Seven years after the unimaginable horror of the Grenfell Tower fire, those who survived and the bereaved at last have an authoritative verdict on who is to blame. This is a staging post, not the end of their courageous struggle for justice. We hope it brings some relief that the public inquiry chaired by Sir Martin Moore-Bick has vindicated their long-expressed view that decades of regulatory failure, combined with the “systematic dishonesty” of construction companies, were responsible for the tragedy that ended the lives of 72 people and broke the hearts of many more.
Arconic, which made the combustible cladding panels that were the main cause of the fire’s spread, and Kingspan and Celotex, which supplied insulation, are singled out as having pursued dishonest strategies in marketing dangerous products. The building control department of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea is found to have shown “indifference to fire safety”, while Conservative councillors were mainly interested in the building’s looks. These are staggeringly awful findings, whose impact must not be blunted by the fact that they are familiar from earlier hearings.
But culpability extends much wider. One of the most striking things about Grenfell is the sheer number of private and public bodies that bear a share of responsibility for what happened. The architects Studio E, the builders Rydon and Harley Facades, the fire consultant Exova and the misleadingly named tenant management organisation (which was really an arm’s-length body of the council) are all blamed for grave failures, and for being part of the “merry-go-round of buck-passing” described by the inquiry’s lead counsel.
The London fire brigade’s failure to prepare for a cladding fire – even after a similar one at Lakanal House in 2009, in which six people died – was criticised in the inquiry’s phase 1 report. Testing, quality assurance and fire safety bodies, and ministers and civil servants, all contributed to a situation in which a wealthy council in one of London’s richest areas was able to turn a worn-out but functional concrete block into a death trap. The Department for Communities, under Eric Pickles and permanent secretary Melanie Dawes (now the chief executive of Ofcom), was “poorly run”. Even worse, Lord Pickles’ deregulation drive was a “serious flaw” and meant matters affecting fire safety and risk to life “were ignored, delayed or disregarded” in the years before the fire. Those who emerge from the inquiry “with the greatest credit”, the report says, are members of the local community.
What happens now? Sir Keir Starmer apologised in the Commons, and said letters would be sent as a first step towards blocking the companies responsible from public contracts. Police and prosecutors have been waiting for the inquiry’s conclusions before considering charges for crimes that could include corporate manslaughter and misconduct in public office. Trials are not expected before 2027 – a decade after the disaster. But holding giant commercial entities to account in the criminal courts is never easy. Key witnesses from Arconic refused to appear at the inquiry.
Given these delays and uncertainty, it would be wrong to think that accountability is solely a matter for the criminal law. The government itself must ensure that consequences flow from the inquiry’s findings. Businesses that have been shown to be dishonest, and cavalier about safety, should be blocked from further public contracts, and from sponsoring MPs (as Saint-Gobain, the maker of Celotex, has been revealed to). It is questionable whether a company such as Arconic, which refused to cooperate fully with the inquiry, should be allowed to operate in the UK at all. Ministers should accept the inquiry’s recommendations for much tougher regulation of construction, a new college of fire and rescue, and compulsory evacuation plans for disabled residents in social housing. Renewed efforts must be made to remediate other blocks with plastic cladding, and compel builders and landlords to take responsibility.
Nothing can make it less distressing to remember the dreadful circumstances in which the victims died. Nothing can excuse inaction against those responsible, now that the inquiry is over.
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