By Charlotte Webster-
Labour MP Richard Burgon ‘s call for justice and real change for the surviving members of the Grenfell fire must be taken seriously.
The public calls for change and justice in relation to the Grenfell fire which cost 72 lives has been loud enough ever since they were made five years ago, but will only get louder as time goes on.
The Metropolitan police has said they will wait for a full report about the tragedy before any prosecution can be considered, which is unlikely to be before 2023.
Many critics believe the police and the government are simply kicking the can down the road.
Marking the fifth anniversary of the disaster, Burgon said: “We need more than the apologies of politicians, we need more than an inquiry, we need to see justice properly done and we need to see real change.”
The MP for Leeds East said: “We’ve heard a lot in recent days about ensuring this atrocity never happens again, but the Grenfell families believe that five years on another Grenfell is a very real possibility.
“Already at the inquiry there’s been a mountain of evidence of how profits were prioritized over safety, how privatization and deregulation watered down building standards, how cuts and austerity contributed.
“All that must be tackled if the words ‘never again are not just platitudes from politicians’, and the lessons from the inquiry must be implemented in full, however uncomfortable that is for the Government.
“But there are already deep concerns that lessons will be ignored and they already are being.”
Constituency MP Conservative Felicity Buchan (Kensington) said there was “a lot more to be done” to address the issues linked to the disaster.
She said: “We are never going to be able to right the wrongs of the past. But we can ensure that there is a lasting legacy from Grenfell. And I am very clear that that legacy must be that everyone has a right to be safe in their homes, and that all residents and all communities, their voices need to be heard.”
While Labour MP Karen Buck (Westminster North) said there had been an “epic failure” in the state’s response in the immediate aftermath of the disaster.
She added: “The way in which the institutions of the state failed the survivors, the relatives and the wider community set a tone for the whole of the following five years.
Shadow housing minister Matthew Pennycook called for the Government to go “faster and in many cases further”.
He said: “If the Government do not accelerate markedly the pace of remediation across the board, we are likely to find ourselves marking the 10th or even the 15th anniversary of the Grenfell fire while still bemoaning the fact that some unsafe buildings require fixing.
“Yet we now know what happened could have been avoided, it could have been avoided if shortcuts were not taken when it came to safety.”
He added: “We have real concerns about whether the new regime is going to be able to function effectively. In particular, we remain unconvinced that the new building safety regulator – which the act makes responsible for all aspects of the new framework – has what it needs to perform all the complex tasks assigned to it.”
Housing minister Eddie Hughes said: “For my part, I am sorry. We’re committed to making things right by fixing the building safety regime that so badly failed them on that night, through the Building Safety Act.
“By implementing the toughest and most stringent fire safety standards through the Fire Safety Act and putting residents themselves at the heart of a reformed social housing sector through our Social Housing Regulation Bill.
“However, we’re not naive about the scale of the challenges that remain… we still have a long way to go on several issues.”