Grenfell Tower Fire

Debate between Joanna Cherry and Alison Thewliss

Thursday 6th June 2019 Commons Chamber

[Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)]

I thank all hon. Members who have contributed to this debate. Few of us here will ever forget the awful scenes of summer 2017. I pay tribute to all the families who lost loved ones and to the beautiful community spirit of all the residents who have campaigned tirelessly for justice. I thank Grenfell United and all who have provided support and solidarity. We saw earlier this month the community iftar commemorating those who were lost two years ago.

The organisation and activism in this community has been exemplary, but let us be clear that they should never have had to be activists. They should not have had to fight for justice—the hon. Member for Bethnal Green and Bow (Rushanara Ali) outlined some of that fight—and they should be living their lives, playing with their kids and spending time with family and friends in safe and appropriate housing.

I thank the hon. Member for Kensington (Emma Dent Coad) for securing this debate and for her personal commitment to this cause. It touched my heart to hear of all she has been through and of all she has done on behalf of her constituents. I am sure she would agree that we do not want to have another debate six months down the line, although I acknowledge her desire to see this through, whatever it takes.

There have been too many debates already, and too little action. Speaking to Katherine Sladden from Grenfell United, it is clear to me that survivors need more than another debate; they need clear and decisive action from this UK Government. It is shocking to hear that they are still waiting to be rehoused in the area.

In her resignation speech the Prime Minister cited the UK Government’s response in calling an inquiry into Grenfell, as the hon. Members for Lincoln (Karen Lee) and for Easington (Grahame Morris) mentioned, as if this were some kind of achievement. I am afraid that history will not judge the Prime Minister kindly on this. Indeed, even the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government has told the House that the Government’s initial response to the Grenfell tragedy was not good enough, and it is beset by delays even now.

It is equally disappointing that the timescale for the public inquiry has slipped and that phase 2 will not now begin until next year and, further, that Scotland Yard has stated that there will be no criminal charges until 2021. I appreciate that there are complexities, but there is a desperate need for justice. The Grenfell fire was a tragedy, but that does not mean it was unavoidable. The people of Grenfell were systematically failed, and a catalogue of errors led to the fire. They tried time and again to raise their concerns about fire risk and other issues, and it should not have taken this fire to get notice taken of those concerns.

The Grenfell residents are not alone, and we know there are still too many people living in high rises with ACM cladding and other issues. They are living with no certainty and a great deal of anxiety about their safety. That is unacceptable, and I ask the Minister for an update on the progress on all building types.

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that Grenfell United, the Grenfell community and their wonderful MP, the hon. Member for Kensington (Emma Dent Coad), are fighting for basic human rights? The Edinburgh Trade Union Council and Living Rent are jointly organising a demonstration next week to show their support for the Grenfell community, to pay homage to those who died and to show support for the ongoing fight. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is appropriate for all rights campaigners and trade unionists across the UK to stand with the people of Grenfell?

[Alison Thewliss]

I absolutely agree, and I thank my hon. and learned Friend for what she says. The solidarity across the UK and across the world has been moving. Again, it is a fight that should not have to be fought. The right to safe housing should not be a fight that we are still fighting in 2019.

The Equality and Human Rights Commission’s report on Grenfell makes for difficult reading, and it says: that the housing was inadequate to begin with; that the right to life of particular groups, such as disabled people, elderly people and children, was not properly considered; that safety notices were published only in English, a language that some people in the tower did not speak; and that, after the fire, people who had suffered inhumane and degrading treatment were continually let down when trying to access support and basic services.

There has been a lack of investment in social rented housing and a lack of value placed on the lives of those who live in such housing. Grenfell United’s briefing says that residents feel short-changed by Kensington and Chelsea Council, with corners cut and concerns ignored. What it calls a “culture of institutional indifference” is chilling, but not as chilling as what the hon. Member for Kensington outlined about the racism and the comments made by people in that institution.

It struck me at the time that some representatives of Kensington and Chelsea Council had never been inside Grenfell. It quickly emerged that other tower blocks in London had no fire doors or safety procedures, and had been like that for some time. I have been inside every block of flats in my constituency, not least because they are great places to leaflet in the rain—it rains a lot in Glasgow—and I cannot imagine going in and finding no fire doors or finding them in such condition. Most have an on-site concierge who wants to know why a visitor wants to get into the building, and there is maintenance.

