Thousands of buildings nonetheless have harmful cladding after Grenfell tragedy

Thousands of blocks of flats still haven’t had dangerous cladding removed despite the Grenfell Tower tragedy.

Housing Secretary Angela Rayner, who is Keir Starmer’s deputy, said it is “not acceptable” that work hasn’t been done. It comes after a bombshell public inquiry report found greed and “systematic dishonesty” led to the deaths of 72 people in the 2017 Grenfell blaze. Since the tragedy, 4,374 buildings were found to be unsafe, of which just 1,088 have been reclad.

Last week families were evacuated after a fire broke out in a block of flats in Dagenham which was undergoing work. Ms Rayner told BBC Breakfast there is “no excuse” for owners not to carry out the lifesaving works – saying delays are “completely unacceptable”. She warned that many more buildings with dangerous cladding have not been identified.

Ms Rayner pointed to a £5billion fund set up following the tragedy to help pay for remediation work. She said: “I don’t accept that the money’s not there. And these companies, and the people that own these buildings, have financial resources as well. I don’t accept that there is not the money to do this remediation.”

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The Labour frontbencher said legal action has been taken against around 400 property owners, but warned that “complex structures” could slow work down. The Housing Secretary said: “Sometimes there’s very complex structures to these buildings, like they’re owned offshore. And I’m looking at that now of how we can continue to really hold these building owners to account to make sure that they do the work.

“There’s no excuse to not do this work now.” Just 50% are carrying out remediation work, Ms Rayner said, and only 29% of those identified have fully removed and replaced the cladding.

Ms Rayner said: “It is completely unacceptable that the remediation is taking as long as it has. And that’s what I want to see, concluded much more swiftly.”

Pressed by presenter Naga Munchetty on whether people living in these homes can go to bed feeling safe, she said: “All buildings in the UK could have a failure of some sort so I can’t guarantee 100% that every building in the UK is going to be safe.”

But she added that fire safety measures – such as evacuation processes and waking watches have been improved. Ms Rayner said she wanted the Metropolitan Police and Crown Prosecution Service to act “as quickly as possible” over the Grenfell Tower blaze.

Following the publication of Sir Martin Moore-Bick’s scathing inquiry report, she told Times Radio: “This is an incredibly complex investigation. And as this is seven years on, and the phase two report is out, and it’s incredibly detailed, there’s considerable volumes to go through, and we will do everything we can to support the Met Police and the CPS to ensure that they can bring their findings and take their action forward as quickly as possible.

“Because, as many of the survivors and the families of the victims have said,… justice delayed, is justice denied, and I absolutely agree that this has to come as quickly as possible.”