Grenfell Tower Inquiry Report

Baroness Brinton Excerpts

Friday 22nd November 2024 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Brinton (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I declare my interests as a vice- chair of the All-Party Group on Fire Safety and Rescue and as a vice-president of the LGA. It is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Stevenson, who laid out many of the Hackitt reform proposals that are so essential.

I start by paying tribute to the victims and survivors, many of whom had complained about the lack of safety in their building for many years, and the wider community around Grenfell. They still face many problems every day. I am pleased that the fire services have recognised their own failures but, as the Minister said in his opening speech, that is just the start of the failures of so many bodies, public and private. At the heart of this inquiry report is the evidence of the poor treatment of people, especially those already marginalised in our society. Sir Martin said it was a

“marked lack of respect for human decency and dignity … many of those immediately affected feeling abandoned by authority and utterly helpless”.

This could also be written about the other inquiry reports, such as Windrush and infected blood. All of us, whether Ministers, politicians, officials, staff or members of the public, must constantly challenge our own thinking and behaviour to make sure that we change. The tenant management organisation failed badly. Never again should social housing tenants be regarded as not worthy of safe housing, or treated as Grenfell tenants were treated. Never again should the vulnerable, especially the elderly and disabled, be regarded as not worthy of safety systems to get people out of burning buildings. It seems extraordinary that in the 21st century, and after 40 years of serious fires, we have to fight for the changes needed to ensure that buildings are safe, mainly but not only from fire.

Sir Martin Moore-Bick’s final report of the Grenfell Tower Inquiry is blunt that building safety has failed for decades in central government, local government and the construction industry. He says that every death single was avoidable. Can the Minister confirm that, as with the Infected Blood Inquiry report, the Government will review these recommendations at pace? Specific criticism about the deregulation of safety legislation is important. The failures of the construction sector, whether regulators, manufacturing companies, builders, maintenance or management agencies, are also shocking. The 2018 Dame Judith Hackitt report’s 50 reforms for the sector were accepted by Sir Martin Moore-Bick and the last Government in 2019. Key was the golden thread of safety, running through the sector from manufacturing construction to regulation and training. After the Hackitt report was published, the last Government accepted that they should implement it urgently, but it appears that only more consultation happened. The steering group on competencies for building a safer future, a sub-group of the CIC Built Environment Professions Together, has noted that:

“The Hackitt review suggests that a year should be required for completing this work, with updates every quarter. On 5 October 2020, the Competence Steering Group released its final report, Setting the Bar, which includes recommendations designed to produce a new competence regime for construction safety. In December 2018, James Brokenshire launched Building a safer future: an implementation plan”.


On 2 April 2020, in response to the Building a Safer Future consultation, the new Housing Secretary, Robert Jenrick MP,

“announced steps to introduce mandatory sprinkler systems and consistent wayfinding signage in all new high-rise blocks of flats over 11 metres tall”.

However, it went out to consultation and we still wait for government action. Can the Minister say when there will be an update in Parliament on the implementation of the Hackitt recommendations and the publications of the very urgent guidance?

The Fire Safety and Rescue APPG has repeatedly written to Fire Ministers about fire safety in flats over the last two decades. We had real frustration in getting Ministers to answer our questions, whether in person or in writing, including after each of the many serious flat fires and coroners’ reports that predate the Grenfell Tower fire, including Lakanal House. Most Fire Ministers over the last 20 years did not engage, not least because fires of this type were a multi-departmental issue. Speaking as a disabled person, I say that one of the areas that most worried me was that 40% of the disabled residents in Grenfell Tower died. There has been much debate in your Lordships’ House, during the passage of the then Building Safety Bill and other legislation, about how important personal emergency evacuation plans are. The excellent fire safety briefing by Triple A Solutions for Equitable makes a clear distinction between the appropriateness of the provision of PEEPs versus person-centred fire assessments. It also explains, in the subsequent pages, why it is so necessary.

The Local Government Association wrote to Dame Diana Johnson, the current Fire Minister, saying:

“As you will know the report of the second phase of the Grenfell Inquiry is expected to be published this Autumn. It is disappointing that your new Department will still not have implemented the recommendations of the first phase inquiry in relation to personal emergency evacuation plans (PEEPs) by this point, despite two years having elapsed since the closure of the second consultation on emergency evacuation. We are concerned that this failure may be at odds with the Home Office’s obligations under the Equalities Act and would welcome an opportunity to share our views with you in more detail”.


Dame Diana’s response concerned the recent announcement of the department’s plans to bring forward proposals and its recommendations. She said:

“More information on the detail of the proposals will be shared when we are able, including a formal response to the EEIS+ consultation, and we will engage with the LGA along with other partners in taking these forward”.


That is still very slow, with no firm date in sight.

I want to mention the duty of candour and the machinery of government. One of the most shocking threads through this report is that there has been no sense of responsibility and a lack of curiosity inside various government departments, by both civil servants and Ministers. That is why we have long supported the duty of candour and are pleased that the Government have committed in their manifesto to introduce it. When will legislation for duty of candour arrive? In the meantime, what changes have been made so that civil servants and public agencies always ensure that Ministers are told uncomfortable truths?

Changing the law alone is not enough. We know from when the duty of candour was introduced into the NHS that cultural change is also vital. Therefore, can the Minister outline the Government’s plans for culture change inside government? The Moore-Bick report also says that the machinery of government and its agencies failed the victims, principally through the interdepartmental working. Fragmentation and lack of curiosity resulted in action, delay and obfuscation, which cost lives. Ironically—or perhaps not ironically—this is also a criticism of the Infected Blood Inquiry report, the Hillsborough report and the Post Office Horizon reports. What steps are the Government taking to ensure that everyone across government knows which department is leading and how the current culture can be changed to ensure that no more tragedies like Grenfell can happen again? It is vital that the police and the CPS move at pace to review the report and investigate those individuals and organisations who Sir Martin said deliberately breached the law. Given the pressures on the police and the CPS, will the Government provide extra resources for this? Justice further delayed is justice denied.

Finally, how will the Government report back to Parliament on the progress of the recommendations? I ask this in light of the Dagenham fire in August. A resident of that block has been in touch, saying:

“The cladding on Spectrum Building had been mostly remediated. The cladding on the fifth and sixth floors had been replaced and held up quite well against the fire—the timber frame of the fifth and sixth floors is where the fire continued to spread … But the site clearly wasn’t safe. There was confusion over the alarms. Mandatory documents don’t seem to exist. And, most importantly, after the devastation, no one talks to residents. We have been treated terribly by the private companies who profit from the development. The local authority have done an excellent job in stepping in and helping us”.


I started by noting that we have a record of 40 years of fatalities. Eight years after Grenfell, there is still an urgent need for everyone involved—government, public services, the private construction sector, housing management agents, freeholders—to really dedicate themselves to making sure that Grenfell can never happen again.