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Tonight, four weeks after Grenfell burned, Newsnight has established | :00:00. | :00:00. | |
the first evidence of cyanide poisoning amongst | :00:07. | :00:09. | |
We hear new testimony of a family's escape | :00:10. | :00:14. | |
And the agony of losing their unborn child. | :00:15. | :00:20. | |
As it settled on my body, obviously everything goes to the baby. | :00:21. | :00:28. | |
The amount that he received, it was obviously enough | :00:29. | :00:32. | |
Nazreen Aklani lost her mother and her aunt in the fire, | :00:33. | :00:40. | |
both are missing and presumed to have died. | :00:41. | :00:43. | |
Four weeks on - has anyone helped her get the answers that she seeks? | :00:44. | :00:50. | |
And why are survivors so unwilling to believe | :00:51. | :00:53. | |
what the authorities tell them - especially about the | :00:54. | :00:55. | |
I was speaking to a friend of mine last week and they said that he's | :00:56. | :01:02. | |
We go in search of evidence that the official death count | :01:03. | :01:10. | |
is wrong and ask why so many doubt it. | :01:11. | :01:12. | |
I said, we've got social media out here. | :01:13. | :01:15. | |
We'll ask two London politicians if it's possible to end | :01:16. | :01:22. | |
Four weeks after the inferno, the charred carcass | :01:23. | :01:36. | |
of Grenfell Tower looms over North Kensington like | :01:37. | :01:39. | |
a malevolent machine, casting still darkening shadows over | :01:40. | :01:42. | |
But as the political debates continue and the parameters | :01:43. | :01:48. | |
of the official enquiry are slowly established, there is perhaps | :01:49. | :01:52. | |
a danger of losing sight of the myriad human | :01:53. | :01:55. | |
For example, the youngest victim of the fire, who was yet to be born. | :01:56. | :02:03. | |
Andreia Gomes was seven months pregnant and had already | :02:04. | :02:06. | |
named her unborn son-to-be Logan when, with her husband | :02:07. | :02:09. | |
and their two daughters, she escaped from the 21st floor | :02:10. | :02:12. | |
The baby growing inside her did not survive. | :02:13. | :02:18. | |
And tonight, we learn that Andreia and her husband | :02:19. | :02:21. | |
Marcio's eldest child, the 12 year old Luana, | :02:22. | :02:25. | |
received a diagnosis of cyanide poisoning - | :02:26. | :02:27. | |
the first to be recorded among the survivors. | :02:28. | :02:31. | |
They have been telling their story for the first time | :02:32. | :02:33. | |
A warning - some people may find it upsetting. | :02:34. | :02:39. | |
We didn't use soft words, we didn't say | :02:40. | :02:41. | |
that her baby brother was | :02:42. | :02:46. | |
sleeping with the angels, sleeping as everybody does every night. | :02:47. | :02:51. | |
We said Logan died and these are the reasons Logan died. | :02:52. | :02:56. | |
The Gomes family lived on the 21st floor of Grenfell | :02:57. | :02:58. | |
Next month they should have been celebrating the birth of their | :02:59. | :03:02. | |
son, anticipated with much excitement by his older sisters. | :03:03. | :03:08. | |
We were making plans, he can sleep with me, | :03:09. | :03:11. | |
floor and I'm going to play with him, they were very excited and we'd | :03:12. | :03:19. | |
Instead, their home is gone and their son, | :03:20. | :03:26. | |
who they had already named Logan, was delivered stillborn by Caesarean | :03:27. | :03:33. | |
section as his mother and sisters lay in induced comas in hospital. | :03:34. | :03:38. | |
I knew something was wrong straightaway when they took the | :03:39. | :03:40. | |
mother as a priority, so I broke down. | :03:41. | :03:43. | |
And then later on they said that the baby had passed | :03:44. | :03:53. | |
They can't say 100%, but they said that the heart couldn't cope | :03:54. | :04:04. | |
with the lack of oxygen, the baby didn't get, | :04:05. | :04:10. | |
so they have done a full autopsy including toxins to see | :04:11. | :04:13. | |
exactly what caused the baby's death. | :04:14. | :04:18. | |
They said that they believed the poison went in and settled on my | :04:19. | :04:25. | |
body, and everything goes to the baby. | :04:26. | :04:37. | |
Especially, seven months is when the lungs of the baby starts to | :04:38. | :04:40. | |
The amount that he received, it was obviously enough to | :04:41. | :04:43. | |
There has been speculation in the four weeks since | :04:44. | :04:53. | |
the fire about what toxins may have been released as the building | :04:54. | :04:56. | |
The family allowed Newsnight to film their discharge papers from | :04:57. | :05:00. | |
Their 12-year-old daughter's diagnosis | :05:01. | :05:03. | |
Her mother and sister were also treated | :05:04. | :05:08. | |
This is the first confirmation of a cyanide | :05:09. | :05:16. | |
poisoning diagnosis as a result of the Grenfell fire. | :05:17. | :05:18. | |
It is believed to be from the insulation. | :05:19. | :05:22. | |
I imagine it would be from the plastics that | :05:23. | :05:30. | |
were melted and burning, but the smoke was certainly, | :05:31. | :05:32. | |
you know, so intense, as soon as you got a mouthful, you | :05:33. | :05:40. | |
