Nearly 100 households from the blocks of flats at the foot of Grenfell Tower are still in emergency and temporary accommodation more than nine months on from the disaster, the government has said.



The news comes after it was announced that less than a third of the total number who lost their homes in the disaster have moved into new permanent accommodation and the government admitted it was “unlikely” all of them would be rehoused by the first anniversary of the tragedy.

Shahin Sadafi, the chair of the survivors’ group Grenfell United, said the news was shocking. “The fire affected so many people. Families next to the tower had to watch the horror unfold, they had to evacuate their homes and many of them lost friends or loved ones that night.

“Living with those memories is hard for us all. So much more needs to be done to get people moved into safe homes so they can rebuild their lives. We’ve heard excuse after excuse, now we just need some action.”

Ministers are guilty of a “shameful betrayal” of the survivors over their continued failure to find them homes, the shadow housing secretary, John Healey, said on Wednesday. He accused the housing secretary, Sajid Javid, of breaking the solemn promise made to them.

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“People rightly expect – and the prime minister promised – to pull out all the stops to get people new homes and make sure all others are safe. Instead, for more than nine months, ministers have been hands off and happy to pass the job off to the local council.”

This week the junior housing minister Dominic Raab told MPs that 95 families who were living in the buildings Barandon Walk, Hurstway Walk and Testerton Walk – near to Grenfell Tower – had not returned.

Of those, 32 households were still living in emergency accommodation, such as hotels, and the remaining 63 were still in temporary homes, he said. Not one has yet been permanently rehoused.

The government said it could offer no information in respect of people from two other nearby blocks for fear of identifying individual households.

Up to 204 households, including the tower and its environs, needed to be found somewhere to live. Last week, Javid admitted “progress has been far too slow”, telling MPs that only 62 of households had been moved into permanent homes.

Three days after the disaster, Theresa May said residents of Grenfell Tower would be found somewhere to live within three weeks. Last September the former junior housing minister Alok Sharma said officials were “working to provide a new home in social housing for all former residents of Grenfell Tower and Grenfell Walk within one year”.

However last week Javid admitted it was “unlikely” all affected households would be in new permanent homes by the one-year anniversary on 14 June.

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In response, Sadafi told Javid: “We note your strong words in parliament this week that ‘this is totally unacceptable. The suffering that these families have already endured is unimaginable. Living for this long in hotels can only make the process of grieving and recovery even harder.’ We agree.”

In a letter to the minister, Sadafi wrote that survivors were “heartbroken that families are being left to suffer in this way”.

On Wednesday, Labour claimed that at the current rate of progress, it will take 15 years to replace the cladding on the more than 300 social housing blocks identified as needing the work.

“It’s astonishing there’s been such little progress and that we have still failed to replace cladding on so many homes when it has failed safety tests and is considered unsafe,” said Shelter’s Greg Beales.