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Sunday 18 June 2017

TASK FORCE APPOINTED ON GRENFELL DISASTER


The Rt Hon. Amber Rudd 17th June 2017
The Home Secretary
2 Marsham St,
Westminster,
London
SW1P 4DF


Dear Home Secretary
I welcome the recent announcement that the very necessary step has been taken to appoint a government Task Force to coordinate all relief and support in this disaster. This is not a moment too soon: we have been hearing this morning of experienced and organised volunteer groups’ despair at being asked to stand back when there was little or no help to replace them.
I have been in discussion over the past few days with local charities, voluntary organisations, and groups of volunteers working for affected residents. They have made representations to me, on the basis of which I I have collated a list of the following key issues they are facing and insist that the following actions are taken:
Immediate support for those affected
  1. No household or individual should have to contact many different parties to get the help they need. Every affected household or individual should have a named officer/social worker, and any handovers done with named replacements. Support should be available 24 hours of the day, 7 days a week.

  1. There must be officials from all relevant government departments and agencies on site to deal with benefit claims, identity documents, any issues related to immigration status and all other key administrative and bureaucratic issues.

  1. Those who need to bury their loved ones must be linked up with the free funeral services being so generously offered.

  1. I have been told that some people who have lost their homes have been sent out of borough and are being given only £10 per day subsistence. If this is accurate it must be addressed without delay.

  1. Those affected and in employment must receive help to inform employers so that they do not lose work because of this disaster.

  1. A very firm commitment that in the short, mid and long-term, residents affected are located within the borough or in close neighbouring boroughs - so they are close to their local networks, schools, work and communities - must be formally announced and communicated to all residents without delay.

  1. As soon as possible I would like to see a full and detailed breakdown of every category and approximate of person, what is being done for them, and where they are being relocated. This to include any temporary or AirB&B guests who may have been staying in the building.

  1. Information, reassurance and advice must be given to neighbouring residents living in towers, along with a timetable of safety checks, especially those in the Silchester estate.

Co-ordination of relief response
  1. There must be a single point of contact and a coordinated response to offers of support by volunteers whose skills and experience are needed, such as counsellors and psychotherapists and solicitors.
  1. There must be regular briefings throughout the day to all those involved in the relief effort, with a single point of contact in each group and a single point of contact for requests for information.

  1. Links must be established between donated funds and those who so desperately need them. Kensington and Chelsea Foundation are a well-established group and we need to see a robust method of getting funds out where needed and without delay.

I appreciate that fulfilling the above will require significant resources and do not want to minimise the scale of the task ahead. No doubt your team has collated a similar task list and I would be grateful for sight of this, and to have your firm commitment that all the above issues have been taken on board.
Finally, I would like to pay tribute to the extraordinary response of both the emergency services and the local community. Their input has been exceptional and unprecedented and offers an example to us all of what can be achieved when communities work together.
I look forward to your early response.
A copy of this letter is being sent to Councillor Nicholas Paget-Brown, Leader of Council of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea.
 


Emma Dent Coad

MP for Kensington

29 comments:

  1. The Government is sending in a task force of civil servants to run RBKC. This is a tacit acceptance that the Government sees Horton Street as incapable of running its own affairs. So the Rotten Borough is now subject to both Government intervention and the advent of a left wing Labour MP. The long awaited revolution has finally arrived at the Town Hall. Quite extraordinary and inevitable.

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  2. ' The Landlord does not listen to the estate ' Rock Fielding Mellon - Well done Rock - Grenfell is what happens . Hang your head in shame. Resign.

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  3. 'We listen but we do not hear ' alleged comment Cllr Mary Weale

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  4. Paget-Brown on BBC TV News in shirtsleeves lying through his teeth. He claims that since last Wednesday morning RBKC officers have been working hard on Grenfell. In which case why, as BBC has also reported, is no one visible at the site, nor is anyone working at Horton Street this weekend? Resignations: Paget Brown, Fielding Mellen and let's not forget Lightfoot the money man. The must be joined by Holgate and Lightfoot.

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  5. Correction: Holgate and Black must also resign.

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    Replies
    1. Bring me the head of Nicholas Holgate20 June 2017 at 03:30

      for his failure to mount an effective rescue service in Latimer Road tailored to the needs of each individual. To offer £ 10 a day subsidence is a disgrace when you run the richest local authority in Europe. Black, Maddison and Jevans must go too for their failure at the TMO.

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  6. Those in Planning and Enviorment health also need to be investigated; even if the TMO is in 'charge' the council still have duty of care to ensure residents' safety. 18 months without checcking the safety of the tower.

    The greater effect has been job cuts to the council. This has highlighted the close connections between developers and the council. As GAG and Dame have been going on for years illustrating the actions of Rocky were being questioned then and now.

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  7. ear Anon 15.37, please note the huge swell of support from our fellow residents for those named above, as evidenced on this thread. Truly heartwarming.

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  8. Nick Paget Brown is an honourable man, and I'm sure he would resign if he had done anything wrong.

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    Replies
    1. Hahahahahahahahahaha
      Hilaire Belloc.

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  9. Why has a specialist, outside agency not been brought in? An NGO that has some vague understanding of dealing with something like an earthquake or other huge disaster? Even the army would do, alarming though that may be.

    Instead we have council officers demanding ID before they will work with people, working 4 hour shifts so that people have to recount their story over and over again, the single best way to embed trauma.

