London fire (11 Viewers)

[clint van damme]

I would expect the Councillor to be far better informed than Lily Allen to start with.
Plus, let's be honest - if the community/residents group had gone to her to say 'Look, we've done our own investigations & the cladding they're using is within current regulations - but banned in many countries because of increased risks. So we wondered if, unlike the council who have very constrained finances on this, would you be willing to fork out (£2/m) to buy these much safer ones? Otherwise, we will be living with that nagging worry every day'
Does anyone thinking she would have said anything other than 'You can fuck right off, it's nothing to do with me!'???

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there might actually be something in what she's saying. Some of the residents have taken to social media to say that there are far more people unaccounted for than the official number.
Hope it's just the shock and confusion of the whole thing because if there's anything in what they are saying then this could be even more horrific than it already is.

 

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[SkyblueBazza]

You can control grief though in the drip feeding information.

There would be a hell of a lot more anger if it came out 150 were dead immediately.

People obviously cannot be identified if burned beyond recognition, but the fire brigade having now gone into the building should be able to provide a body count.

A fair few will have been cremated...the ashes blown about & washed away...how many illegals might have been in there? It's amazing that people are even beginning to talk about the numbers. Its not like a car crash where the bodies are found pretty much where they're expected to be

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[Otis]

The downplaying of the death toll is odd. I get that you can't be 100% accurate as you don't know for sure who was in there at the time but to keep throwing around low figures like 12, 17 dead is just wrong.

You know how many flats there are and a good idea of how many were rescued or on floors with no chance of survival. Not that hard to give an estimate.

They knew how many they rescued. The fire brigade released a figure of 65.

Yeah, it's a bit odd, though the most horrendous of circumstances and of course many bodies hard to identify.

 

[SkyblueBazza]

Horrendous job for firefighters trying to discover and retrieve the charred bodies. Can't even begin to think how you can count/identify the bodies.
Whilst I'm critical of overall government policy in the area i do believe in the immediate aftermath they are on a hiding to nothing. I certainly believe that this fire (the extent of it) was avoidable but people are rightly angry and whatever politicians do at this moment will treated with suspicion. May made a misjudgement with not meeting survivors yesterday but I do not see it as worse than that.



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There are hundreds of flat fires every year. Many of the firefighters will have attended some bad ones I am sure.
So imagine What they must have thought & felt upon approach - seeing what they were going to have to deal with..?

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[xcraigx]

I read a news report a couple of days back, it could have been the BBC, where people had been posting fake missing appeals on twitter usually using images of semi famous Mexicans. What the hell is going through their heads when they do such things, unbelievably tasteless.

 

[SkyblueBazza]

People may argue that they could've used a better product for more money. Well that's true but why would you?

People do all the time when it is for or affects themselves. Cars, houses, clothes...everything.

The issue here is the residents have been ignored & thier lives seemingly considered as only of token value.

A good landlord would not strictly look for the lowest cost &/or standard of goods & service for their tennant...they would probably look primarily at well-being of the tennant. Shelter security & safety - those are the basics for accommodation so corners shouldn't be cut on them. Refurbishments of any kind should imo be considered about every 5yrs & start with maximising those 3 items primarily, the aesthetics is the only place where the corners should even be considered to cut.

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[SkyblueBazza]

I agree, the cladding used met all current regulations and standards and would have been approved by building control. Someone, however, has to answer why a product with a plastic (highly flammable) core was allowed to be used to clad high rise buildings?

"That'll do - fuck it!" by some project manager that started off with grand ideas but got continually thwarted with 'too expensive is probably what it will come down to

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[SkyblueBazza]

She's not the nicest is she. Comes across as very cold.

Middle name must be 'Dis'

Initially No10 said she hadn't spoken to the residents because of security fears. I thought, what would Princess Diana have said faced with that? "Bollocks" probably! Then later in the day after criticism mounted...she reportedly cried in private. About what? Her miserable maligned approach being so condemned? Or for the residents.

Ffs...she sacked her advisors for getting stuff so badly wrong. David Davis said she is a great decision maker & listener. How so??? Her current advisors seem at best only as good as her last ones, she is listening to the wrong people AND making terrible decisions when it comes to people.

I think she is a liability for the Tory party, and the media are right on her case. I suspect she may well be gone by Tory party conference

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[SkyblueBazza]

The downplaying of the death toll is odd. I get that you can't be 100% accurate as you don't know for sure who was in there at the time but to keep throwing around low figures like 12, 17 dead is just wrong.

