Jeremy Corbyn says empty flats owned by the rich ‘should be seized for Grenfell victims’

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn suggested that empty homes owned as investments by rich people could be ‘requisitioned’ for displaced Grenfell Tower victims.

In a speech where he drew attention to the extreme inequality in the London borough of Kensington, he said it was a ‘tale of two cities’.

Mr Corbyn told MPs: ‘Properties must be found, requisitioned if necessary, in order to make sure that residents do get rehoused locally.’

‘How is it acceptable that in London you have luxury buildings and luxury flats kept empty as land banking for the future while homeless people look for somewhere to live?’

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Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn have both visited the site of the Grenfell Tower blaze, and people are pointing out the marked differences between the two.

The Prime Minister spoke to emergency services, but refused to meet any tower residents or survivors of the devastating blaze due to unspecified ‘security reasons’.

The Labour leader spent 40 minutes speaking to residents, and was pictured comforting a distraught woman who was telling him about a missing 12-year-old who lives on the 20th floor.

One resident reportedly told Mr Corbyn that the PM ignored the community, saying: ‘She was s**t.’

The death toll currently stands at 17 following the tragedy, with that number expected to rise significantly.

It has now emerged that fireproof cladding, which could have prevented the devastating inferno, could have been installed at a cost of just £5,000.

The building was refurbished last year, and covered in aluminium coated panels, known as Reynobond.