In a letter sent to survivors and families of residents who died as a result of the disaster, the police set out their case following an initial assessment of information.
In their letter, police said: “The officer leading the investigation has today notified Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea and the Kensington and Chelsea Tenant Management Organisation that there are reasonable grounds to suspect that each organisation may have committed the offence of corporate manslaughter, under the Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act 2007.”
“In due course, a senior representative of each corporation will be formally interviewed by police in relation to the potential offence.”
The letter also states that it does not mean that they are the only individuals or organisations being investigated.
It follows a previous statement in which the Metropolitan Police had said it was considering ‘every criminal offence from manslaughter onwards’.
But despite the letter, any potential prosecution would have to be passed through the Crown Prosecution Service and the current Director of Public Prosecutions, Alison Saunders.
The news comes as chair of the public inquiry into the disaster, Sir Michael Moore-Bick, has been repeatedly put under pressure in meetings with residents and survivors, who have said that he ‘does not represent us’.
It has led to calls from London MP David Lammy for an ‘advisory panel’ of survivors, victims and family members to be set up to assist Moore-Bick with the inquiry, in order that it has ‘the confidence and trust’ needed to be ‘legitimate and authoritative’ in its findings.
And also earlier this month, the Hazards Campaign called for politicians to be interviewed under caution, due to their role in undermining health and safety legislation and culture, it claimed.
The lobby group said in an open letter to Commander Stuart Cundy, who is in charge of the fire investigation, that ‘deregulation fetish’ MPs should be interviewed about the initiatives which have ‘undermined criminal health and safety law over a long period’.
Moore-Bick has also said he is concerned that the inquiry will not have the broad remit that victims of the fire have called for – and instead will just look at the direct causes of the fire and their effect.
Lammy and others have called for a ‘second stage’ to the inquiry, which would look at social and economic issues, including the ‘systematic failure’ of the management of social housing provision – as well as the political decisions that allowed a disaster such as Grenfell to occur.
There were at least 60 firms that were originally identified as contribution to Grenfell Tower and its associated building and refurbishment works, although the level of involvement of each of these companies varied widely.
In the past month, detectives on the investigation have been assessing the role of these companies and individuals who refurbished the tower block, as well as those responsible for its fire safety strategies and policies, prior to the letter detailing the action against the local authority and TMO.
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On the basis of what’s been in the news there’s also ‘reasonable grounds’ for a prima facie case of multiple breaches of CDM2007 on top of corporate manslaughter. Reading between the lines this looks like someone finally got caught out performing those “value engineering” exercises that HSE call “design changes during construction” where the CDM Coordinator is (illegally) kept in the dark about. This has become fairly standard practice on bigger construction projects and the disappearance of the CDM-C role has meant that unsafe value engineering practices are even less likely to be picked up or even acted upon. HSE should take the lead in this investigation as the relevant enforcing authority because they can enforce both the Corporate Manslaughter Act and CDM. Succesful prosecutions of the CDM breaches alone, are highly likely to see jail terms and massive fines for Client and either the Designer or the Principal Contractor (depending on who made the decison to change the cladding specification to the flammable version). Designer may also be culpable for failure to ensure safe compartmentalisation of fire escape passages and stairwells. If the “intent” is for those responsible to bear the full weight of justice through prison sentences this is a surer path than trying for Corporate Manslaughter, which merely redresses the financial imbalances arising from failure to identify a “directing mind” (Mens Rea). It cannot override Gross Negligent Manslaughter (which does carry potential jail terms) because the corporation still assumes vicarious liability for the acts & omissions of its officers (provided they are following company instructions)
Peter, you make some excellent points. Notwithstanding these, I’m not sure that ‘value engineering’ can be attributed to all those tower blocks that have subsequently failed fire tests in the wake of the Grenfell fire. In which case this was an industry wide non-compliance issue and not just specific to C&K Council. Not dismiliar in principle to the capsizing of the Herald of Free Enterprise, where the CM prosecution failed partly due to the fact that not closing the bow doors when departing port was an industry wide practice by other ferry operators and not unique to just Townsend Thorenson – aka P&O Ferries.
Next point re Corporate Manslaughter and prosecutions – whilst there is a clamour for blood, I doubt any individual will be held to account because of the complex ‘corporate veil’ which protects individuals in large organisations. Hence it does make some sense to prosecute pursuant to the CM&CH Act 2007 where other health and safety offences can be taken into account. I strongly suspect if a CM prosecution fails, then a charge pursuant to s3 HSWA will be successful – rightly or wrongly. A s37 charge could follow for individuals…but don’t hold your breath.