There should be d be a program in place to demolish these old tower blocks as Bexley have done with the Larner Road Estate. The problem being, finding homes for the families that are displaced, so councils go gone the refurbishment route. I would like to add that I spent a good deal deal of my working life in the sprinkler industry (37years) and believe you me retrofitting sprinkler systems into existing tower blocks would be a logistical nightmare with location of the water tanks and pumping equipment etc. The best way would be demolish them and rebuild to modern standards, after all they will probably be demolished in the next 25years anyway.
It would be interesting to know how long realistically buildings are expected to last. The five storey LCC mansion blocks built in the 1930s are still going strong and you see plenty across London. Some tower blocks have barely lasted thirty years before demolition - this seems unacceptable.
Buildings should be able to be adapted assuming they were properly built and and adequately designed - there are tower blocks all over the world and they're not all failing so quickly.
There should be d be a program in place to demolish these old tower blocks as Bexley have done with the Larner Road Estate. The problem being, finding homes for the families that are displaced, so councils go gone the refurbishment route. I would like to add that I spent a good deal deal of my working life in the sprinkler industry (37years) and believe you me retrofitting sprinkler systems into existing tower blocks would be a logistical nightmare with location of the water tanks and pumping equipment etc. The best way would be demolish them and rebuild to modern standards, after all they will probably be demolished in the next 25years anyway.
This was a £9-£10 million refurbishment, how much more could 120 1 and 2 bedroom flats cost to build?
Also hearing that some displaced families are in hotels and haven't been told if they can stay there. They have to be told they can stay there until there situation is reviewed with them and resolved. They have lost everything and will be traumatised - we have to ensure they are looked after.
The building insurers will be responsible for the alternative accommodation (cost) assuming the council take that level of insurance. They are insured by a Norwegian company Protector, I expect they will if they haven't already appoint someone local to deal with that. There may be a blanket contents cover but more likely that was left to each individual so they may well need additional assistance.
As an aside, the management company seems to be owned by the residents/tenants themselves with the majority of the board made up by them (obviously funding is from the council).
Well it needs to happen now - the families need all the support and security they can be given now
Let us put sprinklers in all high rise buildings now so people can sleep safely. The point I was making is there is already a report reccomending that. It could just as easily have been a Labour government sitting on it - but let's not get defensive and do something instead.
There has to be some kind of cost-benefit analysis with any spending decision - no amount of money can reduce life's risks to zero.
It seems fairly likely to my untrained eye that a sprinkler system would have been useless given the ferocity of this fire and thus the problem lay elsewhere (seemingly in the building design).
Perhaps the sprinklers could be designed to come on *before* the block turns into an inferno?
On that basis every time there is a small controllable fire in one flat the entire building would be submerged in water as a precaution.
Well this has happened before and there is a reccomendation /solution that has been sitting on somebody's desk. I'm sure a sprinkler system of today can localise rather than go off in the whole building.
There should be d be a program in place to demolish these old tower blocks as Bexley have done with the Larner Road Estate. The problem being, finding homes for the families that are displaced, so councils go gone the refurbishment route. I would like to add that I spent a good deal deal of my working life in the sprinkler industry (37years) and believe you me retrofitting sprinkler systems into existing tower blocks would be a logistical nightmare with location of the water tanks and pumping equipment etc. The best way would be demolish them and rebuild to modern standards, after all they will probably be demolished in the next 25years anyway.
This was a £9-£10 million refurbishment, how much more could 120 1 and 2 bedroom flats cost to build?
We need to ensure a longer lifespan for buildings and to design them so that they can be maintained and adapted. Too much housing of a poor quality is built in this country and maintenance is often shoddy.
It costs more in the long run if we keep promoting shoddy solutions.
Let us put sprinklers in all high rise buildings now so people can sleep safely. The point I was making is there is already a report reccomending that. It could just as easily have been a Labour government sitting on it - but let's not get defensive and do something instead.
