<< A plausible explanation for the careless attitude towards establishing effective oversight measures is that under the previous arrangements the Kensington and Chelsea Borough council was directly responsible for managing social housing. [16], In August 2017, it was announced that KCTMO would no longer manage the Lancaster West Estate containing Grenfell Tower, which would come under direct council control. On that occasion I went out on to my balcony, but there was thick smoke there. /F5 20 0 R Your life is too precious to stay put. In December 2017, the TMO board decided that it could no longer guarantee that it could deliver services to a standard that residents should expect and fulfil all its duties contained in its contract with the council (known as the modular management agreement or MMA). Fire-resistant zinc cladding approved by residents of Grenfell Tower was replaced in the refurbishment contract with cheaper aluminium panels to save 293,368, according to documents seen by the Guardian. /Im22 22 0 R /Parent 2 0 R He continued: I cannot imagine the possible consequences of a fire in this building and as a duty of care the RBKC must ensure we can get out in an emergency, if there is a need to evacuate. >> Mr Daffarn disputed being disruptive but accepted he had a difficult relationship with the councillor. Kensington and Chelsea decided to keep the name Kensington and Chelsea TMO, in the hope that tenants would identify with it. It stated: We do not see it necessary to instruct or fund an independent adjudicator at this time.. Not according to Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kensington_and_Chelsea_TMO which states that in 2017 it had a huge total of EIGHT residents on its board of thirteen (the other seven being non-residents), representing nearly TEN THOUSAND properties. /F9 13 0 R A list of amendments to the 9.2m contract between Kensington and Chelsea Tenant Management Organisation (KCTMO) and Rydon, the builder for the refurbishment of the 24-storey tower, reveals that the saving was made after tender by fitting cassette fix aluminium cladding in lieu of zinc cladding. Witness David Collins said the fire safety issues were a product of the culture and leadership at KCTMO. Managers took us vs them approach to Grenfell Tower tenants, The fire speaks to the failure of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, one of the wealthiest boroughs in the country, to adequately regulate social housing. I got my elderly neighbour out of his flat and we walked all the way down the 189 steps. The secret mine that hid the Nazis' stolen treasure. The minutes, seen by the Guardian, recorded: Rydon have completed the mock-up for the cladding and it was confirmed that the planners are viewing the colours and fixing detail on 17 July The initial feedback on the cladding, following a walk around prior to the meeting, is that the vertical sections need design work., It added in a post-meeting note: The initial feedback from the planners is that they would probably prefer the champagne to brushed aluminium and they were not that keen on the face fix.. A tolerance was set for fire performance on the project and both products were within that range, the Guardian understands, but the aluminium panels were considered more combustible. Kensington and Chelsea is a rich area. He showed new notices stuck up in the hallways after last Octobers fire stating: There is a stay put policy for residents unless the fire is in it affecting your flat.. Mr Chapman said he feared the fire safety consultant appointed by KCTMO would be tasked with proving residents wrong rather than conducting a proper assessment. I do not want to comment on the terrible Grenfell disaster beyond saying that it is hardly fair to blame the TMO structure for a problem endemic in the social housing industry, well known from Lakanal and fully exposed over many years in Inside Housing. /Parent 2 0 R [18] In late December 2017 KCTMO announced that it would be handing control of all of its housing stock back to the council by 31 January 2018 as an "interim measure".[19]. [11][12], Grenfell Action Group, the block's tenant organisation, had repeatedly warned of major fire safety lapses since 2013. My point is this: it is a serious and dangerous error to draw the lesson that KCTMO was not really a TMO. /Font << Grenfell residents not listened to They have been hiding from residents; they have been hiding from backbench councillors for over a week.. /F2 17 0 R /Resources << endobj /F10 10 0 R OToole, who also lives in Burnham House, said he was reassuring tenants that the building is safe because there was a fire in a 10th-storey flat in a neighbouring block two years ago which was contained. /F1 16 0 R I was woken that day by the smell of burning, he said. Rydon, the company involved in the upgrading of Grenfell, reclad four 22-storey blocks and one 18-storey block in the Swiss Cottage estate as part of a 18m revamp 11 years ago. It became an ALMO in 2002 in response to the (Labour) governments funding of Decent Homes and the fact that they wouldnt give the funding to local authorities (or TMOs). The lessons of