Grenfell Inquiry web of blame

The web of blame refers to a piece of evidence which was submitted during the Grenfell Inquiry as part of Counsel to the Inquiry's Closing Presentation on November 22, 2024. The council submitted a 16 page document describing the relationships between key parties involved in the Grenfell tower refurbishment project, with each diagram describing relationships from the perspective of each of the individual parties. The diagrams of each of the respective parties are shown above with the individual organisations as they appear in the inquiry report listed below. The written transcript of the inquiry notes: "Many questions were asked of many witnesses for hundreds of days. One question remains: who among the core participants has actually admitted that they caused or contributed materially to these deaths? That may be one question too many and too much to expect. Humankind cannot bear very much reality. But in the absence of an answer, the focus of my closing is to map out for you who blames whom and for what, and there are three reasons for doing that: legal , cultural and moral":

List of parties noted individually in the Grenfell Inquiry web of blame::

Arconic
Celotex
Kingspan
Harley Facades
Rydon
Studio E
Exova
The TMO
RBKC
DCLG
BBA
BRE

The inquiry also noted on November 22, 2024:

"Now, at this point it might be useful to show you what all of these different little maps of blame look like when merged. It looks like that. (Indicated). That is the web of pointer and counte rpointer, who blames whom and, I’ve explained, for what".

"You will note that on that map there are a number of core participants not covered. That is because I’m not going to cover NHBC, Siderise, PSB, Max Fordham, JS Wright or the other core participants who have made closing submissions. That does not diminish the importance of their roles, but I’m not sure that public understanding of causation and culpability will be improved by close analysis of their positions about culpability by me here and a further obscuration of what is already a complex picture. Nor am I proposing to cover the LFB. The LFB have not generally sought to shuffle off responsibility onto others, other than perhaps central government, and particularly in respect of the commissioners’ and senior fire safety officers ’ warnings to central government even before Lakanal, and certainly afterwards, about the dangers of tall building fire and smoke spread, its influence on evacuation and stay put, and on the ambit of the Fire Safety Order. All of that is the subject of detailed evidence from Modules 5 and Module 6 part 1, which defies simple and neutral presentation."

Top images and image above from Counsel to the Inquiry's Closing Presentation 10 November 2022 Grenfell Web of Blame PDF.

On 22 May 2024, the Metropolitain Police update on the Investigation into Grenfell Tower tragedy noted that 180 officers and staff were dedicated to the investigation and had:

"Identified and are investigating 19 companies or organisations and 58 individuals, as suspects.
Entered an “early investigative advice” phase and submitted eight of 20 advice files to the Crown Prosecution Service.
Interviewed under caution over 50 suspects for a total of more than 300 hours.
Spent more than a year forensically examining Grenfell Tower, and painstakingly removing its exterior piece by piece.
Collated more than 27,000 exhibits, which are held in a 635m2warehouse big enough to park 25 double decker buses inside. The exhibits include cladding, insulation, doors, windows and other parts of the building, down to screws, nuts and bolts.
Followed up more than 27,000 separate lines of enquiry.
Taken more than 12,000 witness statements.
Retrieved more than 152 million documents and files.
Evaluated 1,600 witness statements provided to the Grenfell Tower Public Inquiry, 300 days of evidence and over 320,000 documents disclosed by the inquiry."

On 4 September 2024 in the item 'Met responds to publication of Grenfell Tower public inquiry report' the Deputy Assistant Commissioner Stuart Cundy said “Our police investigation is independent of the public inquiry. It operates under a different legal framework and so we cannot simply use the report’s findings as evidence to bring charges. To secure justice for those who died and all those affected by the fire we must examine the report – line by line – alongside the evidence from the criminal investigation. As I said previously, this will take us at least 12-18 months. This will lead to the strongest possible evidence being presented to the Crown Prosecution Service so they can make charging decisions. I can’t pretend to imagine the impact of such a long police investigation on the bereaved and survivors, but we have one chance to get our investigation right. We will be thorough and diligent in our investigation while moving as swiftly as possible. We owe that to those who died and all those affected by the tragedy.”

Also on 4 September 2024 Kier Starmer PM announced that the Government 'would respond in full to the Grenfell Phase 2 Inquiry report within six months.' On 13 February 2025, in response to one of the recommendations from the report, the Prime Minister confirmed that 'responsibility for fire will move from the Home Office to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. This change will bring responsibility for building safety and fire under a single Secretary of State, providing for a more coherent approach to keeping people safe from fire in their homes. The Home Office will retain management of the Airwave Service Contract on behalf of the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government and will remain responsible for the Emergency Services Mobile Communications Programme and His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICFRS). This change will be effective from 1 April 2025. The Government will respond to the full report in due course."

On 26 February 2025 the 'Grenfell Tower Inquiry Phase 2 Report: Government response' was presented to Parliament by Angela Rayner the Deputy Prime Minister and Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government. The government responded piece by piece to the 58 recommendations given by the inquiry in its 11 chapter policy paper, a long awaited and anticipated official acknowledgement of the outputs and steps forward. Included in its announcement was the section 'Taking action against construction product manufacturers' which said:

"134. The Inquiry’s Report was clear that one very significant reason why Grenfell Tower came to be clad in combustible materials was systematic dishonesty on the part of those who made and sold the rainscreen cladding panels and insulation products.
135. The government is taking action. The construction products regime must include deterrents to prevent the behaviours we saw as part of the refurbishment of Grenfell Tower. Having committed to reform in September 2024, our construction products green paper includes proposals to strengthen sanctions, penalties and liabilities against manufacturers.
136. In addition, procurement legislation has been reformed to enable government to take stronger and broader action in relation to supplier misconduct which we will, where appropriate, utilise to effectively hold organisations to account. The new Act allows us to investigate suppliers and, if certain grounds are met, to add their names to a published and centrally managed debarment list, which must be taken into account by contracting authorities across the public sector in awarding new contracts and undertaking new procurements.
137. The Cabinet Office is launching investigations into a number of organisations criticised by the Inquiry, using new debarment powers in the Procurement Act 2023, to establish whether professional misconduct has taken place. We will make decisions on these organisations at pace.
138. We want to act swiftly and decisively, and are committed, where appropriate, to pursuing meaningful act ion in respect of failings related to the Grenfell tragedy."