were gagging, you were constantly gagging on the way down. | :05:41. | :05:45. | |
I can't imagine what my daughters were going | :05:46. | :05:53. | |
through at the time and I'm sure you were gagging as well. | :05:54. | :05:56. | |
You were always having the gag reflex, it was that | :05:57. | :05:59. | |
This was the family's flat where they sheltered, unable to | :06:00. | :06:02. | |
They had been advised that firefighters would rescue them but | :06:03. | :06:07. | |
two hours and up to five emergency calls later, just before 4am, | :06:08. | :06:11. | |
The curtains were on fire, the Moses basket was | :06:12. | :06:21. | |
on fire, that side of the window was on fire. | :06:22. | :06:25. | |
I looked at the window and thought it must have cracked. | :06:26. | :06:27. | |
Everything was fine so I knew that the fire came in between the | :06:28. | :06:34. | |
There were a lot of gaps because of the insulation they | :06:35. | :06:46. | |
The only thing I could do was literally grab the door, | :06:47. | :06:49. | |
and then I looked and said we have to go now, | :06:50. | :06:52. | |
there's no turning back, we have to try. | :06:53. | :06:54. | |
I was holding the rail and I kept shouting, keep going, | :06:55. | :06:58. | |
keep going downstairs, try and give them as | :06:59. | :06:59. | |
At one point my daughter replied to me | :07:00. | :07:04. | |
I realised she must have let go of the rail. | :07:05. | :07:24. | |
I turned round, stopped, I turned around and said | :07:25. | :07:31. | |
I'm waiting for you, follow my voice, I kept shouting to them. | :07:32. | :07:36. | |
I kept climbing the stairs and she said, I can't, I can't, and she | :07:37. | :07:40. | |
The smoke was so heavy, you couldn't see anything | :07:41. | :07:46. | |
that was there, so I was shouting to them, waiting. | :07:47. | :07:52. | |
Thankfully at that moment I looked down and there was a | :07:53. | :07:55. | |
light coming up and it was a fireman. | :07:56. | :07:58. | |
They were rescued but the delay on the staircase meant that he | :07:59. | :08:09. | |
had lost Andreia and their younger daughter. | :08:10. | :08:11. | |
I said I needed to go back and see where my wife is and | :08:12. | :08:17. | |
the policeman said, I'm not promising anything | :08:18. | :08:18. | |
I relaxed a bit at that point and then the other one | :08:19. | :08:23. | |
said, is your daughter's name, Megan? | :08:24. | :08:27. | |
I said I was good because they had got out. | :08:28. | :08:29. | |
An ambulance took the family to hospital where the | :08:30. | :08:33. | |
Did you know immediately that you had lost your son? Or did you have | :08:34. | :08:45. | |
to tell Andreia? Before she got brought out of | :08:46. | :08:48. | |
the coma, moving a little bit, very I was talking to her and the first | :08:49. | :08:56. | |
thing she did was to try and put her hand on her stomach | :08:57. | :09:04. | |
and said, I'm sorry. The family have nothing | :09:05. | :09:09. | |
but praise for the support they've received from the NHS, | :09:10. | :09:14. | |
firefighters and friends. As for those who decided | :09:15. | :09:16. | |
to cut costs on I'm very angry with | :09:17. | :09:18. | |
them because it could That's where the anger | :09:19. | :09:21. | |
really stems from. Yes, it was an accident, | :09:22. | :09:25. | |
I'm sure, but it It shouldn't have | :09:26. | :09:28. | |
happened like this. The residents never wanted | :09:29. | :09:33. | |
the cladding in the first place. When you go ahead | :09:34. | :09:37. | |
knowing that something could happen and they ignored that, | :09:38. | :09:44. | |
this is me, personally, I feel that I don't know if is | :09:45. | :09:48. | |
the right word, but you just killed so many people | :09:49. | :10:00. | |
and you just killed my son. In a normal situation | :10:01. | :10:06. | |
I could have gone out, he was seven months, he | :10:07. | :10:09. | |
could have survived. But because of their | :10:10. | :10:14. | |
conditions, he... Andreia and Marcio Gomes | :10:15. | :10:23. | |
talking to Katie Razzall It is worth stressing that we do not | :10:24. | :10:41. | |
know where the cyanide came from, whether it was plastics from inside | :10:42. | :10:43. | |
the building or the insulation. Sadly, neither the Government | :10:44. | :10:45. | |
nor council were able Her mother Sakineh | :10:46. | :10:47. | |
lived on the 18th floor On the night of the tragedy | :10:48. | :10:53. | |
she was being visited by her sister, Nazreen's aunt Fatimeh, | :10:54. | :10:58. | |
and both women described the unfolding horror | :10:59. | :11:02. | |
on the telephone to family members Presumed but not yet confirmed dead, | :11:03. | :11:04. | |
the uncertainty surrounding their situation is also | :11:05. | :11:10. | |
being endured by many other grieving families and their continuing pain | :11:11. | :11:15. | |
is exacerbated by a lingering suspicion that the authorities | :11:16. | :11:17. | |
are still being less I am so sorry for your loss and | :11:18. | :11:33. | |
thank you for joining us. One would presume that four weeks after the | :11:34. | :11:37. | |