In the past, some blocks that, thankfully, have now been demolished were not great but, as a councillor at the time, I had a relationship with housing officers so I could challenge such things. I listened to constituents’ concerns, as I still do, and I acted on those concerns. I find it hard to understand this fundamental disconnect, and I hope it is not too late to mend that disconnect between those who live in such blocks and those who represent them.

I urge Ministers to consider the calls from Grenfell United for an independent tenant protection regulator that can put power back into the hands of tenants to ensure that they have full recourse to means of resolving complaints and bringing all properties up to a safe standard. The Scottish Housing Regulator was established in 2011 under the Housing (Scotland) Act 2010, and its statutory objective is to

“safeguard and promote the interests of current and future tenants of social landlords, people who are or may become homeless, and people who use housing services provided by registered social landlords (RSLs) and local authorities.”

That is a means of recourse.

I urge the Minister to look at the Scottish model, which includes a process for reporting significant performance failures. That is defined as

“something your landlord does or fails to do, which puts the interests of the tenants at risk. This does, or could, affect all your landlord’s tenants.”

Such a system would certainly have caught the concerns of Grenfell residents and prompted an investigation.

What is most disturbing, however, is the Government’s approach to fire safety. It has been nearly two years since the events at Grenfell and, as the hon. Member for Croydon North (Mr Reed) reminded us, nearly 10 years since Lakanal House. The response in England has lagged behind the response in the other nations of the UK. The National Fire Chiefs Council and the Royal Institute of British Architects have called for fire safety regulations in England to be brought in line with those in Scotland and Wales, particularly in requiring sprinklers and a second means of escape.

The Scottish Parliament set up a ministerial working group in the wake of the Grenfell fire, and legislation will be introduced this year to fulfil those recommendations, which include extending the mandatory installation of sprinklers in new builds to cover buildings that provide care and to larger multi-occupancy flats. A change in building standards will reduce the height of high rises from 18 metres to 11 metres—I note that the UK Government are still talking about 18 metres, but 11 metres is much better because 18 metres is very high—and will extend the range of new buildings that require non-combustible cladding.

New measures have also been proposed to improve evacuation by using sound alerts and requiring two escape stairs in all new high-rise residential buildings. That will go alongside the development of a database of safety-critical information for existing high-rise residential buildings. The Scottish Government will also issue fire-safety risk assessment guidance to the residents of high rises, the lack of which was a contributing factor at Grenfell.

For private companies, a positive step from the UK Government would be to zero-rate cladding and sprinkler systems. I have repeatedly called for that, as has the Scottish Government’s Minister for housing, Kevin Stewart MSP. It is in the Government’s gift to incentivise private companies to act responsibly and to relieve some of the burden of costs, and I sincerely hope they will take that small step.

Some private developers have taken a responsible route and met the costs, but there is still no statutory obligation on them to do so. I call on the Minister to make a move in that direction. As the hon. Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts) and others have said, the Minister must also provide revenue funding for ongoing building maintenance—not just for the one-off capital works—because that will keep people safe for years to come.

I also urge the Minister to look at more advanced testing across various materials, as the hon. Gentleman also said, and to consider the wider context. It has been suggested to me by some in the industry that materials may pass the tests when taken out of context, but they act in quite a different manner once in situ and installed on a building, as the hon. Member for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter) mentioned. This requires serious investment and testing, with discussions with all involved in building design and manufacture, and I urge the Minister to take that on board.

The impact on those who endured trauma at Grenfell will continue for some time, and I appreciate that a wellbeing service has been set up to last five years, but we must not assume that this will be the end of the need of some residents or that they will all access such support when it is first offered. The support needs to be there for the long run. I ask the Minister for further consideration of what the needs of residents will be in future years, and an assurance of how those will be met. I also note that although the soil testing that the Minister announced last October has shown low risk, people are still anxious. He must be mindful that some harms, due to the chemicals involved, may take longer to emerge, and I ask him what the plan will be to ensure that everybody is looked after in the years ahead. As the hon. Member for Kensington mentioned, the mental health and social needs of the whole community must also be taken into account; the definition must be as wide as possible.

