Six months after the fire, with the scarred remains of the tower still standing, we examine what has been done to deal with the aftermath of the tragedy

Rehousing

Forty-eight hours after the Grenfell Tower fire, Theresa May pledged that victims would be rehoused within three weeks. It was a wildly optimistic target, and the authorities’ failure to come close has sparked anger and despair. Only one in five of the Grenfell Tower households has been permanently rehoused. The process has been “painfully slow”, said the government’s own independent Grenfell recovery taskforce last month.

Targets have repeatedly changed. In July, the Royal borough of Kensington and Chelsea said rehousing would happen “as quickly as possible”. In October it said temporary or permanent accommodation would be offered to all residents in hotels before Christmas. Yet Kensington MP Emma Dent Coad says there will be 200 children “stuck in hotels” on 25 December, including people from affected neighbouring blocks. [See footnote.]

Most recently, Alok Sharma, the housing minister, promised a new home in social housing for all former residents of both the tower and Grenfell Walk within a year.

According to RBKC’s latest figures, of the 210 households from the tower, 45 are in new permanent homes and 54 in temporary homes. 66 households have not yet accepted offers and remain in emergency accommodation – mostly hotels. The rest have accepted offers of permanent or temporary homes but have not yet moved. Dent Coad said the situation was “indefensible”.

RBKC said it had bought over 250 homes to meet the backlog. It said it had made over 450 offers of different housing to around 200 households. It stressed that some people were not yet ready to move.

RBKC said the homes would be fully furnished with curtains and white goods at no extra cost, on top of which residents would receive a £10,000 “fresh start” grant from the Kensington and Chelsea Foundation. Rent and “core” utility bills would be covered by the taxpayer for a year and thereafter the rent would be no higher than their Grenfell rent. Each household would also receive £5,000 plus £500 for each person aged 16 or over.

But some bereaved residents stress they don’t need money or possessions, because they are not poor people. The most important thing is a home for their families.

The future of the tower

In September, the communities secretary, Sajid Javid, said residents were “keen to learn what the plans are for the site of the tower, and surrounding area”. In November he added: “You are in the driving seat for decisions related to it.” But since the first days after the fire, people have complained that the sight of the burned-out shell of Grenfell every morning re-traumatises them and they feel their wishes for the future of the site have not been met.

“One thing that creates a lot of anxiety and stress is the question of what happens to the site,” said Ahmed Elgwahry, whose sister and mother were killed in the fire, and who is now involved with the Grenfell United survivors group. “There are what the coroner refers to as toxic remains which cannot be buried in a cemetery. The rightful thing to do would be to transform the site to a memorial garden. We have asked for that. Whether we will get that I don’t know.”

Mental health professionals have also warned that the sight of the tower from the busy Westway Road also risks traumatising a far wider population, in particular children.

It is “reprehensible that it has remained uncovered for so long”, concluded the Grenfell taskforce last month.

“We need cast-iron assurances, in writing, that the tower and the site will be given over to a memorial of the community’s choosing and that the land be handed on to the community,” said Shahin Sadafi, chair of Grenfell United, the main survivors’ group.

Justice and the public inquiry

In August May said: “It is vital that there is justice for the victims of this appalling tragedy and for their families who have suffered so terribly.”

But there is significant distrust in the public inquiry she announced. That is partly down to a lack of community representation alongside the judge, Sir Martin Moore-Bick. But it is also because of still-raw memories of how people were left without support from the authorities immediately after the fire, when they were homeless, grieving and desperate. By Wednesday night, almost 17,000 people had signed a petition demanding greater community involvement in the inquiry. Moore-Bick says that is a decision for the prime minister.

There is also a strong desire to see those responsible jailed. Scotland Yard’s investigation into possible individual and corporate manslaughter is a source of hope for the community.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest There is a strong desire from survivors to see those responsible jailed. Photograph: Matthew Chattle/Barcroft Images

“We had 71 people murdered in that tower,” Bellal El Guenini, a survivor, told Javid and other MPs on Tuesday night. Two of his children collapsed into comas after escaping with him and his pregnant wife. “The important thing is that truth must be found and justice must be seen.”

Moore-Bick said in September that he would provide the prime minister with a first report by early April 2018. It is now acknowledged this will not happen.



Mental health

In July, Javid said: “Making sure that the victims ... have all the support they need is clearly a priority and mental health is a big part of that ... it is not a question of resources.” In November’s budget, £28m extra was earmarked for mental health and regeneration around Grenfell.

But the scale of the disaster’s mental impact is something that hasn’t been seen in Britain in recent times. Local health planners think thousands could suffer post traumatic stress disorder, which can cause panic, anxiety, depression and flashbacks.

The NHS has been taking advice from professionals who handled the response to a 2013 freight train crash in Lac-Mégantic, Canada, which claimed 47 lives and where the need for mental health treatment rose after a year and the mental health response is ongoing.