tragedy, you had find out rather more than what you have about what | :11:38. | :11:42. | |
happened to her mother and your aunt, is that the case? We know more | :11:43. | :11:49. | |
in terms of meeting other victims and we have approached them, we have | :11:50. | :11:56. | |
found things out for ourselves and... No, it has taken so long for | :11:57. | :12:03. | |
the numbers to reach 80. The next day the numbers of dead were nine. | :12:04. | :12:09. | |
We always knew it was more and we still know it is more, that is no | :12:10. | :12:14. | |
information for us. It is things that we assumed. You mentioned | :12:15. | :12:20. | |
dealing chiefly with other survivors and grieving families, what lines of | :12:21. | :12:24. | |
communication do you have with what you describe as the authorities? We | :12:25. | :12:30. | |
have very little communication, we have been given a key worker and we | :12:31. | :12:35. | |
have had to run around so much. We were given a family liaison officer | :12:36. | :12:40. | |
by the police quite quickly. And through them we were promised to | :12:41. | :12:46. | |
have a key worker which puts us in touch with the council and they are | :12:47. | :12:51. | |
supposed to help us, introduce us to things that are available and | :12:52. | :12:54. | |
everything. And it took so long to have one of those in place. We | :12:55. | :13:01. | |
literally had to chase the officers to be able to find out who that | :13:02. | :13:09. | |
actually is and once in place, a number of phone calls we have had to | :13:10. | :13:14. | |
make chasing her up, I would rather have called the places myself and | :13:15. | :13:19. | |
have everything done. We find out through other means and had to put | :13:20. | :13:23. | |
it to her, there has not been much communication. What is it you are | :13:24. | :13:27. | |
mostly trying to establish that you have been unable to? One of the main | :13:28. | :13:33. | |
things we have been trying to do and I know my brother sorted out the | :13:34. | :13:39. | |
Housing for my disabled brother and we have been trying to sort that | :13:40. | :13:43. | |
provisionally ourselves because there was no key worker and when she | :13:44. | :13:47. | |
came in she took over and did nothing with it and we had to ring | :13:48. | :13:52. | |
her and remind her, the MP as short as this would get done. She called | :13:53. | :13:58. | |
us one week later to say the council has refused everything and when we | :13:59. | :14:01. | |
asked for her to put us in touch with the manager that took that | :14:02. | :14:04. | |
decision, she spoke to my brother, I believe today or yesterday, to say | :14:05. | :14:09. | |
the manager is going on annual leave and she left it as that without | :14:10. | :14:13. | |
telling us who else would be in charge. Which I find quite shocking, | :14:14. | :14:20. | |
so many people traumatised and going through this tragedy, not just | :14:21. | :14:23. | |
myself but everybody, and the managers and the council say that it | :14:24. | :14:28. | |
is OK to continue with annual leave. You say not yourself but you still | :14:29. | :14:33. | |
do not know for sure what happened to your mother? No. My brother was | :14:34. | :14:40. | |
on the phone to them, we know they went to the 23rd floor and we know | :14:41. | :14:46. | |
they died there because... Do you understand by the authorities have | :14:47. | :14:52. | |
been unable to definitively confirm that to you? Yes, they let them burn | :14:53. | :15:00. | |
for too long. You know... What is more horrendous than getting burned | :15:01. | :15:05. | |
alive? You ask yourself, is there anything worse? I am afraid there | :15:06. | :15:11. | |
is... Having no remains and yes, it has taken so long because they | :15:12. | :15:15. | |
failed to put out the fire when they should have. When I went to that | :15:16. | :15:21. | |
site in the morning, we were there all day, there was still fire inside | :15:22. | :15:26. | |
the building, the next day, 24 hours later. And because of that, yes, it | :15:27. | :15:30. | |
is hard for them to tell us what has happened to my mother and my auntie | :15:31. | :15:34. | |
because they have been so burned that the coroner defines them as | :15:35. | :15:40. | |
calcified, there was no organic matter in the bones for them to be | :15:41. | :15:44. | |
DNA tested. And I do not know who took the decision to decide that | :15:45. | :15:52. | |
they did not need to fight the fire any more. I do not know why somebody | :15:53. | :15:57. | |
who was responsible for that far decided it was OK to stop fighting | :15:58. | :16:00. | |
it and let everything else burn. Because... That decision has cost us | :16:01. | :16:08. | |
the remains of our family. That we could have had. And I see that as a | :16:09. | :16:13. | |
criminal offence. That should be investigated. | :16:14. | :16:19. | |
You have no remains to bury. We have no remains, since the first day, we | :16:20. | :16:29. | |
told our family liaison officer that we want to have a video of the | :16:30. | :16:35. | |
coroner's search. They said, we think this is part of their work | :16:36. | :16:42. | |
