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BY BARRIE CLEMENT


Unite’s justice fight for victims in ‘avoidable’ Grenfell tragedy


Stewart Hall woke up at about 1 am on June 14 to the sound of screams and explosions.


Thirty six-year-old Stewart, a Unite housing activist who lives just 30 yards from Grenfell Tower, looked out of his window and saw flames leaping up the outside of the building.


He rushed out with his friends and started giving water to those who had escaped from the inferno.


And then he saw the full extent of the catastrophe. “It was horrific. The worst thing I’ve ever seen. People were jumping out of the building. Others were throwing their kids down. One child was thrown from the top of the building.


“It should never have happened in a thousand years.”


Stewart stayed on to help until 7 am when he went to work at St Mungo’s, the charity for the homeless. His manager sent him home and Stewart went back to help at the site of the disaster.


He had friends who lived in the tower, some of whom are still missing. It is estimated that around two dozen Unite members lived there, equally divided between the industrial and Community sections.


At the time of going to press, 15 of the Unite members were known to be alive and eight were either missing or dead.


The official death toll is 80.


In the days after the fire he was at the tower from early morning to late at night. Much of his work consisted of sorting out donations of food and clothing which had flooded in from all over the UK.


Stewart went back to work, but it was clear that he was exhausted and his manager told him to take three days off. “The whole thing has not really sunk in yet. I don’t think it’s going to sink in until we know for definite about the people who are missing.”


Privatisation He believes


the obsession with


privatisation is the fundamental problem. “This is what happens when you privatise everything and when making money is more important than people’s safety.”


Stewart says there was an open gas main on the stairway which was the only means of escape. He saw a yellow flame leaping up the building, tracing the line of the open pipework. “The authorities were told about the danger of the pipe ages ago and did nothing.”


The original plan for the refurbishment of the tower stipulated that fire retardant cladding should be used. “Instead of that, they went for the cheaper option.”


So what do the survivors and the bereaved need now? “They need justice and they need answers,” says Stewart.


He asserts that those answers will not be provided by Sir Martin Moore-Bick who was appointed to lead the inquiry into the disaster and who once ruled that


Westminster City council should be allowed to move a single mother of five, 50 miles away to Milton Keynes.


One theme recurs among the survivors, says regional Unite Community co- ordinator Dave Condliffe. “People in the locality held together, but the state didn’t.”


In particular Dave tells how in the first few hours the local community provided much-needed help – including a range of religious groups.


There was a gradual change in the mood of Grenfell Tower residents as the days went by. “It went from a sense that the community was all pulling together, then the mourning process kicked in and then anger over the fact that they felt abandoned by the state,” says Dave.


On the afternoon after the fire, Dave went to the Latimer church community centre near the tower to offer practical help. Many residents said they needed masks because potentially toxic debris that was still falling from the tower and they were worried about their children.


Dave ensured that 100 masks were bought and then they were distributed by Unite Community branch.


Unite has donated £100,000 to the Red Cross London Fire Relief Appeal and was planning to provide additional assistance to individuals. “I have met as many people as possible and I have simply asked them what they need, rather than telling them what we think they need.


RAGE


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