Grenfell Tower Fire: Eighth Anniversary

Tom Collins Excerpts

Tuesday 10th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Joe Powell]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. I do applaud the many steps the Government are taking on this issue—for example, on professionalising the housing sector and implementing Awaab’s law on damp and mould. As she states, the truth is that without real change, all of us in this House know that a tragic case such as that of Awaab Ishak could easily happen again. In my constituency, that means that the purpose of the RBKC, Notting Hill Genesis, Peabody, Octavia and others should be to serve the residents, not to make their lives a misery, as too often ends up happening. We have launched a local campaign on safe and healthy homes to try to address the systemic failure in the community around Grenfell.

There will be no justice until the painfully slow process of remediating unsafe buildings across the country is complete.

[Tom Collins (Worcester) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend for securing this debate. Last week, the residents of more than 40 flats in Barbourne Works, Worcester, were suddenly evicted after an inspection of unremediated cladding found such severe fire hazards that an immediate prohibition notice was issued. How that was able to happen is a question that must be answered. In the meantime, does the Minister agree that the building managers—in this case, FirstPort—must put residents first, and must not be allowed to let legal disputes or the allocation of blame slow down the urgent work of making the building safe and allowing residents to return home?

[Joe Powell]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention, and I agree—it is staggering that hundreds of thousands of people are still living in buildings like the one he describes, with major fire defects. Members across the House from up and down the country will have constituents affected, with people trapped in unsellable properties, leaseholders on the hook for non-cladding defects, and social housing providers sinking funds into remediation that could be spent on building the new social homes our country desperately needs.