    The ARROGANCE of RBKC: as long as the councillors don't need help the assumption is that no one needs helps.

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  10. Everything that has happened at Grenfell and continue to happen to the residents of north kensington and other social housing has been predicted. There is an indisputable paper trail. Paget Brown should resign, the Councillors that sit on the various scrutiny committees should have their CV's checked to ensure they have actual have the qualifications and experience to grill officers who currently pass papers by them knowing full well they don't understand what they are looking at and that they are not in touch with residents enough to know what is happening in local communities. And residents who dare to challenge or disagree are labelled as trouble makers or sent legal letters to scare them. The Tri Borough hailed the mass exodus of officers who knew and understood their roles and responsibilities. The people who replaced them have come from neighboring boroughs who work to control local communities and groups rather than actually knowing their place that is they are public servants to service our community. This is a shameful stain on our Boroough that will not go away unless someone has the dignity and respect to face local people....they are still waiting, irrespective of the tale paget brown et al are spinning. Shame on them all.

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  11. Watching the sanctimonious Gregg Hands promising to pay the victims of Grenfell to move away from N. Kensington! The further away, the more money! We're expected to be impressed by RBKC's offer of £5 million to achieve this latest example of social cleansing. First they kill people, then shunt the survivors out of the Rotten Borough. This is not social cleansing; it's social genocide. Now it's Ian Duncan Smith. Shaking his head in fake sorrow while delicately relating the victims of Grenfell to terrorism. Both politicians have given a superb, vomit inducing performance.

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    Replies
    1. Emma Dent Coad MP does not escape unscathed20 June 2017 at 03:52

      As Queasy has only attacked Tory politicians allow me to balance the equation.

      If Emma Dent Coad MP had any conscience she would resign as MP and Councillor. She was a Director of the TMO for a number of years. She was told, by the many not the few, that the TMO was incompetent, mismanaged and corrupt. The many not the few gave her evidence of corruption, incompetence, and mismanagement at the TMO.

      Emma Dent Coad MP has some explaining to do, why did she give her support to a thoroughly bad housing provider for so many years by being on its Board, helping to create a false air of respectability for a Tory Council. A disaster may have been avoided if she had resigned from the TMO and spoke out in public about the sham of tenant management and the useless people who work run it.

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    2. Emma is tainted by her involvement with the TMO.

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    3. Has anyone told Jez Corbyn, man of the people, about this?

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    4. Councillor Blakeman is also complaining about the situation at the TMO. She is on the TMO at the moment. The pair of them know how bad the TMO is. Talk about opportunism.

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    5. Why weren't the pair of them screaming from the roof tops about the TMO before the fire.

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    6. Will Emma Dent Coad MP and Cllr Judith Blakeman hold a public meeting at the Town Hall so that we can establish what they did and didn't do on Board the TMO.

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    7. Coad and Blakeman not on message21 June 2017 at 12:03

      We need to establish how Coad and Blakeman acquiesced in TMO incompetence by giving succour to a Company that they both served as Directors. They now say that they knew the TMO was failing. Oh, why oh why, did they go on playing the Tory Council's game of tenant mismanagement. There is no escaping their complicity

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    8. Local Resident22 June 2017 at 04:52

      All of these replies are totes redonc. Blakeman complained 19 times to TMO. EDC worked tirelessly with the complaints of Grenfell residents for years. Looks like someone is desperate to shift the blame, but we all know where it lies. Pathetic.

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    9. 04.52 But Blakeman and Coad did not actively dissent from the collective responsibility line required of all TMO Board Members. Making a complaint to the TMO or the Council is not speaking out. THEY SHOULD HAVE BOTH RESIGNED from the TMO Board and spoke out publicly in the press. Instead they went on serving on the TMO. This is not shifting blame. It's the truth.

      Delete
  12. Angry Resident18 June 2017 at 23:42

    The Council has failed fundamentally to respond to this crisis. No 10 has had to step in and Appoint the Red Cross to handle the situation - at the same time telling Council employees to stay away.

    The Hornton Street organisation has to be rebuilt. The Leader, Cllr Paget-Brown has to resign.

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  13. Supporter of Moylan18 June 2017 at 23:43

    Sharpen your pencil, Daniel

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  14. Where are the independent journalists

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    Replies
    1. Excellent point. Read The Observer yesterday and saw no mention in print of Rock Feilding Mellen by name. Dear Dame, don't let the focus move to the government helping out so that the disgraceful Hornton Street cabal can scurry out of the spotlight.

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  15. All said above....let's hope that the homeless will be rehoused swiftly in one of the constantly empty flats/apartments....We see all these vast blocks full of 'LUXURIOUS' apartments; yet not a single block with affordable/social housing... This goes back a long way and Boris is also guilty of approving many of these 'luxury' towers.

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  16. Gross Injustice19 June 2017 at 17:02

    "Rbkc were supposed to hand out money to survivors along woth other compensation today and didn't bother turning up."

    WOW. WTF!
    https://twitter.com/saywhatuwantok/status/876819930024431616

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  17. Insensitivity goes a long way.

    "Traumatised survivors offered temporary accommodation in high-rise flats"
    https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/grenfell-tower-fire-latest-survivors-offered-temporary-high-rise-flats-accommodation-outcry-a7797026.html

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