Keeping the Enemy Closer

Now that the important lessons from the Grenfell Tower fire have been learned (viz. that the rehousing of victims, far from being a priority, should barely even count as a concern; and that unsafe cladding should continue to be used unless residents are prepared to pay for its replacement), Her Majesty's Government has made a small condescension to the expendables and their families. The inquiry panel is now to include "people with the skills to examine the cultural and community reasons" behind the disaster, something the Prime Minister had previously refused to countenance. Being something slightly other than a born diplomat, and possessing an authoritarian streak nearly as wide as the yellow stripe running up her back, Tin-Pot Tessie presumably lacked the subtlety to see their inclusion as anything other than a hindrance to her will (in Modern Standard Whitehall English, the Will of the People) and an unacceptable adulteration of Sir Martin Moore-Bick's anticipated whitewash with a subversive touch of the tar-brush. Given the absence of much in the way of mind, heart or policy, her change of position is no doubt an encouraging sign; at least for anyone who believes that anyone with an interest in the larger causes of the disaster should be cosily outvoted and democratically marginalised, rather than excluded outright.