An inquiry into the 2017 Grenfell Tower fire in London has handed down its final report, finding all 72 deaths it caused were preventable.
In June 2017, the Grenfell Tower, a 24-storey public housing block in West London, caught fire overnight.
It was Britain’s deadliest residential fire since World War II, and prompted a seven-year inquiry into the fire’s cause.
The report attributed the disaster to “decades of failure” by governments and the construction industry.
So, here’s what you need to know.
Grenfell Tower Fire
Just before 1am on 14 June 2017, a fire broke out in a flat on the fourth floor of the Grenfell Tower, a public housing complex in London.
The blaze quickly spread to flammable cladding (insulation) on the outside of the building.
70 people aged between six months to 84-years-old died in the fire.
Another person later died in hospital, and one woman gave birth to a stillborn baby because of the trauma of the fire. The child is counted in the official death toll.
Inquiry report
The day after the fire, the UK Government established an inquiry into its cause. It was conducted by a panel including a retired judge, an architect, and the head of a housing non-profit.
In a final report handed down this week, the panel outlined how Government cost-cutting and negligent manufacturing were largely to blame for the deaths.
It found Grenfell’s insulation included cheap, flammable materials, such as polyethylene, which should not have been used on a high-rise residential building.
The panel said the UK Government was “well aware” of the dangers of the cladding but “failed to act on what it knew,” prioritising cost savings over safety.
It attributed the fire to “systematic dishonesty” by the cladding manufacturer, failures by building assessment bodies to carry out appropriate tests, and “a cavalier attitude” towards safety by the building’s architects.
The report concluded that the fire and the deaths of 72 people was “the culmination of decades of failure” by those responsible for the building.
Arconic
Grenfell’s cladding was manufactured by a company called Arconic.
The panel found Arconic had known how flammable the cladding was since 2005, but “deliberately concealed… the true extent of the danger”.
Last year, over 900 survivors and family members of those killed settled a civil case against Arconic and the council managing the building.
The settlement allowed for criminal charges to be brought in the future. This week, UK authorities said criminal proceedings may be years away.
“The simple truth is that the deaths that occurred were all avoidable, and that those who lived in the Tower were badly failed over a number of years and in a number of different ways by those who were responsible for ensuring the safety of the building and its occupants.”
Grenfell Inquiry chair, retired judge Martin Moore-Bick
Response to the Grenfell Tower inquiry
Grenfell United, a group of survivors and bereaved families, said the report “speaks to the lack of competence, understanding and fundamental failure” of those responsible for the building.
It said: “We paid the price for systematic dishonesty, institutional indifference and neglect.”
Both current UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer and former PM Rishi Sunak apologised to those killed in the fire and the families affected on behalf of the Government.
