Fire at Grenfell Tower in London

as mentioned upthread, it's considered acceptable on storefronts and as you say "petrol stations" because if those go up it's what's inside that matters, not so much what's on the facade

can you really AFFORD to strip and re-refurb 87 high rise housing complexes, though, in these times, etc

I'm just sceptical about that particular figure.

http://imgur.com/hrzEUoT

http://imgur.com/wc2Yg7M

https://image.ibb.co/cVbsa5/image.jpg[
https://image.ibb.co/fRJihk/image.jpg[

Glasgow has a Tory MP? I truly understand nothing

MSP (member of the Scottish Parliament) which is apportioned through proportional representation. If they got @ 15% of the votes they would get an MSP.

oh wait lol that's the one that drinks and is a lesbian and should maybe get the PM job

yes

ThT was a stupidly simplistic way to describe how it's apportioned but yes, you don't have to win a seat to get representation because it's tallied by a larger area not a specific seat. Kind of.

Police say 79 dead or missing. I know I shouldn't be surprised by this but still comes as a shock.

I didn't get that impression re The Unité

this might also have been my own paranoia! however, these psychic dimensions of buildings are not irrelevant in terms of their safety. If estates are seen to be dodgy, this will have some effect on how safe people feel in them, how they behave when there, how they consider them from a decision-making point of view, etc.

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/alarming-grenfell-similarities-whistleblower-claims-10640564

Denial within the article, but the quoted council press release in the article strongly implies the Scottish government recategorised safety standards of building materials in 2013.

A council statement from November 2013 confirmed insulation work had been given the green light to resume after new Government guidance had ruled them safe. Housing issues are devolved to Holyrood but the Scottish Government often follows the same guidelines as the rest of the United Kingdom.

The press release said: “Insulation work is to begin again at council properties in the Dumbarton and Alexandria area after new guidance from the Government acknowledged the materials being used were ‘low risk’ in terms of flammability. The council’s contractor had halted work at a number of properties after concerns were raised over a technical issue relating to the external wall insulation systems being installed.”

Joe Delaney – a local resident who said he was acting on behalf of the community – told the Guardian: “I asked staff from the local job centre and DWP staff at Westway Sports Centre to correct this matter today. All they did was what everyone in authority has done so far: offer platitudes and ask traumatised people to do the running by calling to beg for this to happen.”

He claimed that the DWP only later moved to clarify the position when disquiet began to emerge on on social media. “Once it became clear that there was media attention focused on them, they have finally done the right thing. Why should it take shame for them to act? Where is their humanity?”

It sounds like the DWP dragged their feet on the temporary suspension of sanctions in Grenfell, very classy.

http://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/sixtyeight-flats-in-2bn-luxury-block-to-be-given-to-families-whose-lives-were-devastated-in-grenfell-a3569876.html

Andrew Lillico will be spluttering into his cocoa. I thought there was no such thing as 'permanent residency' for council house tenants? What if one of them gets a good job? As head of the RMT for instance?

some interesting details in there

The complex, a former HMRC office block, is owned by developer St Edward, a joint venture between the Berkeley Group and Prudential

Two bedroom flats are currently being advertised for up to £2.4 million, meaning the overall cost could be as much as £150 million.

A source at the development said many of the flats had been bought by foreign buyers, often knocking through walls to make bigger homes. The source said: “It is crazy money. The garage is full of Maseratis and Ferraris. But I think maybe the people here wouldn’t mind the empty flats being used - it would be a way of giving something back.

“There are a lot of empty flats here - it would be the right thing to do.”

the government sells property and it's snapped up by developers who sell flats for millions to people who don't have any intention of living there, great stuff

nationalise the construction and development industries tbh

lolico, call hi by his name

the comments on that article are, of course, largely horrific

feels bizarre and perverse and indicative of the state of things that the city fucks up housing people in places that meet a basic standard to the point that tens of people die as a result, then makes amends by giving those people a multi-million pound home with a swimming pool, around the corner.

i'd be really interested to know how much the building sold for when hmrc gave it up by my google powers are failing me

It's like those stories where billionaires are asked by their maids to sort out toilet roll supply and buy them a factory or something. Or the local poshos who donated sets of golf clubs. Can just see the City of London saying "need to get these fellows some flats, but nothing too dear of course, why, hello there".

Hopefully will depress the prices on the other intended empty units and start the great buy-to-invest exodus.

xp
From a bit of googling, it looks like lots of the HMRC estate (including Charles House, this building) was taken over by Mapeley under a PFI deal in 2001…
https://www.nao.org.uk/report/hm-revenue-customs-estate-private-finance-deal-eight-years-on/
I can't see what happened after that. Did Mapeley sell it on?

the standard story says it's currently owned by a developer st edward, so i guess so

i'd be really interested to know how much the building sold for when hmrc gave it up by my google powers are failing me

I'm struggling too but I'm trying the Council's Capital programme documents. Most interesting thing I've found in them so far is in the 2013-14 statement:

https://www.rbkc.gov.uk/pdf/capital_programme_2013-14.pdf

Grenfell Tower Refurbishment – the tower is a 23 storey
1970s tower block that is in need of refurbishment and updating.
The project includes window replacement, thermal cladding to
improve insulation, a new communal heating system and
conversion of unused office space into additional dwellings.