There has to be some kind of cost-benefit analysis with any spending decision - no amount of money can reduce life's risks to zero.
It seems fairly likely to my untrained eye that a sprinkler system would have been useless given the ferocity of this fire and thus the problem lay elsewhere (seemingly in the building design).
Perhaps the sprinklers could be designed to come on *before* the block turns into an inferno?
On that basis every time there is a small controllable fire in one flat the entire building would be submerged in water as a precaution.
Yes, that's right. In the same way that when you turn the tap on in your kitchen sink, every tap in the house goes on.
Unless... the sprinklers could be designed to come on only in the area in which there is smoke and heat detected?
(By the way, how did your argument switch so seamlessly from "the ferocity of this fire" to "small controllable fire"? You could try to use one of those as an argument against sprinklers, but not both, surely).
The cladding as I understand it, was flammable. It is 2 sheets of aluminium with a highly flammable polyethylene core. It was almost certainly legal and complying with fire regulations.
It would have cost £1,150 per flat to fit a sprinkler system.= £138K.
It would appear to me that the building/fire regulations are at fault. This sort of flammable cladding should not be legal. I can't understand for even a nano second, why it is legal.
My cousin works the LFB and is good friends with her. Nobody has a bad word to say about her.
Please tell your cousin to tell her she's a ledge. What area is she from locally?
What I like about her more is that when she is speaking, she's not some polished smooth operator. She speaks as she is. I hope they don't try to change her.
I'm hoping corporate manslaughter laws will be taken seriously in the future - we pay vast sums to executives in various industries who keep telling us about how high pay is needed to attract the best yet when things go wrong they're never held to account.
I've worked in both the private and public sectors and have seen seem terrible managers who bully staff and try to defend the indefensible. Trying to implement policies that a five year old can see won't work or aren't adequately funded happens time and time again by those who are pursuing their own career advancement and are not interested in work being done properly.
There should be d be a program in place to demolish these old tower blocks as Bexley have done with the Larner Road Estate. The problem being, finding homes for the families that are displaced, so councils go gone the refurbishment route. I would like to add that I spent a good deal deal of my working life in the sprinkler industry (37years) and believe you me retrofitting sprinkler systems into existing tower blocks would be a logistical nightmare with location of the water tanks and pumping equipment etc. The best way would be demolish them and rebuild to modern standards, after all they will probably be demolished in the next 25years anyway.
This was a £9-£10 million refurbishment, how much more could 120 1 and 2 bedroom flats cost to build?
in that part of london much more than 10 million i would say.
There should be d be a program in place to demolish these old tower blocks as Bexley have done with the Larner Road Estate. The problem being, finding homes for the families that are displaced, so councils go gone the refurbishment route. I would like to add that I spent a good deal deal of my working life in the sprinkler industry (37years) and believe you me retrofitting sprinkler systems into existing tower blocks would be a logistical nightmare with location of the water tanks and pumping equipment etc. The best way would be demolish them and rebuild to modern standards, after all they will probably be demolished in the next 25years anyway.
This was a £9-£10 million refurbishment, how much more could 120 1 and 2 bedroom flats cost to build?
in that part of london much more than 10 million i would say.
Why would it cost more to replace a block of flats in one area than another?
There should be d be a program in place to demolish these old tower blocks as Bexley have done with the Larner Road Estate. The problem being, finding homes for the families that are displaced, so councils go gone the refurbishment route. I would like to add that I spent a good deal deal of my working life in the sprinkler industry (37years) and believe you me retrofitting sprinkler systems into existing tower blocks would be a logistical nightmare with location of the water tanks and pumping equipment etc. The best way would be demolish them and rebuild to modern standards, after all they will probably be demolished in the next 25years anyway.
This was a £9-£10 million refurbishment, how much more could 120 1 and 2 bedroom flats cost to build?
in that part of london much more than 10 million i would say.
