Just 10% of private towers have had Grenfell cladding removed

As campaigners marked the second anniversary of the Grenfell Tower disaster by projecting messages against vulnerable blocks in London, Salford and Newcastle, it was revealed this week that just 13 out of 176 privately owned high rises identified as being clad in the same material have been fixed.

Research by The Guardian using figures from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government showed that in the last four months just three buildings had seen the aluminium composite material (ACM) removed.

In the social housing sector, just over a third of buildings wrapped in ACM have been fixed - 56 out of 158 - however applications to a £200 million fund set up by the government to help those in private building where the owners refuse to pay up have been suspended until summer at the earliest.

The fire last weekend that tore through a private development by Bellway Homes in Barking highlighted the continuing threat to people living in blocks.

Last night’s guerrilla projections, which were organised by the Grenfell United action group, were targeted at three blocks which two years on from the tragedy, in which 72 people died, are still unsafe.

Frinstead House, which is on the Silchester Road Estate in west London and neighbours Grenfell, had the message ‘2 years after Grenfell this building still has no sprinklers’ beamed on to it.

In Salford, the statement on NV Buildings was: ‘2 years after Grenfell and this building is still covered in dangerous cladding. #DemandChange’. A leaseholder of a flat there told the Guardian that the 250 households there were being asked to pay up to £3m to remove combustible insulation.

And Cruddas Park House in Newcastle the message was: ‘The fire doors in this building are still not fit for purpose’.

Hannah Reid, who lives in the building, told the newspaper that “we are afraid the same thing [as Grenfell] could happen to us. The demands of the people of Grenfell were ignored and the same thing is happening to us. Not just us but all across the country.”

The anniversary, which falls on Friday 14, will be marked by commemorative services and a silent march through the streets of west London around the tower.