anyway. The victims' meeting at Olympia, we were told there was no | :16:43. | :16:47. | |
video. We have taken pictures. Commander Cundy said yes, we will | :16:48. | :16:51. | |
get these pictures out to the families because we are very keen on | :16:52. | :16:57. | |
them, it is our right. Just like everything else, it was a waste of | :16:58. | :17:02. | |
time, time we could have spent grieving. We weren't given the | :17:03. | :17:07. | |
pictures as they promised, they said they would get them to us | :17:08. | :17:12. | |
immediately. We have been denied everything. I have no idea what's | :17:13. | :17:17. | |
out there. For all my no, they could be in one piece. I should stress | :17:18. | :17:22. | |
that there is an open invitation for the Council or central government to | :17:23. | :17:26. | |
address many of the questions that are continuing to be thrown up by | :17:27. | :17:29. | |
this awful, all full tragedy. Thank you for joining us. | :17:30. | :17:32. | |
I spent several hours at the scene today and almost | :17:33. | :17:35. | |
everyone I spoke to, from the local MP to the manager | :17:36. | :17:40. | |
of the Maxilla social club that sits in Grenfell's shadow, | :17:41. | :17:44. | |
told me that the official response to the tragedy remains inadequate | :17:45. | :17:46. | |
It is perhaps unsurprising that this perceived absence of accountability | :17:47. | :17:52. | |
and authority has fostered an environment in which suspicion | :17:53. | :17:56. | |
and mistrust have been allowed to fester. | :17:57. | :18:00. | |
Tonight - a vigil for those that died took place at the tower. | :18:01. | :18:05. | |
From the death toll itself, which currently officially stands | :18:06. | :18:12. | |
at 80, to the efforts to rehouse survivors, many report a deep | :18:13. | :18:15. | |
And it is a distrust which could ultimately hamper any | :18:16. | :18:19. | |
inquiry that requires the cooperation of a community | :18:20. | :18:21. | |
profoundly sceptical about almost everything they are being told. | :18:22. | :18:25. | |
So many questions about Grenfell hang in the air. | :18:26. | :18:42. | |
The definitive answers are many months away. | :18:43. | :18:49. | |
The public inquiry hasn't even decided | :18:50. | :18:51. | |
its terms of reference yet, which questions it will investigate. | :18:52. | :18:54. | |
I was here covering the fire on the day | :18:55. | :18:56. | |
and have followed the story ever since. | :18:57. | :18:58. | |
And one thing that has made Grenfell seem very different to me, | :18:59. | :19:01. | |
feel different from a lot of other similar disasters is how widespread | :19:02. | :19:07. | |
and how strong is the view that the authorities are lying to us | :19:08. | :19:10. | |
At the heart of this view is the question of how | :19:11. | :19:14. | |
That number is established by the police. | :19:15. | :19:18. | |
But is it really more than that, and if so, | :19:19. | :19:23. | |
are the police, the government, the Fire Service and the media all | :19:24. | :19:29. | |
colluding in a cover-up to downplay this disaster's true death toll? | :19:30. | :19:31. | |
If you're not going to report the right numbers, there's no | :19:32. | :19:38. | |
There's no point you being here because all | :19:39. | :19:42. | |
I and many of my colleagues have had encounters like this one. | :19:43. | :19:47. | |
People throwing their children out of the | :19:48. | :19:51. | |
You can see first hand there's more than 58 missing posters | :19:52. | :19:57. | |
The media, seen as in collusion with the | :19:58. | :20:02. | |
powerful who want to suppress the truth. | :20:03. | :20:05. | |
We've got social media, we've got social media out here, we don't | :20:06. | :20:08. | |
Rumours become hardened into fact, despite | :20:09. | :20:17. | |
I've got a friend who works for the fire brigade here. | :20:18. | :20:24. | |
Yesterday on the phone he said they found about 42 | :20:25. | :20:27. | |
It's only because we know him, he's a fireman, | :20:28. | :20:38. | |
This Facebook video that alleges that 42 bodies were | :20:39. | :20:46. | |
found in one flat has been seen by more people than the nightly | :20:47. | :20:50. | |
audience for BBC and ITV's main bulletins put | :20:51. | :20:52. | |
A claim that then finds its way into the mouth of a | :20:53. | :20:56. | |
The 79 figure that has stood for a week does not accord | :20:57. | :21:01. | |
with those who lived down there and say | :21:02. | :21:03. | |
that the survivors, there is a | :21:04. | :21:05. | |
In one flat alone, people say there were up to 40 people gathered, | :21:06. | :21:11. | |
because they had gathered there, it was Ramadan. | :21:12. | :21:21. | |
In the cold shadow of Grenfell Tower I met Virginia Sang. | :21:22. | :21:27. | |
She lives in one of the three blocks of maisonettes that radiate | :21:28. | :21:30. | |
She has lived there since she was a child. | :21:31. | :21:33. | |
The official figure is 80 at the moment, dead or missing. | :21:34. | :21:36. | |
I was told Sunday after the fire it was 200 and | :21:37. | :21:48. | |
Right, and that rings true to you, it is more | :21:49. | :21:55. | |
