Skip to content

Grenfell Tower: Chairs left empty for victims at Jubilee party

PA Media Table decorated with flags and green cupsPA Media
Each place at the table was set with a name card, napkin, plate, cup and flag

Grenfell Tower survivors and activists have said they had "respect" for the Queen's response to the disaster, ahead of her Platinum Jubilee and the five-year anniversary of the fire.

They spoke at a jubilee street party they held earlier, where table places were set for each of the 72 people killed by the 2017 fire in west London.

Each place at the table was set with a name card, napkin, plate, cup and flag.

Campaigners reflected on the Queen's relief centre visit following the fire.

Aaron Chown / PA The table and tower in backgroundAaron Chown / PA
Justice4Grenfell said the empty place settings were a "reminder" of the 72 people killed in the 2017 fire

Emma Louise O'Connor, who escaped from the 20th floor of the tower when it was alight, said: "The Jubilee celebrations being so close to the five-year anniversary, it's kind of hard to be able to get involved with celebrating".

Grenfell five years on: 'We are sewing a quilt the size of Grenfell Tower'

'Still no justice'

Yvette Williams, a Justice4Grenfell campaigner, said the Queen had been "embraced" by the community in North Kensington when she visited, but criticised the government's response to the fire.

"Five years on, a toothless public inquiry and millions still trapped in their homes by flammable cladding, and still no justice," she said.

"There have been no lessons learned and little action taken. As people up and down the country enjoy street parties, as they quite rightly should, we want to let the powers that be know that our community will always remember the 72 who died needlessly here that night."

The ongoing Grenfell Tower Inquiry found the tower's cladding was a key factor in the fire's rapid spread.

Aaron Chown The tableAaron Chown
Paper plates with commemorative wording were placed at each of the 72 settings at the table

Ms Williams added the Government should be legally obliged to follow the recommendations of the inquiry and prosecute those responsible, but said she feared there was a lack of "political will".

At the middle of the table, six places were laid for members of one family. Nabil Choucair, who lost his mother, sister, brother-in-law, and three nieces in the inferno, said his family was "far from getting justice".

He said: "The laws need updating, the legislation needs amending, regulations need to be updated as well."

Presentational grey line

Follow BBC London on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Send your story ideas to [email protected]