Grenfell resonate across the entire social housing world. /Im49 35 0 R Mr Daffarn wrote to project managers and the KCTMO that the planned closure of a car park for work on the tower would make the problem worse. In sharp contrast to this model, TMOs are locally based, grassroots community groups that want to improve local conditions in their social housing estate or small area. What is the actual purpose of this TMOs? /Xi13 38 0 R /F12 15 0 R << The Council at the same time cut the Council Tax of the highest band of tax-payers. There is no clear mechanism to respond to the urgent needs of the 2000-3000 residents living on Lancaster West estate, under the shadow of Grenfell since the recent suspension of the ALMOs operations there. The handback consisted of all the services to residents and those support functions required to enable these services to be provided. London. The correct lesson is that user control of governance does not in itself secure user empowerment.. Grenfell /F11 12 0 R /Type /Catalog To find out more about cookies and change your preferences, visit our, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kensington_and_Chelsea_TMO, How Tenant Management Organisations have wrongly been associated with Grenfell, British Government @ LSE General Election 2015 Event Series, Write for the LSE British Politics and Policy blog, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported. Tenant Management Organisations are small, tenant-led organisations that take on a number of landlord functions from local councils. Green party councillor Sin Berry has demanded a block by block breakdown of the materials and structural plans for cladding used on every single block in Camden, highlighting heightened concern for safety in council high rises across the country. We possess the insight and flexibility to adjust to a changing real estate market. Read about our approach to external linking. Date: 6 June 2018. /F8 11 0 R Residents at high rise flats managed by the organisation that ran Grenfell Tower have spoken of their concerns over their safety after Wednesdays catastrophic fire. Additionally, the knowledge accumulated through the previous arrangements was not retained within the new corporate body: priorities changed, partly through the perception that tenant involvement conferred sufficient legitimacy on decision making, partly as the priorities of the management team changed and partly because of the increased scale of responsibility delegated to a small and inexperienced organisation. The Kensington and Chelsea Tenant Management Organisation was established on 1 April 1996, when it assumed management of 9,760 properties from the council. They must have complied with the law, he said. The number of companies and organisations that Scotland Yard detectives investigating the disaster know so far to have played a role in the refurbishment is more than 60. On the 14th of every month, the community around Grenfell gathers to remember those whose lives were lost on the night of the fire. Documents show contractors were asked to fit aluminium instead of more fire-resistant zinc, saving 300,000. (modern). /CropBox [0.0 0.0 595.2 857.28] [The KCTMO] doesnt spend enough on safety. Giving evidence at the inquiry into the disaster, Mr Daffarn said he had "spent a long, long time thinking how to describe this organisation" but he "wouldn't change a single word of it. /CropBox [0.0 0.0 595.2 857.28] << The Kensington and Chelsea borough-wide TMO, formed in the 1990s, is known by tenants locally around Grenfell Tower as a fake TMO. 8 0 obj 7 0 obj I have yet to see any rebuttal here. L6 Property Management is a full service, investor-focused property management solution that ensures homeowners the peace of mind that their valuable /F9 13 0 R Maybe stinks would be a more apposite word. And (2) that a board of 8 tenants is wholly inadequate for managing or even just supervising such a large number of 10,000 properties. The Faculty of Law, University of Oxford, Lecturer in Law, Oxford Brookes University, The Grenfell Tower Fire as a Breach of the Right to Life. /F12 15 0 R The Director of Housing proposed a borough-wide TMO that kept the housing department intact. /F3 18 0 R Required fields are marked *. >> The TMO has a board comprising eight residents, four council-appointed members and three independent members. It is important to remember that corporate responsibility encompasses the duties and responsibilities of corporations, but such duties are the responsibility of a variety of social actors and not merely focussed on codes and reporting procedures. Theres no sprinklers, no fire alarms and the security cameras dont work. /ProcSet [/PDF /Text /ImageB /ImageC /ImageI] The number of at risk buildings has risen steadily since the government ordered a full review of high-rises around the country, and there is still a 100% failure rate in fire safety tests. /F10 10 0 R As secretary of the Grenfell Tower Leaseholders Association (GTLA), he had raised concerns about bare gas pipes being run through the stairwell of the building the only fire escape during recent upgrade works. /Kids [3 0 R 4 