So confirmation from contemporaneous documents that the cladding work was primarily for insulation purposes and not the cosmetic story doing the rounds.

The aesthetic concerns were part of the spec, as is normal whenever estates (including mine) are regenerated (our regeneration has been put on indefinite hold, huzzah - Camden tenants voted against handing over to an ALMO).

tbf i don't think they were ever likely to outright say the work was to tidy up an eyesore in an official document - insulation seems like a plausible reason and if it just happens to also make the building less offensive to affluent eyes, well then i guess it's just a bonus eh what-what *pops champagne cork, ingites £100 note in front of a homeless person*

Right, I think I have it...

https://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200102/cmhansrd/vo021107/text/21107w85.htm

Mapeley paid £370M for the IR/HMCE properties

http://www.mapeley.com/CaseStudies/CharlesHouse.aspx

Mapely got rid of it for Nil Premium to clear their liabilities when HMRC cut back on their office needs

interesting - cheers aldo

so it sold for £370m and is now allegedly worth £2bn, while the cost of rehousing local people there could be £150m

hurrah for capitalism

St Edward apparently sold the apartments at "cost price" - so £10m rather than £150m.

However, it's not clear if these were the existing "affordable housing" units built into the development.

Affordable housing was removed as a requirement:

http://www.kensingtonsociety.org/wp-content/uploads/Annual-2014-2015.pdf

Page 49 or thereabouts

Basically, in the choice between affordable housing or the school the planners chose the school. Also issues with providing new/separate access.

I wasn't suggesting earlier that cosmetics wasn't a consideration at Grenfell Tower, but it absolutely wouldn't be unusual on a Capital Programme report to say that work was cosmetic/to improve the appearance.

£370M wasn't for Charles House, it was for ALL the buildings in that Hansard answer.

According to this guy's LinkedIn profile, just the cost of demolishing the building as was before new build/regen could start was £2.5M

https://www.linkedin.com/in/chris-read-49a01248/?ppe=1

I wasn't suggesting earlier that cosmetics wasn't a consideration at Grenfell Tower, but it absolutely wouldn't be unusual on a Capital Programme report to say that work was cosmetic/to improve the appearance.

The external finishes would have needed planning approval from the council. So there was scope there for council officials to have some input into the aesthetics

Also the skyscraper forum that stet I think linked to upthread is really interesting. An early planning statement doesn't mention aluminium panels but zinc ones.

Absolutely, don't disagree with those points. I'm just pointing out that the council were formally describing it as cladding for insulation purposes in 2013/14 so as far as they were concerned at that time it was the primary purpose of the works.

Yes I know. I wasn't having a pop.

K&C chief exec sacked http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-40362317

Paget-Brown needs to go.

http://www.primeeconomics.org/articles/treasury-economics-george-osborne-and-grenfell-tower

I find myself agreeing with much of this Ann Pettifor piece, but not entirely sure about her her line of argument and conclusion - probably need to read it again later.

Poignant messages left by firemen at the scene of the #GrenfellTower fire. pic.twitter.com/U3yWbQYU5Y

— CameramanJim (@cameramanjimITV) June 22, 2017

http://www.primeeconomics.org/articles/treasury-economics-george-osborne-and-grenfell-tower🕸

I find myself agreeing with much of this Ann Pettifor piece, but not entirely sure about her her line of argument and conclusion - probably need to read it again later.

I completely agree. The economic profession largely embraced austerity and not for any reasons that could be supported by evidence or observation. Dogma is the right word for it and their myopic stupidity is one of the root causes of all this.

yeah that article is booming

Thread on Grenfell and the death toll (79 is far, far too low) which is fuelling suspicion of a cover up (1/?)

— David Lammy (@DavidLammy) June 25, 2017

When all the scummer press were focusing on the faulty Hotpoint fridge/freezer the other day I couldn't help thinking it wouldn't have caught fire if it was plugged into an RCBO (which will trip on slightest phase neutral imbalance or overcurrent) circuit. And also all electrical appliances can become dangerous over time. I appreciate Hotpoint don't have a good record, but in social housing people who are poor are more likely to buy 2nd hand white goods.

Yeah, short of signs of arson or particularly foolhardy risks, focusing on the cause of this or any domestic fire is limited in use at best.

In this instance it's actively distracting

This is damning.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p056nw0f

A fire expert inspecting another Rydon building.

I do like the way that man says the word "appalling"