I also understand that there has been a period in which rent and bills have been frozen for some residents who were displaced and rehomed, but that it is due to come to an end relatively soon. I ask the Minister to give more detail on what is going to happen, because I am concerned that for those who have lost everything, a sudden hike, with no gradual transition, could leave some residents struggling. Although I believe sessions have been arranged with Citizens Advice, as much assistance as possible should be offered by the whole of government to those residents who require it.

Grenfell was a tragedy. It was scandalous. It was avoidable. It was symptomatic of a wider problem with this UK Government’s attitude to social rented housing and to the people and communities who live there. But this is not irredeemable. The residents of Grenfell want to ensure that nobody else will lose their life or the life of a loved one in such an awful way. They will always remember the 72 who died, but they want to create lasting change in their memory. I call on the UK Government and the Minister to honour the survivors and the lost by taking action, and to do it now.

Police, Fire and Rescue Services: Funding Reductions

Debate between Joanna Cherry and Alison Thewliss

Wednesday 20th February 2019 Westminster Hall

[Joanna Cherry (Edinburgh South West) (SNP)]

It is my pleasure and privilege to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hosie.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Easington (Grahame Morris) on bringing the debate to the Floor of the Westminster Hall Chamber. I share his tributes to the police, the fire services and the emergency services of all the nations of these islands. I also take the opportunity to commend him for his comments on the dangers of making the fire service a scapegoat for the Grenfell fire. The thrust of what he was saying was that if we want to know who was responsible for the Grenfell fire, we should follow the money—see who benefited from the cheap cladding and the poor upkeep of the building—rather than blaming the men and women who risked their lives to save lives that night.

We have heard a number of interesting and diverse contributions, from the hon. Members for Batley and Spen (Tracy Brabin) and for Strangford (Jim Shannon) and my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss). My hon. Friend raised in particular the role that the fire services play in Scotland, with their proactive preventive measures, such as offering to go into people’s homes to assess their anti-fire readiness. That proactive strategy is reflected in the way the Scottish police force, the Crown Office and some Scottish social services have approached the problem of knife crime in Scotland, treating it as a public health emergency. My hon. Friend has spoken about that eloquently on a number of occasions.

This debate is really about funding. The hon. Member for Easington painted a concerning picture of the effect of the reductions in police and fire and rescue services across England and Wales. Those concerns are clearly widely held. As the Scottish National party spokesperson for justice and home affairs, I want to contribute constructively to the debate by offering an overview of the somewhat different position in Scotland. In an era of severe funding cuts to police and fire services across England and Wales, the UK Government would do well to look to the example of the Scottish Government, who have managed to protect such vital public services from the worst excesses of the UK Government’s failed austerity project.

Let us look at the stats on crime in Scotland, from the Scottish crime and justice survey. Since 2008-09, crime has fallen by 32%. The vast majority of people in Scotland—87%—say that they experience no crime. That is not to diminish the severe experiences of the 13% who do but, again, the Scottish Government have leading legislation for the victims of crime and for vulnerable witnesses. Since 2006-07, recorded crime in Scotland has fallen by 42%, and non-sexual violent crime is at one of its lowest levels since 1974, and represents a 49% fall since 2006-07. That is largely due to the public health approach to the problem of knife crime in Scotland, in which the police and emergency services collaborate with other healthcare and social services professionals to reduce violent crime at a time when it is sadly on the rise in England and Wales.

[Alison Thewliss]

My hon. and learned Friend makes a good point about the impact of that approach to tackling knife crime, particularly in relation to young people. Does she agree that that investment over an extended period of time has been valuable in dealing with knife crime and the impact of violence on young people?

[Joanna Cherry]

Absolutely, and I am pleased to say that the UK Government have recognised that, by coming up to Scotland to study the approach that we have taken. Cressida Dick from the Metropolitan police has been up to Glasgow to see the approach that has been taken there, and I know that UK Government Ministers have been to my constituency and to see Scottish Government Ministers in Edinburgh to discuss these issues. Witnesses have also given evidence to the Select Committees on Home Affairs and on Justice about the approach taken in Scotland.

