A specialist taskforce is to be sent in to Kensington and Chelsea council to take over the running of key services following the Grenfell Tower fire.
The Communities Secretary, Sajid Javid, has announced an independent recovery taskforce to help the borough cope. It is expected to manage the council’s housing, regeneration, community engagement and governance services.
Separately, Sir Martin Moore-Bick, the retired judge chairing the inquiry into the fire, has launched a consultation into its terms of reference after ministers hinted it could be broadened to satisfy the concerns of residents.
After his appointment, Moore-Bick warned residents that he had been asked to conduct a narrow inquiry, but he now says he wants to “consider a broad range of evidence”.
Launching consultation on the scope of the inquiry, he said: “I want to hear from people directly affected by the fire and others involved, to listen to their views on the shape of the inquiry’s work and the questions we should be seeking to answer.”
Announcing the new taskforce, Javid said: “The scale of the recovery effort needed on the Lancaster West estate in the months to come cannot be underestimated … This intervention is putting in place the foundations that will support the longer-term recovery.”
Details of the move, which follows heavy criticism of the council’s response to the disaster, will be confirmed in a written statement to MPs.
The new team is expected to be phased in as the current Grenfell Tower response team is gradually wound down.
The taskforce stops short of demands from the shadow communities secretary, Andrew Gwynne, and London mayor, Sadiq Khan, for ministers to appoint external commissioners to take over the running of the whole council.
It amounts to another admission of the scale of the failure at what was regarded as an effective council until the fire, but Labour said it did not go far enough.
It follows the departure of the chief executive Nicholas Holgate a week after the fire and then, after much criticism, the resignation of council leader Nicholas Paget-Brown and his deputy and housing chief, Rock Feilding-Mellen. On Monday, Kensington and Chelsea elected the former education cabinet member Elizabeth Campbell to replace Paget-Brown.
Campbell said she had called on Javid for more help. She said: “The unprecedented scale of this incident makes it impossible for one organisation to cope on its own. That’s why my first action as leader was to ask DCLG for help, and I’m delighted they have been so swift to respond.
“I look forward to working with their staff as we all concentrate our efforts on healing the wounds in the north of our borough and to regain the trust of a community traumatised by disaster.”
A team from other councils was ordered into the council days after the fire to deal with the emergency response. The Grenfell Response Team admitted yesterday that only 14 of the 158 families evacuated from the tower and nearby Grenfell Walk had accepted offers of temporary accommodation.
Gwynne said: “Despite being a clear admission of failure, this is a half measure that does not go far enough to address the woefully inadequate performance of Kensington and Chelsea council throughout this crisis.
“It is clear that the community has lost trust in their council. Sajid Javid needs to finally show some leadership by bringing in external commissioners – in consultation with residents themselves – to make sure everyone in the borough is getting the support they need.”
Labour MP Andy Slaughter, a former opposition councillor in Kensington and Chelsea, dismissed the taskforce plan as “another sticking plaster”.
Speaking to Sky’s Talking Politics, he said: “This is the worst of all worlds. Clearly Kensington can’t cope. The new leader is part of the old regime … some of the services will be taken over but the same old crew will still be in charge. There is not a clarity of who is in charge and it is not decisive enough.”
The move was given a cautious welcome by Labour’s Karen Buck, who represents the neighbouring area of Westminster North, but in a tweet she called for residents to be involved.
The HuffPost UK, which first reported the taskforce plan, said the council’s other services were rated highly and so would not be taken over.
It said Javid would use the precedent of Birmingham city council, where an independent improvement panel was sent in with the council’s agreement to turn around its finances and governance.
