Grenfell Tower Fire: Failures, Inquiry, and Legacy Timeline

Police send files on 54 people and 20 organisations to prosecutors 2026

Nine years after the fire, the Metropolitan Police completed its investigation and passed files on 54 individuals and 20 companies and organisations to the Crown Prosecution Service, together with 14 overarching evidence files. Police asked prosecutors to consider corporate manslaughter, gross negligence manslaughter, health and safety offences, fraud-related offences and misconduct in public office.

Deputy Assistant Commissioner Kevin Southworth called it ‘a milestone moment’ in ‘one of the most complex investigations ever undertaken by any UK law enforcement agency’. The CPS has committed to charging decisions before the tenth anniversary on 14 June 2027.

30 of 61 recommendations complete 2026

The government’s latest progress report recorded 30 of 61 tracked recommendations complete: 58 from Phase 2 plus three outstanding from Phase 1. Fire and rescue reforms were furthest ahead (9 of 13); construction-industry reforms, the heart of the Phase 2 findings, furthest behind (9 of 28).

On cladding, the government was monitoring 4,697 buildings at the end of July 2026: works had started on 2,551 and finished on 1,833. Responses to consultations on construction-product reform are promised later in 2026, with legislation ‘when Parliamentary time allows’.

The ninth anniversary, and a memorial taking shape 2026

The community marked nine years since the fire. The bereaved-led Grenfell Tower Memorial Commission appointed the design team Freehaus in November 2025 to develop a permanent memorial on the site, described in consultation as a peaceful ‘sacred space’ with a garden and a monument. A planning application was expected in late 2026.

Evacuation plans for disabled residents become law 2026

Building owners in England must now identify residents who could not evacuate unaided because of a physical or cognitive impairment, offer them a person-centred fire risk assessment, and agree an evacuation plan. Disabled residents were disproportionately among those who died at Grenfell; the Phase 1 report had called for such plans in 2019.

Demolition paused where handprints were found 2026

During visits before the floor-by-floor dismantling reached them, bereaved families found handprints on stairwell walls that they believe were left by people escaping, and an inscription reading ‘Allahu Akbar’ on another floor. When officials said no sections above the ninth floor would be kept, families sent a pre-action letter seeking a judicial review, and the government paused works around the affected landings.

The Building Safety Regulator stands on its own 2026

The Building Safety Regulator, created by the 2022 Act inside the Health and Safety Executive, became a separate arm’s-length body in January 2026 and completed its staff transfer in June. The government published its response on a single construction regulator on 9 July 2026. That wider reform, one of the Inquiry’s central recommendations, still needs legislation.

Dismantling of the tower begins Event

In February 2025 the government told families the tower would be taken down after engineers concluded it was structurally unsafe. Work began in September 2025 with the removal of the rooftop plant room, carried out by Deconstruct UK, which had maintained the site since 2017. The covering, bearing a green heart and the words ‘Forever in our hearts’, had stood over North Kensington for years.

Contract-ban investigations put on hold Justice

Debarment investigations under the Procurement Act 2023, which could have barred firms from public contracts, had been opened into Arconic, Saint-Gobain (for Celotex), Exova, Harley Facades, Kingspan, Rydon and Studio E. The Cabinet Office paused them after police and prosecutors warned they could prejudice the criminal investigation and any trial. Survivors had urged the government to move faster.

The government accepts every finding Reform

Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner presented the government’s response to Parliament, accepting all of the Inquiry’s findings. Of the 58 recommendations, 49 were accepted in full and the other nine, all aimed at government, in principle. The response promised a single construction regulator, tougher rules on construction products and a chief construction adviser.

Acceptance was the start of the work, not the end: many changes need consultation or new laws.

Phase 2: ‘all the deaths were avoidable’ Inquiry

The final report concluded that the deaths of all 72 people were avoidable. It found the fire was the culmination of decades of failure by central government and others to act on the danger of combustible materials on high-rise homes, and systematic dishonesty by some cladding and insulation makers who manipulated tests and misled the market.

It also criticised the council and the TMO for ignoring residents, testing and certification bodies, the architects, contractors and fire engineers, and the London Fire Brigade’s slow learning from earlier fires.

A civil settlement, and a new housing law Justice

Around 900 bereaved relatives, survivors and residents settled civil claims against 22 parties, including manufacturers, contractors, the council and the TMO. The terms were confidential and involved no admission of liability; the total was reported at about £150 million.