You know how many flats there are and a good idea of how many were rescued or on floors with no chance of survival. Not that hard to give an estimate.

But that is 'confirmed' dead. The police are also saying something like 70 known to be unaccounted for...the simple fact is that nobody can really be sure who or how many were actually in there at the time.

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[SkyblueBazza]

there might actually be something in what she's saying. Some of the residents have taken to social media to say that there are far more people unaccounted for than the official number.
Hope it's just the shock and confusion of the whole thing because if there's anything in what they are saying then this could be even more horrific than it already is.

The only way they would know who & how many people were in there to be able to provide such information at this stage is for some kind of check-in, which people would get all angry about as it is 'big-brother' stuff. We cannot have it all ways

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[We'll_live_and_die]

"That'll do - fuck it!" by some project manager that started off with grand ideas but got continually thwarted with 'too expensive is probably what it will come down to

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You seem to have an idea about this sort of thing, so you'll know it was the BSI that signed this
Material off for use in high rise blocks. The project manager just picks the best option available to suit the brief.

 

[dutchman]

Local councils are still failing to carry out emergency tower block inspections

Despite assurances from cabinet ministers that “teams of people” are urgently inspecting tower blocks across the UK, some councils have so far taken little action, the Observer has established.

Of 10 local authorities with significant numbers of tower blocks that were contacted, only three could confirm they had conducted any on-site inspections since Wednesday. Damian Green, the prime minister’s deputy, and Sajid Javid, the communities secretary, have claimed that councils have been inspecting the estimated 4,000 high-rise blocks across the country.

Authorities in Aberdeen, Sheffield and Haringey, north London have inspected their tower blocks to some degree, with more planned next week. But in Bristol, officials say they are “currently assessing what inspections, if any, we need to carry out”. In Harlow, Essex, council officers “will be hand-delivering letters to all tower block residents next week”. And in Barnet, London, officials could only say that there would be a “further urgent review” of cladding systems installed on their tower blocks.

Councils in Coventry, Sandwell, and the London boroughs of Newham and Brent were unable to say if they had carried out any inspections or even how many tower blocks they had.

 

[Brylowes]

Local councils are still failing to carry out emergency tower block inspections

Despite assurances from cabinet ministers that “teams of people” are urgently inspecting tower blocks across the UK, some councils have so far taken little action, the Observer has established.

Of 10 local authorities with significant numbers of tower blocks that were contacted, only three could confirm they had conducted any on-site inspections since Wednesday. Damian Green, the prime minister’s deputy, and Sajid Javid, the communities secretary, have claimed that councils have been inspecting the estimated 4,000 high-rise blocks across the country.

Authorities in Aberdeen, Sheffield and Haringey, north London have inspected their tower blocks to some degree, with more planned next week. But in Bristol, officials say they are “currently assessing what inspections, if any, we need to carry out”. In Harlow, Essex, council officers “will be hand-delivering letters to all tower block residents next week”. And in Barnet, London, officials could only say that there would be a “further urgent review” of cladding systems installed on their tower blocks.

Councils in Coventry, Sandwell, and the London boroughs of Newham and Brent were unable to say if they had carried out any inspections or even how many tower blocks they had.

How many tower blocks are there in Coventry?

 

[dutchman]

How many tower blocks are there in Coventry?

Twenty four, according to the Telegraph and Whitefriars:
Grenfell fire: Housing group reassures city high-rise residents
I think that excludes private rented accommodation though?

 

[hotrod]

Middle name must be 'Dis'

Initially No10 said she hadn't spoken to the residents because of security fears. I thought, what would Princess Diana have said faced with that? "Bollocks" probably! Then later in the day after criticism mounted...she reportedly cried in private. About what? Her miserable maligned approach being so condemned? Or for the residents.

Ffs...she sacked her advisors for getting stuff so badly wrong. David Davis said she is a great decision maker & listener. How so??? Her current advisors seem at best only as good as her last ones, she is listening to the wrong people AND making terrible decisions when it comes to people.

I think she is a liability for the Tory party, and the media are right on her case. I suspect she may well be gone by Tory party conference

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There is no comparison between Princess Diana and Theresa May. There was a hate campaign initiated against the Tories almost immediately after the appalling tragedy hence possibly the reason that T May did not visit, It had been suggested that some people were using the tragedy for political reasons.
Regards.