Yeah but I was speaking to a friend who said he has been told | :21:56. | :21:59. | |
Well, we don't know, I'm praying it's not. | :22:00. | :22:03. | |
We don't think they new how many people lived in the tower, because | :22:04. | :22:11. | |
the tower was very overcrowded, so they don't have the correct number | :22:12. | :22:16. | |
for how many people was living there. | :22:17. | :22:20. | |
Do you think there were many people who weren't on the books? | :22:21. | :22:23. | |
But despite investigating these claims, Newsnight has so far found | :22:24. | :22:33. | |
no evidence that such large numbers were in the tower. | :22:34. | :22:35. | |
To calculate the total number in Grenfell that night | :22:36. | :22:40. | |
we need to know the number of people who escaped. | :22:41. | :22:43. | |
The police say it was 255 and add the number of missing | :22:44. | :22:46. | |
The police say the number is 80, implying a total of 335 | :22:47. | :22:52. | |
All the people you can see on these posters | :22:53. | :23:03. | |
are accounted for in some way, they are either | :23:04. | :23:05. | |
officially confirmed as | :23:06. | :23:07. | |
So if there were many other people, dozens, even hundreds of other | :23:08. | :23:16. | |
victims of the Grenfell fire, where is the evidence, where are the | :23:17. | :23:19. | |
people looking for them, where are the neighbours, the friends and | :23:20. | :23:22. | |
Unless they were so anonymous that nobody knew they were | :23:23. | :23:26. | |
As for the argument that 100 or more undocumented | :23:27. | :23:34. | |
migrants were living in the tower unknown | :23:35. | :23:35. | |
to the authorities, the | :23:36. | :23:37. | |
police have detailed lists for who was living | :23:38. | :23:40. | |
the block, so where were these extra people supposedly living? | :23:41. | :23:46. | |
Official figures from the police are that 80 | :23:47. | :23:48. | |
18 are from the 106 flats where the police have | :23:49. | :23:56. | |
The remaining 62 are from 23 higher flats where the police have been | :23:57. | :24:07. | |
The police have said they have not discovered a flat containing 42 | :24:08. | :24:11. | |
Identifying, even numbering victims is a huge and slow | :24:12. | :24:16. | |
30 years ago, 31 people were killed in a fire at King's | :24:17. | :24:20. | |
Cross Station and it took months to identify some of the victims. | :24:21. | :24:23. | |
It is a grisly truth that in a high temperature, | :24:24. | :24:26. | |
long burning fire like Grenfell, very little human evidence | :24:27. | :24:29. | |
The upper floors of Grenfell became effectively a crematorium, the | :24:30. | :24:39. | |
temperature must have been 2000 Celsius. | :24:40. | :24:43. | |
A crematorium is a roundabout 1600 Celsius so what | :24:44. | :24:45. | |
would be left is not an identifiable body but fragments of bone and ash | :24:46. | :24:53. | |
To identify a body we need not just the teeth and | :24:54. | :24:57. | |
get DNA from that body, we need to have something to compare it with | :24:58. | :25:00. | |
Independent groups and organisations try | :25:01. | :25:02. | |
to put together lists of the | :25:03. | :25:10. | |
dead and missing have not identified the scores or hundreds of missing | :25:11. | :25:13. | |
victims that some believe died in the blaze. | :25:14. | :25:15. | |
Without having access to the police's data, the BBC has | :25:16. | :25:17. | |
managed to identify 72 of the 80 people | :25:18. | :25:20. | |
An unchecked crowd sourced database has come up with 83 names. | :25:21. | :25:25. | |
We have completely failed to find any evidence to support the idea | :25:26. | :25:30. | |
that a real number of casualties from the Grenfell fire is | :25:31. | :25:33. | |
significantly different from the numbers that the police | :25:34. | :25:35. | |
That leads to a rather obvious question. | :25:36. | :25:38. | |
Why are so many so determined to believe that the | :25:39. | :25:41. | |
One factor is certainly the lack of trust in any of the institutions | :25:42. | :25:50. | |
We know, for example, that Grenfell residents tried to raise fire | :25:51. | :25:54. | |
safety concerns for years but felt ignored. | :25:55. | :25:57. | |
Many in social housing complained of unresponsive, uncaring | :25:58. | :25:59. | |
Especially in central London, where they suspect the councils | :26:00. | :26:05. | |
would rather sell off valuable sites to developers. | :26:06. | :26:08. | |
She said something like, I have put wet towels under | :26:09. | :26:10. | |
the door and I am just really scared. | :26:11. | :26:12. | |
Rizwan Hussain lost a friend and fellow activist in | :26:13. | :26:19. | |
He is sceptical of conspiracies but understands how | :26:20. | :26:23. | |
In regards to the local authority, I think there was just a lack of | :26:24. | :26:31. | |
answers coming from them, there was a lack of representation. | :26:32. | :26:34. | |
Everything on the ground was basically community-led. | :26:35. | :26:41. | |
People were asking the question, where are the local authorities and | :26:42. | :26:43. | |
Where is the organised system in place of | :26:44. | :26:46. | |
