Haringey's Local Response to Grenfell

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Permalink Reply by John McMullan on June 23, 2017 at 17:26

Well it's now a criminal investigation so I expect nothing less. See the pain behind the eyes of the police officers standing outside Scotland Yard pleading for people who may have escaped the fire but are unwilling to come forward because of worries about their immigration status and know that there are a lot more dead than 79.

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Permalink Reply by JackRuby on June 23, 2017 at 18:32

Plus all the illegal subletting that was going on.

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Permalink Reply by Gordon T on June 23, 2017 at 19:36

General information sheets on the library counters, I spotted today.

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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on June 24, 2017 at 15:14

Who can you trust? Who Knows? Who speaks out? Who is listened to? Who is punished for speaking truth?

1. Assurances given by Leading politicians may be sound.  The same applies to assurances given by senior officers and by a Council's PR team. Each and every one of these sources may be giving information which is as accurate and reliable as they can possibly make it.
However, in Haringey having been personally on the receiving end of lies, half-truths and obfuscations I have no reason to assume that anything from these local sources is trustworthy.

2. In the official Haringey responses as in those of other local councils there may be references to checks, inspections, standards and certificates. Again this may be as accurate and reliable as the person giving the information can possibly make it.
However, at the same time, shouldn't we also adopt a high degree of scepticism. Especially when it emerges that such procedures, checks etc may turn out to be suspect?
“The proposed plans and other details submitted were reviewed by RBKC [Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea] building control,” the council said in a statement. “While a formal decision notice was not issued for the plans, the plans submitted were fully vetted by building control with comments provided; these comments were then followed up by the site inspection regime. Site inspections began on the 29/08/2014 with 16 inspections undertaken with final completion issued on the 07/07/2016 and a completion certificate issued.”

Part B of the building regulations, which deals with fire risk, states: “The external envelope of a building should not provide a medium for fire spread if it is likely to be a risk to health and safety. The use of combustible materials in the cladding system and extensive cavities may present such a risk in tall buildings.”

Barry Turner, director of technical policy at Local Authority Building Control, which represents council building control teams in England and Wales, said: “What we need to know is what was inspected. You can go on site 16 times but not necessarily see everything you need to see. They may have inspected the fixings, the fire barrier and the cavity, which are equally important but are useless if you put a flammable material on the front.”

Turner said that it was difficult to tell the difference between fire-resistant and non-fire resistant panels once they are installed and stressed that “the person responsible for doing it right is the person carrying out the work”. (Source: Guardian 21 June 2017.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jun/21/grenfell-tower-16-c...

3. What we've learned from the Grenfell tragedy is that whistle blowers were ignored. That residents' complaints and legitimate concerns were ignored or brushed aside. That a local councillor's legitimate concerns were brushed aside. 
Many years ago I learned from reading public inquiries into a different type of organisational breakdown - abuses in different types of residential institution - that there were invariably complaints made and concerns raised. And that these were ignored - and sometimes whistle blowers punished.

4. We now have what seems to me some new and valuable work into what's called "The Duty of Candour". The aim being to ensure that when somewhere, inside a system, knows or suspects that something is going wrong or has gone wrong, they should be under a duty to say so. With them having corresponding rights to speak-out being valued and and safeguarded.

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Permalink Reply by John McMullan on June 24, 2017 at 16:27

One person's Duty of Candour is another person's Being a Dick.

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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on June 24, 2017 at 16:38

That's silly, John.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2dtCz3OFcSM

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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on June 24, 2017 at 17:24

Another complication: Airbnb.

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