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

Shocking hypocrisy in decimating hse and fire standards and then say we will do all we can. Still really cross

 

[clint van damme]

Middle name must be 'Dis'

Initially No10 said she hadn't spoken to the residents because of security fears. I thought, what would Princess Diana have said faced with that? "Bollocks" probably! Then later in the day after criticism mounted...she reportedly cried in private. About what? Her miserable maligned approach being so condemned? Or for the residents.

Ffs...she sacked her advisors for getting stuff so badly wrong. David Davis said she is a great decision maker & listener. How so??? Her current advisors seem at best only as good as her last ones, she is listening to the wrong people AND making terrible decisions when it comes to people.

I think she is a liability for the Tory party, and the media are right on her case. I suspect she may well be gone by Tory party conference

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Maybe the only reason she's hanging onto her job is because she's 'found' or has copies of the Westminster paedophile ring files she 'lost'.

 

[wingy]

I'd say what we have here is evidence of the 'Class' divide within Society.
Both in the approach to standards /Quality required for social housing, the people who rely on it.
What is not unique though in provision going back to 50- 60's is errors being made, anyone remember th death traps of Canleys steel houses, yet generous in proportion etc.
There are two questions here, It may beggar belief but the use of such materials 'May' be innocent, although voices of concern were raised.
The other is were all the conditions of installation met.
Couple that to resources available for monitoring, franchising out of regulatory bodies,Social housing providers, deregulation of planning etc.
What is evident in the aftermath that resources are no avaliable to the folk affected and they appear to be doing a sterling job in both helping and representing themselves in this age o I'm alright Jack.

 

[dutchman]

Grenfell Tower victims 'given £10 a day to live on' - BBC News
Some Grenfell Tower fire survivors have been given just £10 a day to live on by the council, Kensington's MP said.
In a letter to Home Secretary Amber Rudd, Ms Coat Dent wrote: "I have been told that some people who have lost their homes have been sent out of borough and are being given only £10 per day subsistence.
Ms Dent Coad earlier told BBC One's Sunday Politics that survivors were being repeatedly moved between hotels.
"We are still hearing stories of people not being allocated properly," she said.
"There's one woman this morning and her child, they have been moved three times since Wednesday into different accommodation."
Labour MP David Lammy said he had heard similar stories when he met local people on Saturday.
Mr Lammy told ITV's Peston on Sunday: "I met people yesterday who had been given that £10."

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

That's just insane

 

[shmmeee]

I read a news report a couple of days back, it could have been the BBC, where people had been posting fake missing appeals on twitter usually using images of semi famous Mexicans. What the hell is going through their heads when they do such things, unbelievably tasteless.

Happens with literally every incident like this. Happened a lot after Manchester. It's just kids wanting lots of retweets.

 

[shmmeee]

Shocking hypocrisy in decimating hse and fire standards and then say we will do all we can. Still really cross

Have you read the quote Brandon Lewis when he was refusing these standards? Tells you everything you need to know about the Tories: pure ideology over lives. They are a disgrace.

Can't find the quote now but it's referenced here: Tory minister warned against beefing up fire safety rules to include sprinklers

All about not regulating because they don't believe in regulation. Fucking scum.

 

[dadgad]

This tragedy goes right to the heart of what is wrong with Tory and neo-liberalist values.
The whole country has been swept along by the creeping tendency that the
ONLY thing that mattered was GROWTH - social justice, services and equality of opportunity and
living standards, increasingly irrelevant.
Grenfell is a stain on this country but worse, is actually the consequence of a political choice by a succession of
govts....and will take generations to rewind. We used to be a society of tolerance and fair play, no longer and
the current crop of ministers have to be the worst in living memory; May, Johnson, Gove; awful, vile and inept.

 

[wingy]

There are hundreds of flat fires every year. Many of the firefighters will have attended some bad ones I am sure.
So imagine What they must have thought & felt upon approach - seeing what they were going to have to deal with..?

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There is a bit of video the beeb have put up this morning, a certain level of surprise at the scale of it, possibly silent apprehension.

 

[wingy]

Twenty four, according to the Telegraph and Whitefriars:
Grenfell fire: Housing group reassures city high-rise residents
I think that excludes private rented accommodation though?

Barras House looks to have recieved a similar makeover.

