Archive: London's Metropolitan Police have released the first footage from inside Grenfell Tower. Source: Metropolitan Police
Fireproof cladding planned for Grenfell Tower was not used and swapped for a more flammable to save £293,000 ($520,000), leaked emails revealed today.
Kensington housing officials demanded "good costs" to satisfy a council boss before the £8.6million ($15.2 million) refurbishment believed to have contributed to the worst fire in Britain for decades, according to Daily Mail.
The cladding encasing the block where 80 people died was described as sparking like a "firelighter" on a barbecue when a fridge exploded.
But minutes of meetings, price outlines and other correspondence before its installation reveal fire resistant zinc was swapped to a cheaper aluminium version.
The leaked documents made little reference to safety concerns, according to The Times.
Documents from June and July 2014 show Artelia UK, the project management consultant, apparently coming under political pressure to reduce costs.
An "urgent nudge email" about cladding prices from Kensington and Chelsea tenant management organisation (KCTMO) to Artelia reads: "We need good costs for Cllr Feilding-Mellen and the planner tomorrow at 8:45am!"
Rock Feilding-Mellen, who is the deputy leaders of the west London council and chairman of its housing committee, was overseeing the refurbishment of the 24-storey block.
The email lists three options for reducing the cost of cladding - including that using aluminium panels rather than zinc could mean a "saving of £293,368 ($520,000)".
The zinc panels would have been non-combustible, whereas the aluminium cladding that was eventually used had a flammable polyethylene core.
Kensington council said the budget for the Grenfell refurbishment project had been £6.9 million ($12.2 million) but Mr Feilding-Mellen had argued for increases which raised it to £10.3 million ($18.3 million) by June 2014.
Fire swept through Grenfell Tower, a high-rise apartment building in west London, early Wednesday, killing at least 79 people. Photo/AP
A spokesman for Kensington Council said: 'Cllr Feilding-Mellen and the cabinet were willing to approve significant and repeated increases in the overall budget based on the advice received from KCTMO, which was responsible not only for specifying and delivering the project but also for ensuring the building met the necessary and current building regulations.
"Any requests by Cllr Feilding-Mellen and the housing department to justify the TMO's requests for increases to the budget would have been made in the spirit of ensuring that public funds were being well managed and could be justified. Safety would not have been compromised."
Last night the first Kensington council meeting to discuss the Grenfell disaster was abandoned after the Press and public won the right to attend.
The local authority had initially announced the meeting of senior councillors would be held in private amid fears of "disruption".
Protesters tried to storm Kensington Town Hall on June 16 two days after the tragedy. The media, including the Daily Mail, then won a High Court order overturning the ban on journalists attending.
But council leader Nicholas Paget-Brown cancelled the meeting midway through after reporters arrived, saying their presence would 'prejudice' the forthcoming public inquiry.
He added: "We can't have an unprejudiced discussion in this room with the public inquiry that is about to take place if journalists are recording and writing our comments."
Councillor Robert Atkinson. who represents the Notting Dale ward in which Grenfell Tower is based, described the decision by members as "an absolute fiasco".
Grenfell Tower in west London after a fire engulfed the 24-storey building. Photo/AP
About a dozen residents from the area had gathered outside Kensington Town Hall in the hope of attending the meeting, but tensions rose when security guards refused them entry.
Teacher Moyra Samuels, a member of the Justice For Grenfell group, said: 'We're bloody angry they are not going to come out and offer a damn explanation as to why we are not able to get in.
"They have not actually stood up and talked to the community, which is despicable."
The inquiry into the Grenfell Tower inferno was engulfed by chaos last night before it had even begun.
The retired judge appointed to conduct the probe admitted it was unlikely to satisfy survivors and families of the victims.
And councillors were condemned for an attempt to ban the Press from a meeting at which the inquiry was due to be discussed.
Sir Martin Moore-Bick, the former Appeal Court judge who will lead the inquiry, vowed to lead a "vigorous" investigation that would get to the truth behind the fire as "quickly as possible".
Urban Search and Rescue officers from London Fire Brigade inside the Grenfell Tower. Photo/AP
But after meeting survivors during a visit to the scene of the blaze in North Kensington where at least 80 died, he admitted: "I'm well aware the residents and the local people want a much broader investigation and I can fully understand why they would want that.
"Whether my inquiry is the right way to achieve that I'm more doubtful."
The inquiry is likely be limited to the cause of the fire, how it spread and preventing a future blaze rather than addressing allegations of criminality.
Grenfell residents also complained that they had not been consulted over Sir Martin's appointment.