0 R 5 0 R 6 0 R 7 0 R] /Annots [] Mr Kinnier said that a full review of the property policy arrangements was recommended in the 2013 document. We tried every way we could possibly find to get a voice and be heard, he said. 72 people lost their lives, 70 were injured, and 223 people escaped the building. From 2015 the Birmingham City Council have closed down that Ladywood Housing Liaison Board, using an entirely false excuse (see my second comment, which has not yet appeared on this page). Following the tragic fire in June 2017, changes were made which ultimately led to the KCTMO handing back delivery of all day-to-day housing and related support services to the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea at the end of February 2018. All queries about housing services should be directed to the Council. >> The leaseholders association also repeatedly raised concerns about residents smoking in the stairwell and the fact that the exposed gas pipes were an easy target for vandalism. /Im58 40 0 R Anne Power is Professor of Social Policy and Head of LSE Housing and Communities. >> /Annots [] /Type /Page /Font << Kensington and Chelsea TMO was the largest TMO in the UK [3] and unique in having been the only TMO that managed the entire housing stock for the local council. [4] Following the Grenfell Tower fire in 2017, the council terminated its contract with KCTMO. Since January 2018, the housing has been directly managed by the council. /Contents 37 0 R My point is this: it is a serious and dangerous error to draw the lesson that KCTMO was not really a TMO.. How to cite this blog post (Harvard style), Nadj, Daniela. Of course we are worried. Kensington & Chelsea Tenant Management The lack of health and safety regulation is therefore a clear a failure on the part of the state to protect the right to life under Article 2 of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (ECHR) 1950. Seventy-two people died in the Grenfell fire on 14 June 2017. Grenfell Article 2 therefore includes a positive substantive obligation on states to take appropriate steps to safeguard the lives of those within their jurisdiction. The doors were finally opened when the meeting was under way, although those bereaved by the disaster and residents were not allowed in. Staff managing social housing for the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea adopted an us vs them mentality towards residents of the Grenfell Tower in the months before the fire that killed 72 people, an inquiry has heard. In many ways the organisation that now exists is the product of central government policy without which the entire housing stock would have remained under direct council control. Kensington and Chelsea council has said it will cooperate with any investigation into the fire. 2 0 obj People need action to restore normal conditions on the estate and rebuild trust. Such justice must encompass potential lawsuits under the Human Rights Act 1998, as well as criminal charges against those entities who manufactured the ACM cladding and were instrumental in the refurbishment of the tower. The TMO continues to exist as an independent corporate entity and the board will continue to be accountable to its members. >> It said Rydon would appoint other consultants (to include fire, DDA [Disability Discrimination Act], acoustic, etc, after the main subcontractors are on board. The National Federation of TMOs, with several hundred members, is shaken to the core by the fire and its aftermath. However, examining the multiple failings shows that when key decision-making organisations failed to meet their obligations under the framework, there were few consequences. 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In most cases, effective governance and management require a governance framework as a tool for providing structure for delivering appropriate decision making and oversight. Edward Daffarn and another resident repeatedly attacked the Kensington and Chelsea Tenant Management Organisation (KCTMO) in a blog. The windows blew, flames were jumping out the window and there was some damage to the concrete, but the cladding and the insulation held, he said. endobj KENSINGTON AND CHELSEA TENANT By the time the blaze had been extinguished 72 residents were dead and an additional 70 others were injured. The Grenfell Tower Fire as a Breach of the Right to Life Kensington and Chelsea Tenant Management Organisation has not responded to the Guardian about the complaints raised by tenants at Adair Tower. Yet neither deemed it necessary to provide adequate health and safety regulations, such as sprinklers, and working fire alarms, which could have saved lives on the night, as stated in the recent Grenfell Tower Inquiry Phase 1 Report. They only put on fire doors after the fire in Adair Tower last October. It is nevertheless understood that fires are statistically calculable occurrences and the extent of the fire that followed the initial source and the difficulty in accessing the building and saving lives can be attributed to failures to properly manage the safety of the building.
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