Kensington & Chelsea Council (RBKC) this evening (2^nd September) held an online briefing attended by all councillors from all parties, ahead of the publication of the Grenfell Tower Inquiry Phase Two Report.  

Along with an audio recording, the slides from the briefing were provided to Urban Dandy by an attendee and can be seen here: GTI Publication Briefing for Councillors 020924 (1). 

Council Leader Elizabeth Campbell introduced the briefing, telling councillors, “It’s up to all of us to respond collectively to Grenfell.”

RBKC’s Chief Executive, Maxine Holdsworth then talked the politicians through the slides so they could know “what to expect in these coming days.”

However, Holdsworth and the rest of the council leadership seem genuinely unaware of what the Report will say. Core participants in the Inquiry will receive a copy tomorrow, 3^rd September, along with a few RBKC officers, but the report will be under embargo, meaning recipients cannot share the document until its general publication at 11am on Wednesday 4^th September.

The online briefing focused on RBKC’s public relations and arrangements around debates, public meetings, and the steps that will lead to the council arriving at its official response to the report in November. These steps include a special full council meeting on 9^th October, scrutiny committee meetings, leadership team meetings, meetings with bereaved and survivors, and public meetings.

RBKC’s Public Meetings

Holdsworth said the council will facilitate two “town hall-style meetings for residents” with the first one on 19^th September (4-7pm) at Kensington Leisure Centre. They will also hold “independently facilitated public meetings for residents,” the first set for 7^th October at Morley College. In December and January, the council will host further drop-in sessions and public meetings for residents regarding next steps, including “ongoing mechanisms for monitoring against the recommendations.”

While the above plans might sound fine in a briefing, North Kensington residents are well-versed in seven years of evidence showing RBKC’s failure to engage or empower local communities in ways that enhance local democracy and enable tangible change. In the context of the atrocity at Grenfell Tower, this failure has been so comprehensive that it is rational to conclude that it has been largely deliberate.

Community – What to Expect

In her first speech after the fire, with her predecessor forced to resign in disgrace by the government, Elizabeth Campbell addressed bereaved, survivors, and affected communities, using the word “change” 11 times as the council scrambled to retain power. In seven years, Campbell’s council has delivered no meaningful change, yet we can expect Campbell and her colleagues to parrot the word without embarrassment in the coming weeks.

Campbell is one of three Conservative councillors who were in Cabinet roles in the period before the fire. Along with Gerard Hargreaves and Catherine Faulks, Campbell was a key figure in a local authority that is a suspect in the Metropolitan Police’s criminal investigation into the fire. They supported the attempts of the Leader and Deputy Leader of RBKC, Nicholas Paget-Brown and Rock Feilding-Mellen to asset sweat North Kensington and transform (disform) its demographics.

The emptiness of the ‘change’ rhetoric was clear by 2018 when RBKC decided to cut £1.1 million from its youth services budget. Supposedly under expert scrutiny from Gold Command, the Grenfell Taskforce, and the Government, all these institutions stayed silent as North Kensington’s young people were further impoverished by the council’s unnecessary austerity policy.

In 2019, RBKC even did away with its own Grenfell Scrutiny Committee. This followed an RBKC “residents’ conference” which attracted 15 people. The plan for scrapping Grenfell scrutiny was then devised by a council panel made up of four Conservatives and one Liberal Democrat, effectively bypassing North Kensington, where all elected Councillors were at that time from the Labour party. The abolition of scrutiny was then voted on by the Conservative majority at the Town Hall; the scrutineers from government and the national media said nothing.

Seven years has seen many other examples of RBKC’s promises of meaningful engagement being followed by the opposite of what the Hillsborough Charter dictates, which Maxine Holdsworth quoted in her presentation: “The Charter commits the Council to becoming an organisation which strives to ”place the public interest above [its] own reputation” and “approach forms of public scrutiny – including public inquiries and inquests – with candour, in an open, honest and transparent way.”

Along with its failures to honour the Hillsborough Charter, the council has comprehensively failed to abide by its own Charter for Public Participation, which was not mentioned in the briefing.

The council has produced far more propaganda than change over seven years. Holdsworth stated that the press team “will be monitoring the media pretty much 24/7 over this coming period.” The Chief Executive also confirmed that the RBKC will produce a media digest with links to commentary about the Grenfell Inquiry Report.  

Truth

Following the formal briefing, Holdsworth took questions from councillors. Emma Dent Coad (Independent) asked why they were expected to “respond collectively” as Cllr Campbell had stated at the outset of the meeting. Holdsworth responded by saying that all councillors will be able to vote on RBKC’s response to the report, which prompted Cllr Claire Simmons (Labour) to note that RBKC’s official response to the Inquiry Report will be viewed as having been approved by “full council” when in reality, it will be another example of a hopelessly divided borough.

Several other councillors – Labour, Lib Dem and Independent – asked questions. No Conservative councillors raised their voices, and because there has been no change at the borough, it will be those Tories who decide the official response of this council to its own atrocity. 

By Tom Charles

@urbandandyLDN

@tomhcharles