Why would it cost more to replace a block of flats in one area than another?
and where are you planning on putting the current residents of the existing flats? whilst you rebuild
600 residents to temporary home, the demolition of the existing block would be at least 2-3 million, a semi detatched house costs 15k to demolish completely majority of the cost going on disposal of materials, bearing in mind the new spurs ground is costing 800 million
There should be d be a program in place to demolish these old tower blocks as Bexley have done with the Larner Road Estate. The problem being, finding homes for the families that are displaced, so councils go gone the refurbishment route. I would like to add that I spent a good deal deal of my working life in the sprinkler industry (37years) and believe you me retrofitting sprinkler systems into existing tower blocks would be a logistical nightmare with location of the water tanks and pumping equipment etc. The best way would be demolish them and rebuild to modern standards, after all they will probably be demolished in the next 25years anyway.
This was a £9-£10 million refurbishment, how much more could 120 1 and 2 bedroom flats cost to build?
in that part of london much more than 10 million i would say.
Why would it cost more to replace a block of flats in one area than another?
There are regional variations on cost to build but not huge, predominantly I suspect more land would be needed to build on horizontally rather than vertically.
There should be d be a program in place to demolish these old tower blocks as Bexley have done with the Larner Road Estate. The problem being, finding homes for the families that are displaced, so councils go gone the refurbishment route. I would like to add that I spent a good deal deal of my working life in the sprinkler industry (37years) and believe you me retrofitting sprinkler systems into existing tower blocks would be a logistical nightmare with location of the water tanks and pumping equipment etc. The best way would be demolish them and rebuild to modern standards, after all they will probably be demolished in the next 25years anyway.
This was a £9-£10 million refurbishment, how much more could 120 1 and 2 bedroom flats cost to build?
in that part of london much more than 10 million i would say.
Why would it cost more to replace a block of flats in one area than another?
and where are you planning on putting the current residents of the existing flats? whilst you rebuild
Why would it cost more to replace a block of flats in one area than another?
Anyway, I don't believe it needed rebuilding. The cladding caused the fire to spread beyond the one flat, which are designed/should be to contain a fire for 30 mins, before the heat would break glass and spread outside.
But if the outside had remained concrete only, the fire would not have spread so quickly and possibly hardly at all.
If the electrics in the building were "faulty" as reported, they should have been sorted, without the need to demolish the block.
There should be d be a program in place to demolish these old tower blocks as Bexley have done with the Larner Road Estate. The problem being, finding homes for the families that are displaced, so councils go gone the refurbishment route. I would like to add that I spent a good deal deal of my working life in the sprinkler industry (37years) and believe you me retrofitting sprinkler systems into existing tower blocks would be a logistical nightmare with location of the water tanks and pumping equipment etc. The best way would be demolish them and rebuild to modern standards, after all they will probably be demolished in the next 25years anyway.
This was a £9-£10 million refurbishment, how much more could 120 1 and 2 bedroom flats cost to build?
in that part of london much more than 10 million i would say.
Why would it cost more to replace a block of flats in one area than another?
and where are you planning on putting the current residents of the existing flats? whilst you rebuild
That is the big issue, and wasn't in the past when councils had a decent amount of housing stock. If the council had to rent similar accommodation for all the residents you're talking £100k-£300k per month. I can't see building costs being much more than £7 million, but it'd need to be demolished, site cleared and new tower built in 6 months before refurbishment start to look the better deal.
Let us put sprinklers in all high rise buildings now so people can sleep safely. The point I was making is there is already a report reccomending that. It could just as easily have been a Labour government sitting on it - but let's not get defensive and do something instead.
There has to be some kind of cost-benefit analysis with any spending decision - no amount of money can reduce life's risks to zero.
It seems fairly likely to my untrained eye that a sprinkler system would have been useless given the ferocity of this fire and thus the problem lay elsewhere (seemingly in the building design).
Perhaps the sprinklers could be designed to come on *before* the block turns into an inferno?
