This live blog is now closing. You can read our report from the second day of the inquiry here:
Second day ends
Moore-Bick draws an end to the second day of the inquiry by thanking Mussilhy and Rahman’s family.
“I’m sorry you had to wait so long to make your commemoration, but it was worth the wait.”
He added with this understatement: “Thank you all for being here so long. It has turned into a very long day and an very emotional day and I grateful to all you for being here.”
“We will start again at 10am tomorrow.”
Karim Mussilhy introduced a video tribute to his uncle Hesham Rahman, who lived on the 23rd floor of Grenfell in flat 204. The video showed family photos with a commentary from his sister and his young nephew Omar. “His personality made me stronger every time I was around him,” Omar said.
Mussilhy remembers visiting his uncle’s flat after the fire. The lifts were not working, which happened quite often, he said. Walking up the stairs brought on Mussilhy’s asthma. He remembered thinking how difficult it would have been for his uncle to escape the flat.
“Until those in power make changes to the system, only God knows how many homes are safe. So listen and learn those mistakes,” Mussilhy said. “We are here because the system failed to protect my uncle and 71 other souls.
“We are here because nobody listened, because that system is broken. You can’t hide behind rules and procedures. That’s what allowed people to die. Materials that are clearly dangerous are still on buildings all over the country.
“It is not good enough for the government to say it is going to remove this material. We want light to be shone on what went wrong and who is responsible. We want an inquiry into the truth.”
Richmond interrupts him to say these points should be made at a later part of the inquiry. Mussilhy carries on. “We have been censored enough,” he says. “You have a duty to the truth and not procedures, because we will not let you forget.”
Mussilhy closes with a poem by his uncle, which includes the line “Remember my presence after my departure.”
Updated
Here’s a summary of what’s happened so far on second day of the inquiry.
- The second counsel to the inquiry, Bernard Richmond, has apologised after distressing images of people trapped in the fire were played without a warning about the content. Several people attending the inquiry left the room in tears, and at least one person required medical help.
- The inquiry heard powerful accounts of the night of the fire by Hisam Chocair, who lost six members of his family in the blaze. He said: “I don’t see this as a tragedy, I see it as an atrocity, because essentially there is segregation between the rich and the poor … My family should still be here.”
- Chair of the inquiry, Sir Martin Moore-Bick, was presented with a copy of a painting of Grenfell Tower by artist Damel Carayol, a relative of victims Mary Mendy and Khadija Saye. A similar image of the work, entitled Eyesore, Final Straw, was presented to Theresa May earlier this month.
- Debbie Lemprell had complained that the regeneration of Grenfell was a ‘nightmare’ before she was killed in the fire. Her mother Miriam said there were problems with the electricity and heating and her daughter was upset about having a boiler behind a door in a corridor. Problems with the lifts made access to the 16th-floor flat difficult, she said.
- Resha Ibrahim, who lost her sister Rania and two nieces, said she still had questions about the fire. In a statement, she said: “There were months of uncertainty before they were identified and buried. To this day the questions remain in my mind and plague me about what exactly happened. It is very important for me to take part in the process of questions of finding out the truth.” Resha also revealed that she still sends text messages to her dead sister.
- The widower of Pily Burton, the 72nd victim of the fire, who died in January, claimed that her stress and dementia were worsened by a leasehold dispute with the council. He said the fire took away her dignity and all the couple’s possessions, but that she remained “perfect”.
Updated
“How is it possible to sum up all these lives, of all these people who have been taken away from us?” asked Hisam Choucair of the Inquiry. “We are broken.”
I put together the Guardian’s tributes to the Choucairs, published last week and based on interviews with the three girls’ teachers, and colleagues of their parents. The six Choucairs - Sirria, Nadia, Bassem, and their children Mierna, Fatima and Zaynab - were the biggest family group killed in Grenfell and I was really moved to hear more about their lives and background from Nadia’s brother Hisam and in the video featuring their sister Sawsan.
This was a family tightly woven into the fabric of their north Kensington neighbourhood - all six of them were well known, and are much missed at Avondale Park school, where Nadia worked and where Zaynab had joined the nursery on her third birthday just a month before she was killed. But they also had strong links with their country of origin, Lebanon, where Hisam described the house Bassem built in the family’s village “with his own hands”.
Hisam said his mother Sirria had prepared all her children “for what we would have to face in life’. She could never have imagined that her surviving children would have to face such overwhelming tragedy - or the fight for justice they are now embarked on.
Headteacher Katy Blackler described how one day when Bassem arrived at school on his bicycle and was asked if he was there to collect his daughters, he said ‘I’m here to collect my beautiful wife’. It’s one of the phrases that’s stayed with me.
The loss of so many people is just devastating. How brave their relatives are to speak so openly.