In July, the Social Housing (Regulation) Act 2023 gave the Regulator of Social Housing proactive inspection powers and introduced Awaab’s Law on hazards such as damp and mould.

The Building Safety Act becomes law Reform

Building on Dame Judith Hackitt’s 2018 review, Building a Safer Future, the Act created a gateway system for higher-risk buildings in England, new duty-holders responsible for safety through a building’s life, and protection for many leaseholders from the cost of fixing historical defects. It followed the Fire Safety Act 2021, which made clear that external walls fall within fire risk assessments.

Phase 2 hearings begin Inquiry

The government accepted in principle all Phase 1 recommendations aimed at it. Days later, Phase 2 began examining the refurbishment, the products, testing, regulation and the council’s conduct. Hearings were paused during the Covid-19 pandemic and ended in November 2022.

Phase 1 report: the night itself Inquiry

The first report found that the exterior did not comply with building regulations and was the principal reason the fire spread. It praised the courage of individual firefighters but found serious shortcomings in the London Fire Brigade’s control room and command, including a lack of planning for evacuating a tower.

Sir Martin Moore-Bick concluded that stay-put could and should have been abandoned between about 01:30 and 01:50, and that doing so would likely have saved lives. LFB Commissioner Dany Cotton retired early, on 31 December 2019.

A ban on combustible cladding, and a year of grief Reform

Dame Judith Hackitt’s independent review called the building regulation system ‘not fit for purpose’. On the first anniversary, buildings across the country were lit green, and the monthly silent walk continued. In December 2018 the government banned combustible materials in the external walls of new residential buildings over 18 metres.

A public inquiry is set up Inquiry

Prime Minister Theresa May announced a public inquiry the day after the fire, and Sir Martin Moore-Bick, a retired Court of Appeal judge, was appointed chair on 29 June. The Inquiry opened on 14 September 2017. Meanwhile, emergency tests found ACM cladding on hundreds of other high-rise buildings across England, starting the national cladding crisis.

72 lives lost Disaster

Seventy people died in the tower and two more later in hospital, the last in January 2018: 72 people, including 18 children. Many were on the upper floors, where the stairs filled with smoke. Disabled residents and those living highest up were disproportionately among the dead.

Survivors lost their homes and possessions, and the surrounding Lancaster West Estate was traumatised. It was the deadliest residential fire in Britain since the Second World War.

Stay-put is finally abandoned Disaster

As flames wrapped the tower, the 999 control room kept advising many callers to stay in their flats, in line with the building’s fire strategy. The London Fire Brigade revoked stay-put at about 02:47. By then the single staircase was filling with smoke, and many residents who had been told to wait could no longer get out.

A kitchen fire in Flat 16 Disaster

Behailu Kebede, the resident of Flat 16, raised the alarm after an electrical fault in his fridge-freezer started a fire. Firefighters arrived within minutes. But the fire had already escaped through the kitchen window into the external wall, and within about half an hour it had climbed the east face to the top of the 24-storey tower, then spread sideways around the building.

‘Only a catastrophic event…’ Warning

The Grenfell Action Group wrote that only a catastrophic event would expose the ineptitude and incompetence of the landlord, the Kensington and Chelsea TMO. Residents had complained about fire doors, emergency lighting, a power surge and the conduct of the refurbishment.

The Inquiry found that the TMO and the council saw some residents as troublemakers and failed to treat their concerns with the seriousness they deserved.

The refurbishment wraps the tower in cladding Warning

The refurbishment added new windows, heating and a rainscreen cladding system. Zinc panels were dropped in favour of cheaper ACM panels with a polyethylene core, fixed over combustible PIR and phenolic foam insulation. The panels were in a cassette form that, the Inquiry found, the manufacturer knew performed far worse in fire tests.

Architect Studio E had never designed cladding for a high-rise residential building. Building control approved the work without spotting that the materials did not meet the regulations.

A refurbishment is planned Event

Kensington and Chelsea council and its tenant management organisation planned a major improvement of Grenfell Tower alongside the construction of a new academy and leisure centre beside it. Part of the aim was to improve the tower’s appearance.

Grenfell Tower is built Event

Built by A E Symes for Kensington and Chelsea council, Grenfell Tower was a concrete social-housing block with a single staircase. Its fire strategy assumed that solid concrete walls and floors would keep a fire inside one flat, which is why stay-put was the standard advice. The refurbishment later brought the number of flats to 129.