And that didn't happen until a few days after. | :26:47. | :26:49. | |
Questions about numbers and where people are, | :26:50. | :26:55. | |
who people are, because they are not being answered, there is a sort of | :26:56. | :26:58. | |
And that suspicion extends to the people that | :26:59. | :27:05. | |
used to be trusted to report tragedies like Grenfell. | :27:06. | :27:09. | |
Now, the media is seen by some as peddling | :27:10. | :27:11. | |
In collusion with the powerful to mislead and | :27:12. | :27:14. | |
Do you have have a lot more faith in the people you talk to around | :27:15. | :27:20. | |
More than the authorities or even the media, to explain? | :27:21. | :27:26. | |
Yes, because we understand what we're | :27:27. | :27:28. | |
going through, we are the ones going through it. | :27:29. | :27:31. | |
And we understand it because we're all very close. | :27:32. | :27:33. | |
Or put on what they want to see or what they | :27:34. | :27:43. | |
We have had no trust in the council for years. | :27:44. | :27:48. | |
So that has made us even worse than what we were. | :27:49. | :27:51. | |
Do you simply not trust us to tell the truth? | :27:52. | :27:53. | |
I have seen some things that they have shown and | :27:54. | :28:06. | |
A human tragedy of this scale touches so many | :28:07. | :28:21. | |
lives in ways that can never be recorded in official statistics. | :28:22. | :28:25. | |
What is clear is that no appeal to the facts as explained and | :28:26. | :28:29. | |
interpreted by authority figures and established media will do much | :28:30. | :28:32. | |
to reform the strongly held opinions that swirl around this disaster. | :28:33. | :28:42. | |
Sian Berry is a Chair of the Housing Committee | :28:43. | :28:46. | |
And Shaun Bailey is a Conservative Party member of London's Assembly. | :28:47. | :29:01. | |
He grew up close to Grenfell - in the borough of | :29:02. | :29:04. | |
It would seem there has been an epic breakdown of public trust or an epic | :29:05. | :29:11. | |
escalation. Do you think this dispute over the death toll is a | :29:12. | :29:16. | |
symptom or a cause? I think it is a symptom, it has to be said there was | :29:17. | :29:19. | |
a lack of information about the death toll and one thing the police | :29:20. | :29:23. | |
normally do in cases like this is put out an estimate of who they | :29:24. | :29:26. | |
think was in the incident and how many people might have survived and | :29:27. | :29:30. | |
those key pieces of information were not given by the police for a very | :29:31. | :29:34. | |
long time, they would only give that number so it is understandable there | :29:35. | :29:37. | |
would be scepticism. I challenge the Mayor and the police and this week | :29:38. | :29:42. | |
for the first time they have put out those numbers and we can have a | :29:43. | :29:47. | |
debate, the police think there were 350 people inside and locals might | :29:48. | :29:50. | |
have different views and before there was nothing to talk about | :29:51. | :29:53. | |
because the police had not given those numbers. It is very important | :29:54. | :29:59. | |
that is clear. In terms of general mistrust, I was called there, myself | :30:00. | :30:06. | |
and Sean are London wide Assembly Members, representing everybody who | :30:07. | :30:10. | |
needs our help and I was asked to come down five days in London are | :30:11. | :30:14. | |
required to help get some practical things done. Largely for the wider | :30:15. | :30:18. | |
community rather than people who had been evacuated, people still in the | :30:19. | :30:22. | |
area, feeling besieged by the media, wondering where any support might | :30:23. | :30:26. | |
be. An absolute lack of information about things like road closures, | :30:27. | :30:30. | |
whether even the school would be open. There was nothing for people | :30:31. | :30:37. | |
and I think you saw that day when you doing everything, there was no | :30:38. | :30:40. | |
information. And it is still not much better and I am still getting | :30:41. | :30:44. | |
messages from people every day, I have had to go back three or four | :30:45. | :30:49. | |
times, there is something very broken there and people are still | :30:50. | :30:56. | |
fending for themselves. This is a vacuum into which volunteers have | :30:57. | :31:00. | |
moved and in many ways continue to bear the brunt of front-line service | :31:01. | :31:04. | |
that the residents expected to be provided by the council. In the | :31:05. | :31:08. | |
continuing absence of the council, it took the former head 80 days to | :31:09. | :31:13. | |
effectively show his face in public before resigning. The continuing | :31:14. | :31:16. | |
absence on the ground of the council, how can these people be | :31:17. | :31:19. | |
expected to place faith in the council that they perceive as | :31:20. | :31:24. | |
letting them down badly? They simply will not, I lived there for a very | :31:25. | :31:29. | |
long time, my friends and family out there, the reaction of the community | :31:30. | :31:32. | |
does not surprise me, they have always been reactive, we look after | :31:33. | :31:36. | |
