuation of ' 4 Tower Blocks ' on the Chalcots Estate due to negligence and yet applied to Kensington and Chelsea where a resignation took place.

I thought the principle of some posts were accountability but only for some it appears to me.

And no I am not defending Kensington and Chelsea council who must pay the piper but if you feel there is a principle involved and expect resignations I fail to see how it is not a principal for all councils.

That's not unusual ww, recently on tv there was a series called 'How to get a Council house' where this issue came up. It's the responsibility of a LA to provide housing but there are more and more instances where, if none is available in the immediate area, a property elsewhere is offered. "Ethnic cleansing"talk about being melodramatic.

I'm not at all surprised that TM's choice of judge for the inquiry is being criticised because for some, no matter what she does it's wrong.

For goodness sake, an inquiry is desperately needed and steps have now been taken to get this underway. Let's see what the initial findings are before we start criticising the process before it's begun.

Pogs
Yes it should apply to all councils, but only if there has been a disaster. There has not been a disaster in Camden.

God knows. The Times has it slapped all over its front page.

Is there anything she can get right?

Why has she picked someone who has previous dealings with the Kensington area?

May's choice of judge over the Grenfell fire has gone down like a lead balloon with the residents.

When in office he frequently sided with Kensington council, in fact one of his last cases he sided with Kensington in sending a resident 50 miles away from her family, even though she was a single mum with severe hypertension , diabetic and HIV positive.
Her lawyers stated that it amounted to "ethnic cleansing"

How often have we heard that in relation to so many London councils?

www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/north-east-news/cladding-newcastle-high-rise-blocks-13254351

Durhamjen: Thanks for posting this link.
www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jun/28/grenfell-tower-fire-was-tory-austerity-to-blame-or-do-problems-date-back-to-blair

There are so many claims and counter claims, and without doing many hours of research it's nigh on impossible to know which to believe. I found the article really informative.

POGS no I don't think it applies to other councils because that's not where the tragedy occurred. I expect the leaders of the other councils to take the necessary steps to ensure the lessons are learned from the tragedy. I would add that in this regard the fact K&C is Conservative is irrelevant. My opinion is not restricted to this tragedy.

My understanding is that Ms Gould has only been council leader for a very short time. I have no idea how much involvement she had with housing prior to her present role. Maybe you should stop looking for strawmen (or women) and stop distracting from the issues in Kensington and Chelsea,

ilovecheese

"Surely part of the reason that people in high positions are given high salaries is that they are being paid to take on responsibility. So if something happens on their watch they should take on that responsibility even if they themselves were not actually responsible. "

Wilma

"when a tragedy of this magnitude happens, I think it is right that the people at the top of the organisation - in this case K&C council and the company that manages the housing stock - should step down because it happened on their watch. The level of their responsibilty is why they get paid so much money. I can't help but think the reason why we have seen so few resignations is because the individuals want a pay off to go."

Out of interest I presume you are of the belief that should apply out of principle to ALL councils?.

So do you think that should apply to Council Leaders including for example Camden? After all it was not just the cladding issue that caused Camden Council Leader Ms. Gould to evacuate residents there are ' a number of fire hazards ' including none fitting of Fire Doors and gas pipework issues for example.

PS. I'm being polite. If I wrote what I really think, GN would delete the post.

anniebach I'm really beginning to wonder about you. My ex-hubby's uncle (and most of his family) came from generations of miners - originally from Cornwall and then Wales.

My ex-hubby's father and uncle started their working lives down the pits, but worked their way out.

Don't give me all this cr*p! They probably had more experience at the coalface than you have ever had!

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jun/27/grenfell-tower-gas-pipes-left-exposed-despite-fire-safety-experts-orders

Manslaughter by gross negligence from Hillsborough.
That's what it could be here. It's all about accountability, as you say, Wilma.