Prime Minister Theresa May has ordered a full public inquiry into the fire that engulfed a west London block of flats, killing at least 17 people.
That figure is
expected to rise, as fire chiefs do not expect to find any more
survivors in the burnt-out Grenfell Tower in North Kensington.
The PM said people "deserve answers" as to why the fire spread so rapidly.
The first victim has been named by the Syria Solidarity Campaign as Syrian refugee Mohammed Alhajali, 23.
Six
victims of the blaze have been provisionally identified, Metropolitan
Police Commander Stuart Cundy said, but "there is a risk that sadly we
may not be able to identify everybody".
Asked about the number of dead, Cdr Cundy said: "I hope it is not triple figures, but I can't be drawn on the numbers."
In
a statement, the Syria Solidarity Campaign said Mr Alhajali, a civil
engineering student, had been in a flat on the 14th floor when the fire
broke out, and had spent two hours on the phone to a friend in Syria.
He had been trying to get through to his family while he was waiting to be rescued.
The group said: "Mohammed bid his friend goodbye, saying that the
fire had reached him. He asked his friend to pass on the message to his
family...
"Mohammed undertook a dangerous journey to flee war and death in Syria, only to meet it here in the UK, in his own home.
"Mohammed came to this country for safety and the UK failed to protect him."
His older brother, Omar, told the BBC he had lost Mohammed on the way out of the building.
Earlier, Mrs May made a private visit to the scene, where she spoke
to Fire Commissioner Dany Cotton and members of the emergency services.
She
said: "[They] told me that the way this fire had spread and took hold
of the building was rapid, it was ferocious, it was unexpected.
"So
it is right that, in addition to the immediate fire report that will be
produced and any potential police investigation, that we do have a full
public inquiry to get to the bottom of this."
Number 10 confirmed the public inquiry will be judge-led. Sources say
the government hopes to announce the name of the judge "soon", the
BBC's assistant political editor Norman Smith said.
London Mayor
Sadiq Khan said one of the issues the inquiry would consider was whether
the tower block had been refurbished in a safe way.
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn also visited the site, meeting residents
affected by the fire. He told community leaders "the truth has to come
out".
The Labour MP Harriet Harman criticised Mrs May for not meeting residents, writing on Twitter: "She should have been prepared to listen to them."
BBC
political editor Laura Kuenssberg said Mrs May's team believed the
decision not to visit residents was made for the right reasons.
"They
didn't want to get in the way, they wanted to allow the emergency
effort to carry on unimpeded and, frankly, it is just not her style to
have TV cameras trailing her every move," she said.
But she said the decision could "prove to be a miscalculation" because events like this "can require real displays of empathy".
Public inquiries are set up for many reasons. Sometimes they are
designed to expose the truth after a controversy, or apportion blame to
individuals.
More often, they simply produce recommendations,
which the government can choose to follow or not. Recent examples
include Leveson, into press standards, and Chilcot, into the Iraq war.
They
differ from police investigations or probes by official bodies because
they are conducted, in part at least, in public. They might even be
televised.
They can be run by a judge, with witnesses giving
evidence under oath, but there is no fixed model. Much depends on the
"terms of reference".
They can also drag on for years and cost
millions of pounds, although the government says it wants the Grenfell
Tower inquiry to "move with speed".
Rydon,
the company that carried out the £8.6m refurbishment of Grenfell Tower,
said it welcomed the announcement of the public inquiry.
It said
it had carried out a partial refurbishment which "met all required
building regulations as well as fire regulation and health and safety
standards".
Housing minister Alok Sharma said the government was working with the
local authority to ensure that "every single family will be re-housed
in the local area".
Fire minister Nick Hurd called the fire a "national tragedy" and said there was "no room for plodding bureaucracy".
He
said there should be "no stone unturned on this because we completely
understand the shock, the concern, the anger, the frustration, the fear
that is out there".
Source...BBC
No comments: