Grenfell Tower Inquiry Phase 2 Report

Daisy Cooper Excerpts

Wednesday 4th September 2024 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

That is a really important point, because there have been I don’t know how many examples of injustice where people have not been listened to and have been disregarded. Different Prime Ministers over the years have stood at this Dispatch Box and quite genuinely made commitments on the back of reports. I do not doubt that for a minute. I think every Prime Minister who has stood here in relation to any of those injustices meant every word that he or she said in response, and yet it goes on. So there is something more fundamental that we have to make time to consider, because I do not want to be back at this Dispatch Box—or any future Prime Minister to be at this Dispatch Box—having a version of the same discussion about injustice, about people being disregarded, not listened to and not taken seriously after the event for too long, and about justice coming too late for people who desperately need it. That is what I mean by turning a corner.

[Daisy Cooper (St Albans) (LD)]

The inquiry report is damning, and the testimony that we heard is utterly devastating. First and foremost, all our thoughts are with the victims, the survivors, the bereaved and everybody affected.

In the last Parliament, many of us fought tooth and nail on a cross-party basis to improve the Fire Safety Bill and the Building Safety Bill so that social tenants and leaseholders who are still living in buildings covered in cladding and with other fire safety defects could get that remediation work done as quickly as possible. It is now clear that in some cases, the waterfall system that has been set up, by which we identify who is responsible, is simply not working and is taking far too long. One idea that was on the table in the last Parliament was that in some cases, the Government could put the money up to pay for the remediation, to take away the risk, and then use the power of the state and its lawyers to go after those responsible with penalties, so that the taxpayer would not lose out. Will the Prime Minister, who says that this is a moment of change and has committed to speed things up, please review that idea to see whether it could be used in some limited cases where there has still been no action?

[The Prime Minister]

That is a really important point. From my own constituency, I know of examples where there was a contract, then a subcontract, a subcontract and another subcontract. In one case in my constituency, it went through seven subcontractors before the person who was actually responsible was found. Everybody simply took a cut of the contract and passed it on. That is a real problem, and we have to get to the bottom of it. We cannot allow that to happen. Of course, we will consider any proposals that are put forward in response to this report, but this is a very real problem of contracts simply being subcontracted over and over again. Trying to find accountability is very, very difficult.