Grenfell Tower Inquiry

Liz Kendall Excerpts

Monday 14th May 2018 Westminster Hall

[Liz Kendall (Leicester West) (Lab)]

I am honoured to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Peterborough (Fiona Onasanya) and I agree with every word she has said. Many people here have spoken about the dignity with which the victims and survivors of Grenfell have spoken, but why should they have to hold it together in trying to persuade this place to take action? Why do they not have the time to grieve for the people they have lost, their families, friends and loved ones? To hold it together, to come to Speaker’s House, to persuade and fight for this Government to act—that should not have to be the case, and I am very sorry it has been.

I will make two practical points and one broader point. First is an issue that many hon. Members have spoken about: the appalling lack of action on rehousing those who have lost their homes in Grenfell. My right hon. Friend the Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy) and my hon. Friend the Member for Kensington (Emma Dent Coad) pointed out that 72 households are still living in hotel rooms and 64 are still in temporary accommodation. Even worse than that is the fact that over half of those families have accepted permanent accommodation, but they cannot move into it because it is not ready.

That is 68 houses. Are you telling me that with all the money, influence and power not just of the council, but of the national Government, we could not get those homes ready for people to move into? Where there is a will, there is a way. The problem is that there does not appear to be the will to sort out those 68 homes for people who have already accepted that accommodation. What is the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea doing? How hard can it be? I hope the Minister will answer that question at the end of the debate.

Secondly, I follow up on the points that my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Yardley (Jess Phillips) and the hon. Member for Walsall North (Eddie Hughes) made about the children who have been affected—who have lost not just their parents, but their sisters, their brothers, their cousins, their friends and their neighbours. This has affected the whole community in that area. I do not believe that either the council or the Government have understood just how widely and deeply it has affected people.

I have heard from the Grenfell families their real concern that, when children wanted to go to visit the tower because it would help them to grieve and to say goodbye, they were told they could not go because it was not safe. They were not asking for the children to go inside, just to go and look and say goodbye, and to feel close to the people they loved. The state knows best—but it did not in this case.

On the point about education, I am deeply concerned that families have had to fight to get the catch-up help they need for their children. We have to put that extra investment into those children, so that they can live as normal a life as possible, fulfil their hopes, dreams and potential, and become the people they want to be. I ask the Minister to look at that again, too.

Thirdly, on mental health, I know that many child and adolescent mental health services advisers have been put in place, but my concern is over the much longer term. If someone ends up needing a physical operation as a child, on their heart or their limbs, they get follow-up support throughout their life, because we know that those physical impacts early on have a big impact later in life. Where is that help and support for the mental health of those children in the longer term?

My final point, which many other hon. Members have made, is that there is nothing—nothing—to be feared from putting the families at the heart of this process. In fact, quite the reverse: there is everything to be gained, because we will not get to the bottom of what happened or have a proper plan to put things right in future unless the families are front and centre. Do not repeat the mistakes of the past. We have heard from many hon. Members about Hillsborough. We know what went wrong there. Do not repeat those mistakes. It is actions, not words, that matter. I hope the Government will act.