our own, the council failed by not giving this a human face and saying | :31:37. | :31:41. | |
we are responsible for putting this right, I understand they are scared | :31:42. | :31:45. | |
of litigation. Do you understand the scepticism about the numbers? I do | :31:46. | :31:52. | |
not buy into the conspiracies but I fully understand why and where that | :31:53. | :31:56. | |
is coming from. If you look at social housing, many people across | :31:57. | :31:59. | |
London are under different leadership, Labour and Conservative | :32:00. | :32:04. | |
and whatever, they feel social housing is inflicted upon them, they | :32:05. | :32:09. | |
have no say, it is not explained why it works the way it does and does | :32:10. | :32:14. | |
things have built up over years. Our community is told its Muslim members | :32:15. | :32:18. | |
are terrorists and the young black men are criminals so they hold out | :32:19. | :32:21. | |
to people who do not try to understand them. The council have | :32:22. | :32:25. | |
built up quite a good reputation, they did a lot of work on the | :32:26. | :32:29. | |
ground, that has been trashed by a very poor response to this. The new | :32:30. | :32:34. | |
council leader has a very steep hill to climb. Some residents would | :32:35. | :32:38. | |
dispute your notion that there was much in place to trashed. We are | :32:39. | :32:42. | |
familiar with the action group's blog that warrant and predicted. You | :32:43. | :32:48. | |
had a community on the ground that the council would largely work with | :32:49. | :32:53. | |
a mini youth groups etc, but when it comes to social housing, which | :32:54. | :32:56. | |
affects a much larger group of people in the area, the council were | :32:57. | :33:02. | |
too distant, they have moved away. Do you understand how that has | :33:03. | :33:07. | |
happened? Yes, as a country we do not punish those in high places and | :33:08. | :33:12. | |
what happens, when I speak to young people, they say, I bet you nobody | :33:13. | :33:16. | |
gets in trouble for this. And there is a very serious thing that can be | :33:17. | :33:22. | |
done, the enquiry, the terms, how the Yoko -- local people... It is | :33:23. | :33:29. | |
important someone explains to them what that enquiry means, you have to | :33:30. | :33:33. | |
manage expectations right now because if not, you will never | :33:34. | :33:37. | |
rebuild the trust. This is an important moment. The enquiry will | :33:38. | :33:42. | |
fail without this trust? This is an important moment for the political | :33:43. | :33:44. | |
establishment to start rebuilding trust. Do you have optimism that | :33:45. | :33:51. | |
that can happen? Against a backdrop that is almost unspeakably big? Yes, | :33:52. | :33:57. | |
local people are organising, trying their best but they are not being | :33:58. | :34:01. | |
given resources and we need a complete reconfiguration of | :34:02. | :34:10. | |
democracy there. ?300 million in Chelsea's back. Why not give that to | :34:11. | :34:14. | |
voluntary groups to get on with what needs doing? We have seen three | :34:15. | :34:19. | |
changes of leadership, of who is running the relief organisation and | :34:20. | :34:22. | |
we are waiting for things to get sorted out, if those organisations | :34:23. | :34:27. | |
and charities had the funding... It is not just about funding. In the | :34:28. | :34:35. | |
short term. It is about disaster response, hand on heart, other | :34:36. | :34:38. | |
council leaders across the country, can they say they would respond | :34:39. | :34:43. | |
better? Probably not. You need a group of people seen enough to make | :34:44. | :34:47. | |
decisions on the ground, anybody directly affected should not find | :34:48. | :34:51. | |
things out in the media, they should be contacted directly and first. And | :34:52. | :34:55. | |
that is not happening. Without that response and team and the seniority | :34:56. | :35:00. | |
to deliver, you will always disappoint the local people. Many | :35:01. | :35:02. | |
thanks to both of you for your time. The Government - in the shape | :35:03. | :35:05. | |
of the Deputy Prime Minister in all but name, Damian Green - | :35:06. | :35:09. | |
said today that it was likely that we'll get a good deal with the EU | :35:10. | :35:13. | |
and the chances of there being no deal at all is | :35:14. | :35:16. | |
"probably overstated." But in tonight's Viewsnight, | :35:17. | :35:18. | |
David Cameron's former advisor, Julian Glover, urges them to get | :35:19. | :35:20. | |
on with it. On the issue of that deal - | :35:21. | :37:02. | |
or no deal - with the EU, there are two particular issues that | :37:03. | :37:06. | |
may need urgent attention. First, the UK's scheduled | :37:07. | :37:09. | |
withdrawal from membership of the European nuclear regulator, | :37:10. | :37:12. | |
Euratom, about which the medical and scientific communities have | :37:13. | :37:16. | |
expressed grave concern. And - separately - | :37:17. | :37:19. | |
we heard warnings today from Ryanair that all fights to the continent | :37:20. | :37:23. | |
could be grounded if we don't get an air transport | :37:24. | :37:26. | |