However, key to the approach in Scotland is protecting the budget of the police and fire services from the consequences of austerity. As we all know, the Scottish Government’s budget has been squeezed over the past few years. Between 2010-11 and 2019-20, Scotland’s discretionary resource budget allocation will have been reduced by 6.5%, which is almost £2 billion in real terms. However, the Scottish Government’s decisions on tax and borrowing have reduced the real-terms reduction to the total Scottish fiscal budget from 5.5% to 3.4% between 2010 and the current year, and their decisions on income tax alone in this coming year mean that we will have an additional £68 million to invest in public services. Such measures have enabled the Scottish Government to mitigate the worst of austerity in very challenging circumstances.

For example, while spending on police forces in England and Wales has dropped by 17% since 2010, and the number of officers has dropped by 14%, in Scotland we have gone in the opposite direction. As my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow Central said, since the SNP Government came to power in 2007, there are now 5.8% more police officers. There has also been modernisation, with one police force for the whole of Scotland. It is important to remember that in London there is one police force for the whole metropolitan area, whose population is nearly twice that of Scotland, so having one force for Scotland was a no-brainer. I will come back to that point when I address my hon. Friend’s comments on VAT. In September last year there were around 32 police officers per 10,000 of population in Scotland, compared with around 21 officers per 10,000 of population in England and Wales.

The commitment to protect public services in Scotland from the effects of the UK Government’s austerity project extends to fire services. The recent Scottish Government Budget—for the year 2019-20—introduced increases in the money available for fire and rescue services, as well as for the police. There has been a real-terms uplift for Police Scotland. The overall Scottish Police Authority budget will increase by 3.7%, meaning an additional £42.3 million. The police revenue budget will increase by 2.8%, meaning an additional £30.3 million. The police capital budget will increase by £12 million, meaning a 52% increase. Also, the Scottish Government remain committed to protecting the police resource budget in real terms in every year of the current Scottish Parliament, which means a boost of £100 million by 2021. So it can be done when the right choices are made by Governments.

Likewise, this year will see the budget for the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service increase by £5.5 million, and that is in addition to increasing the service’s spending capacity by £15.5 million in the previous financial year. The Scottish Government’s Budget also confirmed that the £21.7 million increase in capital funding for the service announced in the 2017-18 Budget will be maintained.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow Central said, the Scottish National party, after much campaigning during this Parliament and the last, was successful in persuading the UK Government to end the VAT obligation on Scotland’s police and fire and rescue services. However, more than a year on, the UK Government have still not repaid the £175 million taken by way of VAT before scrapping the unfair charges. They need to reverse that decision and return the money to Scotland’s emergency services. Scotland’s police and fire and rescue services were the only territorial forces in the UK asked to pay VAT—as my hon. Friend said, other national public organisations south of the border were not asked to pay VAT. Make no mistake about it: that was a political decision. It has now been reversed, and the money that was wrongfully taken should be paid back.

My hon. Friend also raised the funds required for policing in Scotland in relation to Brexit, which has been estimated at £17 million a year, including capital costs for uniforms, equipment and vehicles of around £800,000 a year. The UK Government need to recognise that when allocating spending. The majority of people living in Scotland did not vote for Brexit, and the Scottish Government’s sensible, compromise solutions for ameliorating the effects of Brexit have been ignored. If the British Government are intent on imposing Brexit on Scotland against our will, the least they can do is meet the costs of the extra policing, as I believe they intend to do for Northern Ireland. Although there are special considerations in Northern Ireland that must of course be respected, that does not mean that differing considerations in Scotland should not be taken into account.

I will end by putting three questions to the Minister. First, will she look carefully at the position in Scotland, to see what lessons can be learned for England and Wales, bearing in mind the crime figures I have quoted and the fact that the Scottish Government have managed, in a time of austerity, to find the money necessary to properly fund the police and fire and rescue services? Secondly, will she intercede with the Treasury to ensure that the £175 million wrongfully taken in VAT from Scotland’s police and fire and rescue services is paid back? Thirdly, will she explain who will fund the extra policing needed in Scotland as a result of her Government’s Brexit plans, which the Scottish people did not vote for?