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[News] Dany Cotton/LFB.







Lindfield by the Pond

Well-known member
Jan 10, 2009
1,886
Lindfield (near the pond)
I enter into the world of NSC politics rarely, but IMHO, we lose too many capable individuals because of politics. Recently we lost an aircraft carrier captain/admiral because of "company" car abuse. Took 25+ years to get a person to the level of skill required to command and lead 700 people on the most modern warship this country owned, and we binned him because he leant "the company car" to his wife. What a waste of talent.

Same with Dany Cotton. A well respected individual, who rose through the ranks, and now is being expected to resign because of a shit building design, and a policy that clearly stated for many years that fire would be contained, and that people were best staying put?

She is retiring in 6 months and wants to put right some failings in that policy. She is a good person, and has always wanted to do the right thing. Hanging her out to dry is just wrong and ultimately pointless. You learn more from mistakes than you do from perfection.

She will retire in 6 months, and will have passed on the sort of experience that we all learn from. I believe she should stay her term and pass on her experience.
 


Bry Nylon

Test your smoke alarm
Helpful Moderator
Jul 21, 2003
19,782
Playing snooker
I notice the official report doesn't make an estimate of the number of lives that would have been lost had the LFB followed the recommendation in the report and tried to effect an emergency evacuation of hundreds of panicked people in the middle of the night into pitch dark hallways and stairwells filled with toxic smoke.

Many of them wouldn't have lasted 3 steps outside their flats before they would have succumbed to smoke inhalation. So then you have corridors filled with collapsed casualties, people trying to take luggage with them, people getting completely disorientated, peope getting separated from loved ones and turning back or just freezing, stampedes, people getting crushed on stairwells in the pitch dark. The practicalities that would have made this a worse option are endless.

The unpalatable fact of the matter is that once the fire in that tower block covered in flammable material took hold, people would die if they were told to stay put and people would die if they tried to evacuate. I believe the report is doing a disservice to those that died, those that survived and those sent to fight the fire by suggesting that evacuating the building is an action that would have saved more lives. I don't believe it necessarily would have and the LFB would still have been thrown to lions for deviating from established procedure.
 


portlock seagull

Why? Why us?
Jul 28, 2003
16,979
I enter into the world of NSC politics rarely, but IMHO, we lose too many capable individuals because of politics. Recently we lost an aircraft carrier captain/admiral because of "company" car abuse. Took 25+ years to get a person to the level of skill required to command and lead 700 people on the most modern warship this country owned, and we binned him because he leant "the company car" to his wife. What a waste of talent.

Same with Dany Cotton. A well respected individual, who rose through the ranks, and now is being expected to resign because of a shit building design, and a policy that clearly stated for many years that fire would be contained, and that people were best staying put?

She is retiring in 6 months and wants to put right some failings in that policy. She is a good person, and has always wanted to do the right thing. Hanging her out to dry is just wrong and ultimately pointless. You learn more from mistakes than you do from perfection.

She will retire in 6 months, and will have passed on the sort of experience that we all learn from. I believe she should stay her term and pass on her experience.

The problem is she’s deemed white and privileged by an angry largely non white community of underprivileged immigrants or 2nd generation ethnic minorities. This tragedy has a huge racial undercurrent to it sadly and she will probably pay the price to keep the multicultural liberals happy when really the issue is class, not colour, and chronic underfunding in wider social welfare that includes housing. This and because a disaster of this size always requires a scapegoat and it seems even our heroic firemen and woman are fair game too these days. Doesn’t make it right though but then that probably doesn’t come into it.
 




Boys 9d

Well-known member
Jan 3, 2012
1,788
Lancing
I notice the official report doesn't make an estimate of the number of lives that would have been lost had the LFB followed the recommendation in the report and tried to effect an emergency evacuation of hundreds of panicked people in the middle of the night into pitch dark hallways and stairwells filled with toxic smoke.

Many of them wouldn't have lasted 3 steps outside their flats before they would have succumbed to smoke inhalation. So then you have corridors filled with collapsed casualties, people trying to take luggage with them, people getting completely disorientated, peope getting separated from loved ones and turning back or just freezing, stampedes, people getting crushed on stairwells in the pitch dark. The practicalities that would have made this a worse option are endless.

The unpalatable fact of the matter is that once the fire in that tower block covered in flammable material took hold, people would die if they were told to stay put and people would die if they tried to evacuate. I believe the report is doing a disservice to those that died, those that survived and those sent to fight the fire by suggesting that evacuating the building is an action that would have saved more lives. I don't believe it necessarily would have and the LFB would still have been thrown to lions for deviating from established procedure.

As an ex-Firefighter all I can do is to totally agree with what has been stated above. It has been expressed much more eloquently than I could have written.
I also wonder if much of the spite is because of her gender?
 
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CheeseRolls

Well-known member
NSC Patreon
Jan 27, 2009
5,922
Shoreham Beach
I think Dany Cotton's evidence at the enquiry reflected poorly on her and on the Fire Service. I do however have some genuine sympathy for her, in the way that so often public servants are thrown to the lions, where those who should truly be held accountable somehow float above it. First a non-political point, as a society we have a choice about how our fire service operates. The only things we seem to value is bravery to the point of personal sacrifice and ladder safety. This is a critical service and rather than trying to cut things to a point that firefighters fight fires forty hours a week, because that's how many hours the rest of us have to do real work. We should be investing in training the service in the broad range of critical skills required to respond to a major incident like Grenfell. These things cost money and strangely we just don't seem to want to invest in the people or the service. We have to readdress these priorities.

Politicians I would like to see be held accountable.

1 Eric Pickles Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government from 2010-2015, who did so much to instil a culture that safety and standards, was unnecessary bureaucracy.
2 Boris Johnson as Mayor of London, who with his usual brass neck associated major cuts to the fire service, with a statistical drop in the number of fire related deaths. No doubt one of the usual suspects will be along soon to tell us, "all politicians lie". No they don't they are often guilty of misjudgement, of changing their minds, of saying things which we disagree with, of being blind to certain perspectives. There is a special category of liars, who wilfully misrepresent the facts, without regard for the consequence. There are very few people in British politics in the last 50 years, who have had such low morals. Jeremy Thorpe, John Stonehouse, Keith Vaz - maybe, none of whom have been in such a position of power.
3 The whole leadership of Kensington and Chelsea Council - rotten to the core.
 


CheeseRolls

Well-known member
NSC Patreon
Jan 27, 2009
5,922
Shoreham Beach
The problem is she’s deemed white and privileged by an angry largely non white community of underprivileged immigrants or 2nd generation ethnic minorities. This tragedy has a huge racial undercurrent to it sadly and she will probably pay the price to keep the multicultural liberals happy when really the issue is class, not colour, and chronic underfunding in wider social welfare that includes housing. This and because a disaster of this size always requires a scapegoat and it seems even our heroic firemen and woman are fair game too these days. Doesn’t make it right though but then that probably doesn’t come into it.

Rubbish and not worthy of further debate.
 




portlock seagull

Why? Why us?
Jul 28, 2003
16,979
Rubbish and not worthy of further debate.

No scapegoat? No racial undertones? No class conflict? Yes, none of these factors were evident at the enquiry...:glare:
 








blue-shifted

Banned
Feb 20, 2004
7,645
a galaxy far far away
I kind of agree with the sentiment that you can't just sack someone on the grounds that "their advice meant that people died" unless you can be very confident that

1) If the opposite advice had been provided fewer people would have died and
2) This isn't just hindsight. If her advice was based on not having bothered to research similar disasters in other parts of the world, then fair enough sack her.

In my mind, as long as the fire service are genuinely learning the lessons then that's all you can ask.

I get the point about her being insensitive at the tribunal thing. Not a sacking offence though, she was just saying it as she saw it I think, if being a bit defensive
 




CheeseRolls

Well-known member
NSC Patreon
Jan 27, 2009
5,922
Shoreham Beach
One for Mr Nylon. A big "this" to this sober article from the Independent from someone who seems well qualified to speak on the matter. Respect to all those who had to deal with the incident on the day.

https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/grenfell-tower-fire-one-year-one-kensington-a8397276.html?fbclid=IwAR2G0bRuKaPE2_GefL-QK1hOv7Ym_yLBSrzCa4zCz0_Xjo4_3b-LfzKYBgA

Such a shame more of the media, didn't attempt to push a more balanced view - hard to argue with any of this.
Footnote - Tony Sullivan refused payment for this piece
 






Weststander

Well-known member
NSC Patreon
Aug 25, 2011
63,407
Withdean area
As an ex-Firefighter all I can do is to totally agree with what has been stated above. It has been expressed much more eloquently than I could have written.
I also wonder if much of the spite is because of her gender?

Isn’t it just the British culture/custom of calling for heads to role, regardless of gender? How many times do we hear semi-aggressive, rhetorical “are you going to resign ....... ?”, from interested parties, heads of whiter than white quangos, hacks.
 



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