On that basis every time there is a small controllable fire in one flat the entire building would be submerged in water as a precaution.
Yes, that's right. In the same way that when you turn the tap on in your kitchen sink, every tap in the house goes on.
Unless... the sprinklers could be designed to come on only in the area in which there is smoke and heat detected?
(By the way, how did your argument switch so seamlessly from "the ferocity of this fire" to "small controllable fire"? You could try to use one of those as an argument against sprinklers, but not both, surely).
On the basis that it seems the (ferocious) fire rapidly spread (from its presumably small beginnings) up the outside of the building (taking everything close to the windows with it) and not via the interior where the sprinklers would have been.
Anyhow we are all speculating that the cladding was to blame before it's been proven - however if it was the cladding then we are going to quickly discover that thousands of privately-owned buildings are also at the same severe risk, which puts to bed the highly politicised argument that no-one bothered about these people because they were poor.
Let us put sprinklers in all high rise buildings now so people can sleep safely. The point I was making is there is already a report reccomending that. It could just as easily have been a Labour government sitting on it - but let's not get defensive and do something instead.
There has to be some kind of cost-benefit analysis with any spending decision - no amount of money can reduce life's risks to zero.
It seems fairly likely to my untrained eye that a sprinkler system would have been useless given the ferocity of this fire and thus the problem lay elsewhere (seemingly in the building design).
Perhaps the sprinklers could be designed to come on *before* the block turns into an inferno?
On that basis every time there is a small controllable fire in one flat the entire building would be submerged in water as a precaution.
Yes, that's right. In the same way that when you turn the tap on in your kitchen sink, every tap in the house goes on.
Unless... the sprinklers could be designed to come on only in the area in which there is smoke and heat detected?
(By the way, how did your argument switch so seamlessly from "the ferocity of this fire" to "small controllable fire"? You could try to use one of those as an argument against sprinklers, but not both, surely).
On the basis that it seems the (ferocious) fire rapidly spread (from its presumably small beginnings) up the outside of the building (taking everything close to the windows with it) and not via the interior where the sprinklers would have been.
Anyhow we are all speculating that the cladding was to blame before it's been proven - however if it was the cladding then we are going to quickly discover that thousands of privately-owned buildings are also at the same severe risk, which puts to bed the highly politicised argument that no-one bothered about these people because they were poor.
There are two forms of this cladding, one with mineral core and the cheaper one with plastic core. It will be interesting to see which was chosen for private builds compared to council block refurbs.
Let us put sprinklers in all high rise buildings now so people can sleep safely. The point I was making is there is already a report reccomending that. It could just as easily have been a Labour government sitting on it - but let's not get defensive and do something instead.
There has to be some kind of cost-benefit analysis with any spending decision - no amount of money can reduce life's risks to zero.
It seems fairly likely to my untrained eye that a sprinkler system would have been useless given the ferocity of this fire and thus the problem lay elsewhere (seemingly in the building design).
Perhaps the sprinklers could be designed to come on *before* the block turns into an inferno?
On that basis every time there is a small controllable fire in one flat the entire building would be submerged in water as a precaution.
Yes, that's right. In the same way that when you turn the tap on in your kitchen sink, every tap in the house goes on.
Unless... the sprinklers could be designed to come on only in the area in which there is smoke and heat detected?
(By the way, how did your argument switch so seamlessly from "the ferocity of this fire" to "small controllable fire"? You could try to use one of those as an argument against sprinklers, but not both, surely).
On the basis that it seems the (ferocious) fire rapidly spread (from its presumably small beginnings) up the outside of the building (taking everything close to the windows with it) and not via the interior where the sprinklers would have been.
Anyhow we are all speculating that the cladding was to blame before it's been proven - however if it was the cladding then we are going to quickly discover that thousands of privately-owned buildings are also at the same severe risk, which puts to bed the highly politicised argument that no-one bothered about these people because they were poor.
