Grenfell Tower

Alison McGovern Excerpts

Wednesday 16th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Emma Dent Coad]

I absolutely concur; they have been failed.

Secondly, the more pernicious sections of the media have berated families for not accepting so-called interim housing, implying that they love living in the luxury of hotels. I have visited those hotels. A Premier Inn is not a luxury. Some have called it a prison. Many have refused the so-called interim housing because they know what it means. A “temporary” placement that I know of lasted 13 years.

As for offers of permanent accommodation, the problems are manifold. Some are heartbreaking. One family was offered a flat in the so-called luxury of Kensington Row, but could not accept it because they needed adaptations to live independently. That work cannot be done for two years because the block is still under guarantee. The proposed solution was to offer home care. A family who were able to live independently were told to accept care from strangers, and another were offered accommodation in an older building needing adaptations.

[Alison McGovern (Wirral South) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the situation she describes is intolerable and must be changed?

[Emma Dent Coad]

Yes. I thank my hon. Friend.

The council has refused to pay for those adaptations because the property is owned by a housing association, and the family are so desperate to move that they have offered to fund the adaptations themselves from their compensation payment. Worst of all to date is a self-sufficient family, whom I know very well, who care for their older disabled family member and are proud to do so, but whose housing needs cannot be met. The council suggested they put that older family member in a care home so that they could be rehoused separately.

The pledges, commitments and guarantees of the Prime Minister, the Secretary of State or this week’s Housing Minister are not rehousing people. We ask the Government once again to send in commissioners to take control of this shameful process. If the Government continue to sit on their hands while tutting their disapproval, they should think about this: some Grenfell-affected people may not make it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alison McGovern (Wirral South) (Lab)]

I want to briefly add to the comments that I made in the Westminster Hall debate on this subject on Monday. I thank the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Paul Scully) for opening that debate.

I want to say two things. First, I ask all Members of the House not to say about Grenfell that this should never happen again. I was the local councillor for Lakanal House when it went up in flames in 2009, and I have to tell everyone that it is too late; it has already happened again. Grenfell is this disaster happening again. We all need to consider the reasons why we failed to learn those lessons. It is very important that we stop thinking about the fact that we ought to prevent future disasters when we are already staring in the face the repetition of a disaster. In addition, the secondary tragedy of the Government’s failure to respond to disaster, as happened after the Hillsborough disaster in 1989, looks set to happen again. The lack of faith that people felt in institutions of the state at that time is, I feel, on the horizon now.

My second point is that Ministers, especially the Secretary of State, should not think there is nothing they can do about that lack of faith. They should not think that people will necessarily lose faith in the Government and what they do because of this disaster. There are things that they can do about it, such as implementing the charter that Bishop James Jones called for in his report on the experience of the Hillsborough families. We know that the Bellwin scheme and all the things we have in place at the moment are way out of date. I know that from the New Ferry explosion in my constituency. We should learn the lessons of Tessa Jowell’s life in responding to disaster and implement James Jones’s charter. In addition to the other measures that we need, the Government should bring forward the public advocate mentioned in the Queen’s Speech. That way, as the Minister said, people will have a legacy.