'Homes are homes not assets': Rayner 'appalled' by Grenfell and says Labour MP Athwal 'needs to fix his properties'
5 September 2024, 13:10 | Updated: 5 September 2024, 13:13
Watch Again: James O'Brien is joined by Deputy PM Angela Rayner | 05/09/24
Angela Rayner has told LBC she is "appalled" by the Grenfell Tower final report, and said that landlords must remember that "homes are homes, not assets".
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Ms Rayner, the deputy Prime Minister and housing secretary, told LBC's James O'Brien said that the fatal fire showed that "profit and greed came above people's safety".
She added that it was "absolutely horrifying to see that at every level, whether it was the regulators, the government, previous governments, the local authority, the manufacturers of the cladding, just every single element failed those people and led to the avoidable deaths of 72 people".
The final report by the Grenfell Inquiry, which came out on Wednesday, set out 58 recommendations.
The government said it would respond in full within six months - but Ms Rayner said she was shocked at how little progress had been made on other buildings with dangerous cladding since 2017.
Read more: Grenfell Tower: Minute by minute of how the tragedy unfolded
James O'Brien reacts as the Grenfell report finds ‘systemic dishonesty’ and ‘decades of failure’
She said that the government was aware of 4,630 high rise buildings that needed remediation, of which 29% had concluded and 50% of them were in progress.
"But that means that we've still got many, many more people that are living in those blocks at the moment, and will, rightly be feeling very anxious about that, and that's why my number one focus is really to that accelerate that work."
The government has said that it will bring forward a plan to speed up remediation in the autumn.
Pressed on what specifically the government would do to allay people's fears, Ms Rayner said changes had already been made and systems set up to speed up the process, but that there were several complicating factors.
Among these is the fact that some buildings belong to companies that have complex ownership structures, sometimes involving off shell companies.
Community activist speaks to Nick Ferrari about Grenfell Tower
"One of the things I'm looking at now is how we can identify who are the owners of the building... and really trying to get to the bottom of that", she said.
She said that Grenfell was part of a long pattern of "systemic failures" that seriously affected ordinary people.
"Time and time again, we've had Prime Ministers stand up, whether it's Horizon, the infected blood, whether it's Hillsborough, and now Grenfell, absolute, systemic failures and people apologising for it, and then saying things must change, and then feeling like, well, when's the next thing coming?"
Ms Rayner said that "We've got to have a look at ourselves as a country and the checks and balances that are in place to make sure that people are empowered."
Inquiry chairman Martin Moore-Bick said that the Grenfell tenants had raised concerns about their building repeatedly, but were ignored.
Ms Rayner said: "They were disempowered, and I've seen this with tenants... where people are fearful to raise concerns because they'll be evicted from their homes."
She added: "It just beggars belief that throughout the whole system, people's voices were not heard and they were treated like second class citizens."
Ms Rayner's Labour colleague Jas Athwal hit the headlines in the days before Grenfell because tenants in a block of flats he owns in east London had complained about persistent black mould and ants.
One resident said that they were afraid to raise concerns because they thought they might be evicted if they complained.
Mr Athwal has since apologised and said he was unaware of the condition his flats were in, as they were being managed by a separate company.
Asked by James how Mr Athwal could remain a Labour MP despite his "arguably very exploitative and inarguably very unpleasant conditions" his tenants were living in, Ms Rayner said that "the whipping situation is not something... I have control over".
She said: "I'm absolutely determined to put more power in for tenants, and it doesn't matter who that landlord is, you have an obligation.
"I've talked about this before... homes are homes. They're not assets. When you're a landlord, you have an obligation. So that's somebody's home."
Pressed on Mr Athwal, Ms Rayner said again: "He needs to make sure, as a landlord, that his properties are fit for purpose".
Reports have emerged in recent days that the government is considering cancelling Right to Buy, the scheme introduced by Margaret Thatcher's government in the 1980s under which council tenants can buy their homes, often at a discount.
The scheme is praised by some for opening up home ownership and criticised by others who point to the declining stock of social homes since it was introduced.
Ms Rayner denied that she was getting rid of Right To Buy but suggested that the maximumn discount of £75,000 introduced in 2012 could be scaled back.