There are two forms of this cladding, one with mineral core and the cheaper one with plastic core. It will be interesting to see which was chosen for private builds compared to council block refurbs.
Let us put sprinklers in all high rise buildings now so people can sleep safely. The point I was making is there is already a report reccomending that. It could just as easily have been a Labour government sitting on it - but let's not get defensive and do something instead.
There has to be some kind of cost-benefit analysis with any spending decision - no amount of money can reduce life's risks to zero.
It seems fairly likely to my untrained eye that a sprinkler system would have been useless given the ferocity of this fire and thus the problem lay elsewhere (seemingly in the building design).
Perhaps the sprinklers could be designed to come on *before* the block turns into an inferno?
On that basis every time there is a small controllable fire in one flat the entire building would be submerged in water as a precaution.
Yes, that's right. In the same way that when you turn the tap on in your kitchen sink, every tap in the house goes on.
Unless... the sprinklers could be designed to come on only in the area in which there is smoke and heat detected?
(By the way, how did your argument switch so seamlessly from "the ferocity of this fire" to "small controllable fire"? You could try to use one of those as an argument against sprinklers, but not both, surely).
On the basis that it seems the (ferocious) fire rapidly spread (from its presumably small beginnings) up the outside of the building (taking everything close to the windows with it) and not via the interior where the sprinklers would have been.
Anyhow we are all speculating that the cladding was to blame before it's been proven - however if it was the cladding then we are going to quickly discover that thousands of privately-owned buildings are also at the same severe risk, which puts to bed the highly politicised argument that no-one bothered about these people because they were poor.
We are not *all* speculating on the cladding being to blame.
Some are considering that the lack of sprinklers might have contributed. Or the lack of fire alarms. Or the lack of lighting in the fire escapes.
The fact that other people might have the same cladding does not absolve the council of the responsibility for the deaths of innocent people they had a duty of care over.
There should be d be a program in place to demolish these old tower blocks as Bexley have done with the Larner Road Estate. The problem being, finding homes for the families that are displaced, so councils go gone the refurbishment route. I would like to add that I spent a good deal deal of my working life in the sprinkler industry (37years) and believe you me retrofitting sprinkler systems into existing tower blocks would be a logistical nightmare with location of the water tanks and pumping equipment etc. The best way would be demolish them and rebuild to modern standards, after all they will probably be demolished in the next 25years anyway.
This was a £9-£10 million refurbishment, how much more could 120 1 and 2 bedroom flats cost to build?
in that part of london much more than 10 million i would say.
Why would it cost more to replace a block of flats in one area than another?
Let us put sprinklers in all high rise buildings now so people can sleep safely. The point I was making is there is already a report reccomending that. It could just as easily have been a Labour government sitting on it - but let's not get defensive and do something instead.
There has to be some kind of cost-benefit analysis with any spending decision - no amount of money can reduce life's risks to zero.
It seems fairly likely to my untrained eye that a sprinkler system would have been useless given the ferocity of this fire and thus the problem lay elsewhere (seemingly in the building design).
Perhaps the sprinklers could be designed to come on *before* the block turns into an inferno?
On that basis every time there is a small controllable fire in one flat the entire building would be submerged in water as a precaution.
Yes, that's right. In the same way that when you turn the tap on in your kitchen sink, every tap in the house goes on.
Unless... the sprinklers could be designed to come on only in the area in which there is smoke and heat detected?
(By the way, how did your argument switch so seamlessly from "the ferocity of this fire" to "small controllable fire"? You could try to use one of those as an argument against sprinklers, but not both, surely).
On the basis that it seems the (ferocious) fire rapidly spread (from its presumably small beginnings) up the outside of the building (taking everything close to the windows with it) and not via the interior where the sprinklers would have been.
Anyhow we are all speculating that the cladding was to blame before it's been proven - however if it was the cladding then we are going to quickly discover that thousands of privately-owned buildings are also at the same severe risk, which puts to bed the highly politicised argument that no-one bothered about these people because they were poor.
