Key witnesses at the Grenfell Tower public inquiry must not be allowed to give evidence “from their sofas”, survivors of the disaster have warned as hearings restart remotely over Zoom next week after a two-month Covid suspension.
With witnesses due to appear from Arconic, which made the combustible cladding, and the tower’s owner, the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, Grenfell United said fully remote hearings meant traumatised members of the community would miss out on the catharsis of seeing figures with responsibility before the fire being held accountable in person.
The inquiry last month decided to restart with fully remote hearings, although it has previously admitted video conferencing means witnesses “might relax and not feel the same pressure to be candid” or could be surreptitiously coached via text or email.
Grenfell United is calling for a rapid resumption of in-person hearings, pointing out that some other inquiries and courts are operating in person.
“We cannot allow RBKC and the tenant management organisation to give their evidence from their sofas, in their slippers into a computer screen,” said Ed Daffarn, a committee member of Grenfell United who escaped the fire. “That will not wash with the bereaved and the survivors. These are the people inside our community who perpetrated against us.”
In an assessment in April of the problems with remote hearings, seen by the Guardian, the inquiry admitted: “It is very difficult … to ‘police’ the witnesses and make sure they are not being ‘fed’ information or being given other illegitimate support by third parties.”
The assessment added: “Core participants and the wider public might be left with the feeling that … the witness had not been exposed to the intensity of questioning that a conventional examination would have achieved.”
Daffarn said: “So many of us have been waiting for so long for these people to be held to account in public. In my mind I have seen it playing out a thousand times. I have seen the courtroom, I have seen the witnesses I want to see struggling under the pressure they will be put under with the answers they cannot give … We need to get these people into the sunlight so we can feel cleaned by it as well.”
The inquiry will ask witnesses to swear that they are alone in the room before they give evidence, but a spokesperson admitted there was an element of trust that witnesses would not use other devices.
“Remote hearings are a temporary measure to be used only for as long as is absolutely necessary,” they said. “As soon as it is safe to do so, limited attendance hearings will resume.”
Deborah French, Arconic’s UK sales manager, will start giving evidence from Tuesday. Arconic’s plastic-filled panels were the main cause of the rapid spread of fire that killed 72 people on 14 June 2017. Three former employees of the US company’s French subsidiary are refusing to attend. They include Claude Wehrle, technical manager, who knew in the years before Arconic’s panels were sold for Grenfell they were “dangerous” and showed “bad behaviour exposed to fire”, according to emails already exposed.
They have claimed that an arcane French law called the French blocking statute means they cannot give evidence. The French government has said that is not the case. Last week, bereaved people and survivors submitted a petition with more than 18,000 signatures to the foreign secretary, Dominic Raab, urging him to apply diplomatic pressure. The inquiry confirmed it would “empty-chair the witnesses” if they did not attend, reading out questions they would have faced and disclosing documents about their role.
“They are using the silliest excuses,” said Karim Mussilhy, whose uncle died in the fire. “My lawyer said it was as if they were saying: ‘I can’t come to work because a unicorn hit my car.’ Its non-existent – it’s not even an excuse.”
Arconic said: “The individuals who have declined to participate in the inquiry have taken the advice of separate counsel and AAP SAS does not have any influence on those decisions.”