agreement in place sharpish. Our Political Editor, | :37:27. | :37:29. | |
Nick Watt and our Business Editor, Helen Thomas have been looking | :37:30. | :37:31. | |
into both of these matters. I will begin with Nick Watt. What do | :37:32. | :37:45. | |
we know about the Euratom situation? The government is facing the | :37:46. | :37:49. | |
prospect of its first major Brexit rebellion over plans to pull out of | :37:50. | :37:53. | |
that treaty. I have learned the government is planning to negotiate | :37:54. | :37:57. | |
a form of associate membership of that treaty. It is not technically | :37:58. | :38:03. | |
an EU treaty but it is overseen by the European Court of Justice. I | :38:04. | :38:06. | |
understand this movement by the government will be enough to satisfy | :38:07. | :38:11. | |
some of the Tory rebels. They believe that associate membership | :38:12. | :38:16. | |
could be happy halfway house that could set precedent for a half in, | :38:17. | :38:20. | |
half out future relationship with the EU and they except the UK cannot | :38:21. | :38:28. | |
go back into Euratom as a full member because advice from UK and EU | :38:29. | :38:32. | |
lawyers is cleared- if you leave the EU, you have to leave Euratom, even | :38:33. | :38:37. | |
though it is not technically an EU treaty. We might have to wait for | :38:38. | :38:40. | |
this to be announced, the government will set out its position paper on | :38:41. | :38:45. | |
Euratom but that will be general and the rebels will hold back for the | :38:46. | :38:49. | |
moment. And some news on that Repeal Bill? Labour have announced this | :38:50. | :38:57. | |
evening but unless that will is amended, they will vote against it | :38:58. | :39:01. | |
at its second reading in early September. Keir Starmer, the Shadow | :39:02. | :39:06. | |
Brexit Secretary, says that Bill allows the government to record too | :39:07. | :39:10. | |
much power and mirrors what he described as flawed approach on the | :39:11. | :39:15. | |
European Court of Justice. If Labour votes against it, it will not | :39:16. | :39:18. | |
necessarily stop the bill in its tracks because potential Tory rebels | :39:19. | :39:22. | |
would not vote against it at the second reading but it will embolden | :39:23. | :39:27. | |
them to amend it with Labour further down the line and ministers are not | :39:28. | :39:32. | |
happy, they say, do not reverse the will of the people. Many thanks. | :39:33. | :39:37. | |
Helen, what did Michael O'Leary have to say? Classic Michael O'Leary, he | :39:38. | :39:42. | |
was in the European Parliament, time to do with reality, flights. After | :39:43. | :39:48. | |
Brexit, Ryanair would shift their craft, we will have to holiday in | :39:49. | :39:51. | |
Scotland or Ireland. You get the idea. The single market and aviation | :39:52. | :39:57. | |
allows airlines to fly freely in Europe and is no fallback option so | :39:58. | :40:01. | |
you need a new agreement and his view is this will not happen because | :40:02. | :40:05. | |
of the red lines put around negotiations by the government and | :40:06. | :40:09. | |
that is debatable. What is truth is airlines sell seats about one year | :40:10. | :40:13. | |
in advance so you need to get a move on. You say classic Michael O'Leary, | :40:14. | :40:16. | |
is airlines sell seats about one year in advance so you need to get a | :40:17. | :40:19. | |
move on. You say classic Michael O'Leary, busy flying solo? I have | :40:20. | :40:22. | |
spoken to several industry types and they are overwhelmingly confident | :40:23. | :40:26. | |
there will be a deal, Willie Walsh, the boss of the owner of British | :40:27. | :40:30. | |
Airways says he thought it would be relatively straightforward. The | :40:31. | :40:35. | |
reasoning, governments on both sides and airlines on both sides want to | :40:36. | :40:39. | |
deal, otherwise everybody loses, tourism, trade and business. There | :40:40. | :40:45. | |
are compensations, a basic bilateral deal preserves UK to Europe flights | :40:46. | :40:49. | |
and vice versa but not necessarily easy jet flying around Europe. | :40:50. | :40:53. | |
Ownership is a problem because current rules require you to be a | :40:54. | :40:59. | |
majority EU owned. Ultimately, the industry thinks we will get a deal | :41:00. | :41:02. | |
because it would be unimaginable chaos without that. Thank you both | :41:03. | :41:04. | |
very much indeed. We just had to leave you with this | :41:05. | :41:06. | |
piece of surreal theatre from Perhaps by repeating it we're just | :41:07. | :41:11. | |
proving the author's point, but here's the actor Andy Serkis, | :41:12. | :41:17. | |
who plays Gollum in The Lord of the Rings, reading out | :41:18. | :41:20. | |
Donald Trump's Twitter feed. AS GOLLUM: The fake news media has | :41:21. | :41:22. | |
never been so wrong... Purposefully incorrect | :41:23. | :41:29. | |
stories and funny sources. We had a beautiful day | :41:30. | :41:37. | |
across the UK today, just a bit of fairweather cloud | :41:38. | :41:56. | |
here and there. Tonight, clear skies | :41:57. | :41:59. | |
and there is raw chill on way, | :42:00. | :42:02. |