The cladding is undoubtedly the issue - the original concrete would never have allowed this spread. There are other issues within the block - I've visited numerous blocks within the local area and there are obvious safety issues.
I'm sure there are a number of buildings that need looking at and this will go back to inadequate fire regulations in this country which comes from always wanting to do things on the cheap. If fire regulations are adequate and enforced then an incident like this shouldn't happen.
Somebody is culpable for this but who will be held responsible?
There should be d be a program in place to demolish these old tower blocks as Bexley have done with the Larner Road Estate. The problem being, finding homes for the families that are displaced, so councils go gone the refurbishment route. I would like to add that I spent a good deal deal of my working life in the sprinkler industry (37years) and believe you me retrofitting sprinkler systems into existing tower blocks would be a logistical nightmare with location of the water tanks and pumping equipment etc. The best way would be demolish them and rebuild to modern standards, after all they will probably be demolished in the next 25years anyway.
This was a £9-£10 million refurbishment, how much more could 120 1 and 2 bedroom flats cost to build?
in that part of london much more than 10 million i would say.
Why would it cost more to replace a block of flats in one area than another?
Er...the land possibly ?
If you're replacing an existing block then you already have the land, so that's not an issue, unless you need to increase the footprint and therefore acquire extra surrounding land
Let us put sprinklers in all high rise buildings now so people can sleep safely. The point I was making is there is already a report reccomending that. It could just as easily have been a Labour government sitting on it - but let's not get defensive and do something instead.
There has to be some kind of cost-benefit analysis with any spending decision - no amount of money can reduce life's risks to zero.
It seems fairly likely to my untrained eye that a sprinkler system would have been useless given the ferocity of this fire and thus the problem lay elsewhere (seemingly in the building design).
Perhaps the sprinklers could be designed to come on *before* the block turns into an inferno?
On that basis every time there is a small controllable fire in one flat the entire building would be submerged in water as a precaution.
Yes, that's right. In the same way that when you turn the tap on in your kitchen sink, every tap in the house goes on.
Unless... the sprinklers could be designed to come on only in the area in which there is smoke and heat detected?
(By the way, how did your argument switch so seamlessly from "the ferocity of this fire" to "small controllable fire"? You could try to use one of those as an argument against sprinklers, but not both, surely).
On the basis that it seems the (ferocious) fire rapidly spread (from its presumably small beginnings) up the outside of the building (taking everything close to the windows with it) and not via the interior where the sprinklers would have been.
Anyhow we are all speculating that the cladding was to blame before it's been proven - however if it was the cladding then we are going to quickly discover that thousands of privately-owned buildings are also at the same severe risk, which puts to bed the highly politicised argument that no-one bothered about these people because they were poor.
The cladding is undoubtedly the issue - the original concrete would never have allowed this spread. There are other issues within the block - I've visited numerous blocks within the local area and there are obvious safety issues.
I'm sure there are a number of buildings that need looking at and this will go back to inadequate fire regulations in this country which comes from always wanting to do things on the cheap. If fire regulations are adequate and enforced then an incident like this shouldn't happen.
Somebody is culpable for this but who will be held responsible?
I doubt whoever drew up and agreed the fire regulations will be prosecuted.
Let us put sprinklers in all high rise buildings now so people can sleep safely. The point I was making is there is already a report reccomending that. It could just as easily have been a Labour government sitting on it - but let's not get defensive and do something instead.
There has to be some kind of cost-benefit analysis with any spending decision - no amount of money can reduce life's risks to zero.
It seems fairly likely to my untrained eye that a sprinkler system would have been useless given the ferocity of this fire and thus the problem lay elsewhere (seemingly in the building design).
Perhaps the sprinklers could be designed to come on *before* the block turns into an inferno?
On that basis every time there is a small controllable fire in one flat the entire building would be submerged in water as a precaution.
