In the wake of the Grenfell Tower tragedy, questions have been raised as to the appropriateness of celebrating the Notting Hill carnival while the grisly tomb of so many still scars North Kensington’s skyline.

Greg Hands, Conservative MP for Chelsea and Fulham – a new constituency formed from parts of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea and Hammersmith and Fulham – asked London mayor Sadiq Khan whether it was “appropriate to stage a carnival in the near proximity of a major national disaster?”, proposing either moving the event, or for the GLA to take over the carnival.

As the newly elected Labour MP of Kensington, Emma Dent Coad, responded: “I find it quite bizarre that an MP from another constituency should attempt to tell the community around Grenfell how to grieve. We know how to grieve. The carnival community has been thinking of various ways to respect and pay tribute to the families and neighbours who have been lost, and to survivors. It is for them to decide what is appropriate.”

Quite. Both regular attendees and contributors to the carnival died in the tower. Almost everybody in the local community knows somebody who either escaped or died, whether it be a family member, friend, colleague or neighbour. In the words of Joe Delaney, who lost friends in the inferno and was evacuated from a surrounding estate: “The carnival is a celebration of the area and its people and therefore the carnival should happen for that reason alone. It should be used as a memorial for those who died. It should be used as a reminder to others of how these people were treated, and we will be celebrating the memory of those who lost their lives.”

After all, this is not the first attempt to stop or move carnival. The former Conservative MP for Kensington, Victoria Borwick, has been a vocal critic, leading the campaign for the carnival to be relocated, citing concerns about crime and public safety. At the end of 2015, the Metropolitan police’s then-commissioner Bernard Hogan-Howe warned that budget cuts meant he could not guarantee the safety of carnival-goers last year, and lacked confidence in the “quality of the carnival’s organisation”.

Negative media coverage of the Notting Hill carnival since the 1970s has typically presented the event as lawless, violent and dangerous, mainly highlighting the number of arrests or reports of violence. But let’s compare today’s carnival to other large-scale events: Notting Hill carnival boasts attendance figures approaching two million people. There were 454 arrests in 2016 within the entire local area, extending several miles outside the official carnival border, a figure reported as worryingly high.

At Bestival, a 50,000-person private event held on the Isle of Wight, drugs worth £175,000 were seized last year. The Edinburgh festival is attended by up to 400,000 people. There were 176 arrests during the 2015 festival period for offences including drugs, assault and theft. Scaled up to the size of carnival, that would equate to more than 800 arrests. Both events were widely covered by the media and described by the police as “a success”.

With a 220ft charred silhouette looming over the route, there is no doubt that this year’s event will bring challenges

Today’s perception of the carnival as solely an entertainment and tourist attraction is distanced from and trivialises the deep cultural struggle for individual and collective empowerment of marginalised and oppressed people. Although it is often forgotten, it began from a deprived and struggling community’s desire to ease racial tensions and bridge cultural differences. This legacy was clearly demonstrated by the diversity of the community’s response in the aftermath of the Grenfell Tower disaster.

As the carnival has grown, many people and groups have contributed and wrestled to organise and shape it, but it is fundamentally a group effort, complete with its disagreements and different areas of activity. Carnival is a mass of artistry, creativity, the result of the people who make it happen. The artists, performers, musicians, dancers, chefs, merchants and all the people who attend are contributors to its massive size and effect. In the weeks leading up to the August bank holiday, the glazing and doorways of shops and houses are fortified with timber panels ready for the onslaught. After the first day, refuse services patrol into the early hours, only for the streets to become covered with assorted carnival detritus on the Monday again.

Two million people – roughly equivalent to the entire population of Slovenia, Gabon or Latvia – crammed into a small area is not a challenge to underestimate. Surely successfully hosting such an event is something to be proud of.

With a 220ft charred silhouette looming over the carnival route, there is no doubt that this year’s event will bring challenges. But stopping or moving the carnival only plays into the hands of those who have conspired for years to have the event dislodged from its rightful home. A minute’s silence is planned at 3pm on bank holiday Monday, to honour the lives of those who passed away. As Pepe Francis, a director of the carnival, has said: “Grenfell Tower is at the heart of our neighbourhood. The families and loved ones of those who died and who are missing continue to suffer. We do not pretend to provide solace. But we can, and will, offer respect and solidarity.”

This year, there is a chance to recalibrate the nature of the council’s involvement, with local councillors giving it due respect and recognition for its contributions to the local area and wider society. Let’s hope they take advantage of the opportunity to shape a new relationship.

• This article was co-written by Dan Parmenter, technical director of the International Times