 

[Ashdown]

This tragedy goes right to the heart of what is wrong with Tory and neo-liberalist values.
The whole country has been swept along by the creeping tendency that the
ONLY thing that mattered was GROWTH - social justice, services and equality of opportunity and
living standards, increasingly irrelevant.
Grenfell is a stain on this country but worse, is actually the consequence of a political choice by a succession of
govts....and will take generations to rewind. We used to be a society of tolerance and fair play, no longer and
the current crop of ministers have to be the worst in living memory; May, Johnson, Gove; awful, vile and inept.

'Succession of governments' and I'm glad that was pointed out because many of our ills started with Blair !!!

 

[wingy]

'Succession of governments' and I'm glad that was pointed out because many of our ills started with Blair !!!

True, and Thatcher.
There s no such thing as Society.

 

[dadgad]

'Succession of governments' and I'm glad that was pointed out because many of our ills started with Blair !!!

Absolutely - until we acknowledge that the culture which has robbed communities of homes fit to live in
and, dare I say it, permitted the loss of our football clubs to off shore cunting hedge funds, we'll not heal.
Blair has been the worst, most damaging PM in modern times - at least Corbyn has integrity.
I would love his next question at PMQ's to be 'from a resident of Grenfell Tower',

 

[SkyblueBazza]

Grenfell Tower victims 'given £10 a day to live on' - BBC News
Some Grenfell Tower fire survivors have been given just £10 a day to live on by the council, Kensington's MP said.
In a letter to Home Secretary Amber Rudd, Ms Coat Dent wrote: "I have been told that some people who have lost their homes have been sent out of borough and are being given only £10 per day subsistence.
Ms Dent Coad earlier told BBC One's Sunday Politics that survivors were being repeatedly moved between hotels.
"We are still hearing stories of people not being allocated properly," she said.
"There's one woman this morning and her child, they have been moved three times since Wednesday into different accommodation."
Labour MP David Lammy said he had heard similar stories when he met local people on Saturday.
Mr Lammy told ITV's Peston on Sunday: "I met people yesterday who had been given that £10."

I can imagine they are paying someone (with honourable intent & genuine motive) to source the cheapest accommodation available on a day-to-day basis. Whereas the decent thing to do would be to find somewhere vacant & offer the owner a decent amount to house them mid-term.

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[SkyblueBazza]

Happens with literally every incident like this. Happened a lot after Manchester. It's just kids wanting lots of retweets.

There are some very strange people about with some even stranger ideas of what constitutes entertainment &/or funny.

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[SkyblueBazza]

Absolutely - until we acknowledge that the culture which has robbed communities of homes fit to live in
and, dare I say it, permitted the loss of our football clubs to off shore cunting hedge funds, we'll not heal.
Blair has been the worst, most damaging PM in modern times - at least Corbyn has integrity.
I would love his next question at PMQ's to be 'from a resident of Grenfell Tower',

D'you know what? The more I see & hear Mr C...the more he seems to appeal. His sincerity (when fully heard out rather than snippets from the gutter press) is SO much more in touch with what people want in terms of how to live with each other. Those that decry him almost religiously are probably the more selfish & harmful amongst us

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[dadgad]

D'you know what? The more I see & hear Mr C...the more he seems to appeal. His sincerity (when fully heard out rather than snippets from the gutter press) is SO much more in touch with what people want in terms of how to live with each other. Those that decry him almost religiously are probably the more selfish & harmful amongst us

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Spot on this.

 

[Johnnythespider]

There are some very strange people about with some even stranger ideas of what constitutes entertainment &/or funny.

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Not really a surprise when you see the attention the likes of Katie Hopkins gets.

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[Ranjit Bhurpa]

D'you know what? The more I see & hear Mr C...the more he seems to appeal. His sincerity (when fully heard out rather than snippets from the gutter press) is SO much more in touch with what people want in terms of how to live with each other. Those that decry him almost religiously are probably the more selfish & harmful amongst us

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Wasn't that exactly how Blair started out, presenting a succession of popular soundbites that appealed to the broad electorate in opposition to an increasingly unpopular Conservative administration? Eventually though, the socialist utopia - even the Tory lite version - runs out of money.
Not sure of Corbyn's ulterior motives but think it's time to ditch the first past the post system in favour of some form of proportional representation, if nothing else to better protect us from the extremes of both left and right.

 

[Grendel]

Jeremy would make a nice Minister of Tea and Sympathy.