Assholes

My good friend (we met once) Dawn Foster in the NYT:

The former chair of the Grenfell Tower residents’ association, David Collins, told me many residents received threatening letters from lawyers for the contractor completing the building work, and they felt intimidated by visits and complaints from managers of the company.

The blaze happened after a yearslong attack by the Conservative government on low-income housing. The amount of public housing being built has dropped for more than two decades, even more drastically since 2012 to reach a 24-year low. Meanwhile, more and more is being sold off and demolished, even though demand is higher than it has been in decades.

Many local councils have been desperate to build, but have instead had their funding slashed, meaning they are closing homeless shelters when they want to build more homes. As well as funding cuts, changes in the classification of homelessness have seen more families turned away when they need help: Over 100,000 children in England are currently in temporary accommodation, while single adults are routinely turned away.