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The Home Office is continuing to insist that creating plans for disabled people to evacuate high-rise blocks of flats is unsafe and too expensive, even though a London council has put scores of such plans into effect. Fire minister Lord [Stephen] […]
Two campaigners have launched a legal challenge over the Home Office decision to reject a key recommendation from the Grenfell Tower Inquiry that would have ensured they and other disabled residents could safely evacuate blocks of flats. Georgie Hulme and Sarah […]
A firefighters’ union has told the government to rethink its decision to reject a key recommendation from the Grenfell inquiry that would ensure disabled people could safely evacuate high-rise blocks of flats in emergencies. The Fire Brigades Union (FBU) said the […]
The government has agreed that its new building safety regulator will carry out an assessment of how disabled people can safely evacuate from high-rise buildings. The proposal was included in the government’s new building safety bill as it finished its progress […]
Two disabled peers have warned the government that disabled people living in high-rise flats will again be forgotten – five years on from the Grenfell disaster – if its building safety bill fails to make their need for protection explicitly clear. […]
Disabled campaigners have launched legal action over the government’s decision to award a crucial fire safety contract to consultants who have repeatedly argued against introducing written evacuation plans for disabled residents of tower blocks. Claddag, a leaseholder action group led by […]
Disabled activists are “shocked and outraged” at the government’s decision to commission fire safety guidance from a company that produced a “discriminatory” and “discredited” policy on evacuating disabled people that was in place at the time of the Grenfell tragedy. Consultants […]
A disabled woman who made a “miraculous” escape from the top floor of Grenfell Tower has told a parliamentary meeting that her husband would still be alive today if there had been an evacuation plan in place for her. Flora Neda […]
A minister has been told that his government’s “absurd” plans to protect disabled residents who would need assistance if they had to evacuate from high-rise blocks of flats are “dangerously misplaced”. A parliamentary meeting heard this week that the “arbitrary” proposals […]
New government plans that would protect some disabled people from the risk of fire in residential buildings do not go far enough, and even suggest that disabled residents might have to pay for measures to keep them safe, say campaigners. The […]