Yes, that's right. In the same way that when you turn the tap on in your kitchen sink, every tap in the house goes on.
Unless... the sprinklers could be designed to come on only in the area in which there is smoke and heat detected?
(By the way, how did your argument switch so seamlessly from "the ferocity of this fire" to "small controllable fire"? You could try to use one of those as an argument against sprinklers, but not both, surely).
On the basis that it seems the (ferocious) fire rapidly spread (from its presumably small beginnings) up the outside of the building (taking everything close to the windows with it) and not via the interior where the sprinklers would have been.
Anyhow we are all speculating that the cladding was to blame before it's been proven - however if it was the cladding then we are going to quickly discover that thousands of privately-owned buildings are also at the same severe risk, which puts to bed the highly politicised argument that no-one bothered about these people because they were poor.
We are not *all* speculating on the cladding being to blame.
Some are considering that the lack of sprinklers might have contributed. Or the lack of fire alarms. Or the lack of lighting in the fire escapes.
The fact that other people might have the same cladding does not absolve the council of the responsibility for the deaths of innocent people they had a duty of care over.
The lack of fire alarms or insufficient lighting in the stairwells don't help explain why the fire spread so quickly.
On a slightly related point, there seems to be some implication that councils try to do things on the cheap but private developers/residents don't but it may well be more the other way around (as those who have lived in private blocks of flats might acknowledge).
Comments
The five storey LCC mansion blocks built in the 1930s are still going strong and you see plenty across London. Some tower blocks have barely lasted thirty years before demolition - this seems unacceptable.
Buildings should be able to be adapted assuming they were properly built and and adequately designed - there are tower blocks all over the world and they're not all failing so quickly.
It costs more in the long run if we keep promoting shoddy solutions.
Unless... the sprinklers could be designed to come on only in the area in which there is smoke and heat detected?
(By the way, how did your argument switch so seamlessly from "the ferocity of this fire" to "small controllable fire"? You could try to use one of those as an argument against sprinklers, but not both, surely).
Built with good old fashion bricks.
It was almost certainly legal and complying with fire regulations.
It would have cost £1,150 per flat to fit a sprinkler system.= £138K.
It would appear to me that the building/fire regulations are at fault. This sort of flammable cladding should not be legal.
I can't understand for even a nano second, why it is legal.
I've worked in both the private and public sectors and have seen seem terrible managers who bully staff and try to defend the indefensible. Trying to implement policies that a five year old can see won't work or aren't adequately funded happens time and time again by those who are pursuing their own career advancement and are not interested in work being done properly.
600 residents to temporary home, the demolition of the existing block would be at least 2-3 million, a semi detatched house costs 15k to demolish completely majority of the cost going on disposal of materials, bearing in mind the new spurs ground is costing 800 million
But if the outside had remained concrete only, the fire would not have spread so quickly and possibly hardly at all.
If the electrics in the building were "faulty" as reported, they should have been sorted, without the need to demolish the block.
Anyhow we are all speculating that the cladding was to blame before it's been proven - however if it was the cladding then we are going to quickly discover that thousands of privately-owned buildings are also at the same severe risk, which puts to bed the highly politicised argument that no-one bothered about these people because they were poor.
Some are considering that the lack of sprinklers might have contributed. Or the lack of fire alarms. Or the lack of lighting in the fire escapes.
The fact that other people might have the same cladding does not absolve the council of the responsibility for the deaths of innocent people they had a duty of care over.
Er...the land possibly ?
I'm sure there are a number of buildings that need looking at and this will go back to inadequate fire regulations in this country which comes from always wanting to do things on the cheap. If fire regulations are adequate and enforced then an incident like this shouldn't happen.
Somebody is culpable for this but who will be held responsible?
On a slightly related point, there seems to be some implication that councils try to do things on the cheap but private developers/residents don't but it may well be more the other way around (as those who have lived in private blocks of flats might acknowledge).