Victims have complained that therapy has involved going to a centre close to the tower. Some say that accessing support in their first language has not been easy. The Grenfell Recovery Taskforce complained of a lack of empathy and emotional intelligence from the council and said that “on too many occasions we have received accounts from survivors and the wider community of poor treatment”.

“We are trying incredibly hard,” said Jim O’Donnell, deputy borough director of mental health at Central North West London NHS foundation trust. “I am proud of the staff that we have got. Nobody is saying we are perfect, but we are trying to reach people.”

Fire safety of other buildings in the borough and across the UK

A week after the cut-price plastic-filled aluminium panels fixed to Grenfell tower spread their fatal flames, May announced similar cladding on all residential towers over 18-metres-tall must be tested for combustibility.

“We cannot and will not ask people to live in unsafe homes,” she said.

Yet thousands of people are still living in towers clad with similar material that testing has confirmed is combustible and fails to meet building regulations.

In the 10 weeks after Grenfell, 262 tall residential towers across England were found to have the same or similar combustible cladding panels, including 161 social housing blocks and 26 student halls of residence.

“We set up a building safety programme to ensure a fire like this can never happen again,” said a spokesman for the DCLG. “We commissioned a series of fire safety tests and published clear guidance so building owners can make informed safety decisions.”

The fire section of the building regulations, which victims of Grenfell believe should have been tightened after the fatal Lakanal House fire in 2009, remains under review. It is unlikely to change until next spring at the earliest, so rules the government has effectively admitted are not fit for purpose still apply. Manchester city council and Birmingham city council have announced they will install sprinklers in all their tower blocks. RBKC has commissioned a feasibility study into the installation of sprinklers in its other towers but this won’t be completed until next year.

Immigration status of residents

Community groups working with survivors of the tragedy say that suspicion remains over the immigration amnesty promised to people affected by the fire.

The Home Office has not yet published figures for the number of undocumented people affected by Grenfell who have tried to access support through the amnesty.

Campaigners say the Home Office rules contain loopholes that could result in survivors being deported. One group working with people affected by the tragedy said that at least 10 people had asked for advice about applying, but it was unclear how many had approached the Home Office.

Chai Patel, the legal policy director for the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants (JCWI) said there were concerns that some survivors would not apply.

“It’s not surprising they didn’t come forward. It wasn’t a guarantee. You could come forward and find that you were still facing deportation,” said Patel.

Under the system announced after the tragedy, victims could stay for a year. New rules announced in October allow survivors to apply for an initial 12-month period, followed by two more periods of two years. After five years of lawful residence, they can apply for permanent leave to remain. The amnesty ends in January next year.

“This way, there will be three hoops to jump through,” said Gracie Bradley, an advocacy and policy officer from human rights group Liberty.

The North Kensington Law Centre said family members of people killed in the fire might not be able to attend the inquiry into the tragedy.

“The Home Office must ensure that the family members of people affected by the fire, who have been designated as core participants in the Grenfell inquiry, should not be required to leave the UK before it has concluded,” said a spokesperson.

A spokesperson for the Home Office said: “We don’t have statistics at this point. We have committed to publish them at some point, but we don’t know when that would be.”

The death toll

The death toll was one of the most bitterly disputed aspects of the aftermath of the disaster. Speaking shortly afterwards, Scotland Yard officer Fiona McCormack was pessimistic about the possibility of quickly being able to identify everyone who died, saying it would not happen until the new year at the earliest. She even cautioned that some victims may never be identified because of the intense heat of the fire.

In that context, Scotland Yard and many observers will deem it a reasonable outcome to have announced the final death toll by mid-November.

But doubt remains locally about whether or not the total of 71 people is reliable. And that, according to the campaign group Justice4Grenfell, is down to a lack of engagement in the crucial early days that allowed mistrust to fester.

Scotland Yard adhered to the Interpol disaster victim identification standards and required dental comparison, fingerprints or DNA, alongside secondary identifying characteristics, such as tattoos and scars, to confirm an identity.



Two weeks after the disaster, police estimated the final death toll would reach 80 people and that remained the position until September, when it was revised down. They only updated the official death toll once the stringent identification standard was met for each victim. That left many people not seen since the fire officially listed only as “missing” for months.

A day after the disaster, the death toll was officially only 17 people, while the photographs of those not seen since it, which could be found all around the area, far outstripped that.

Moreover, said Justice4Grenfell activist Judy Bolton, the local community was not kept informed of developments by police.

“If there had been transparency in the beginning,” she said. “We wouldn’t be sitting here doubting numbers.”

• RBKC disputes Emma Dent Coad’s estimate that 200 children will be in hotels this Christmas. It says that 52 families with children from the area are still in hotels, including 30 from the Grenfell buildings. The council did not say how many other children were in hotels among the 30 families with under 18s who are living in hotels from the walkways. It said 12 of the families from Grenfell with children in hotels have accepted new homes, but have not yet moved in.

• This article was amended on 14 December 2017 to correct some victim details.