'Medical emergency' after harrowing film shown
A film shown about the Choucairs has caused considerable distress in the inquiry room. It showed distressing images of people trapped in the building as it burned and around 20 people got up and left the room, some breaking down in tears and wailing.
Outside in the foyer one person is having what appears to be a panic attack and is being assisted by one of the counsellors and several other people.
The counsel to the inquiry has described is as “a medical emergency”. The counsel to the inquiry has had to stop the film as a result of this. Even as someone not directly affected by the fire the images were shocking, so survivors’ reaction are completely understandable.
The counsel to the inquiry, Bernard Richmond, had said he would warn people if images of fire or the building were about to be shown but has admitted that he forgot.
Paramedics are now here treating the woman who collapsed and she seems to have gathered her composure and is being counselled in an anteroom.
It was felt very quickly that the content of the film was too much for some people and there were pockets of commotion around the auditorium as people decided whether to leave or not.
But the film was allowed to run on for a couple of minutes. This feels like a difficult moment for the inquiry so early on. Emotions are still incredibly raw and there will be more distressing testimony to come in the weeks and months ahead. How that is handled is now sure to be reviewed by the inquiry team.
Updated
A statement by Nadia’s sister and Sirria’s daughter, Sawson Choucair, was read out by her lawyer. Sawson lived with her mother in flat 191 on the 22nd floor, just across from her sister’s flat at 193.
“I was never happy there myself but my mother loved being closed to Nadia and her grandchildren,” the statement said. Sirria also liked the view.
Sirria prayed five times a day, but struggled to get to the mosque. She was dedicated to her job at the Royal Marsden hospital where she got to know Pily Burton.
Sawson said her nieces were confident and the best behaved children. Respecting others was a family tradition, she said.
All the photos I had of the family were all taken away from us in the fire, she said.
Bassem was working on terrible pay in restaurant so I got him a job at M&S where I worked. He was quickly promoted and very strict with staff. But he made work fun for me.
During the fire Bassem said everything would be alright, because he was trained in fire safety.
She added: Everything has been taken away from me: my mum, my sister, the brother-in-law that I worked with every day, and my nieces. I lost everything I owned. This should not have happened. We do not want excuses. We demand justice for every single family. We are broken.
Updated
Hisam Choucair: 'I see it as an atrocity. They should still be here'
On the last day he visited the family to collect his children, Hisam Choucair said his sister was asleep. Zaynab, his three-year-old niece, had a headache. Fatima (11) and Mierna (13) talked to Hisam before he left.
Mierna loved Arabic and pop music and sport and was very artistic. She loved school and loved learning. She was very focused but in a very relaxed manner. She wanted to be either a doctor or a lawyer. She could not decide.
Hisam ended with this powerful passage:
On the night of the fire I received a call at around 2am. My brother told me to turn on the TV. I couldn’t believe it. I ran down their immediately. I found the building completely engulfed in flames.
Sawson [my sister] tried to call them, but now there was no signal. The phone was ringing and ringing. And we had to stand there for hours and hours, helpless, watching them all burn to death.
It was five months before we were able to bury them. We took them to the village where all our family are from. It was my mother’s wish to be buried next to my father who died had when they were in Lebanon. So now they are buried together: my mum, Nadia, Bassem, Fatima, Mierna and Zaynab on a little slope in a remote country cemetery. It is not like a cemetery here is more like a garden of peace.
My mum’s mother is still alive but she is unable to get about, unable to visit the grave of her daughter, granddaughter and three great-grandchildren. She is not coping very well.
I have not be able to grieve. It has been one thing after a another. In one night I lost half of my family. I feel like a stranger now. It has destroyed everything. I feel like part of me has been taken away.
When I look at the tower I have flashbacks. I know they are images in my head but I can see people behind those windows. Dying, trying to get out. So I keep busy.
It has already ruined many lives. The difficulties have caused huge upset within our remaining family. This inferno has split up families and smashed up their lives.
None of the counselling I receive can ever repair what has already been done ... I don’t see this as a tragedy, I see it as an atrocity, because essentially there is segregation between the rich and the poor. I think they call it a postcode lottery.
But I’m here to remember six lives. They were ordinary people, but they were also extraordinary people. They were my family, and they should still be here.
Updated
Hisam said his sister Nadia Choucair was the baby of the family but also a determined fighter, who always wanted to work with children.
She was loved by the parents, teachers and kids at Avondale Park primary school, where she worked.
She touched the many lives, Hisam said.
Her husband Bassem Choukair never took a day off work which he cycled to before five in the morning. Hisam got to know Bassem on walks in Lebanon.
Nadia loved the area around Grenfell and knew so many people through looking after their children. She loved where she lived but that all changed with the refurbishments. There were so many problems, he said. Problems with the lift meant that Hisam’s mother Sirria found it “virtually impossible to leave the building” and her 22nd floor flat. I always had a bad feeling about the building, Hisam said.
Hisam said Nadia and Bassem had saved a deposit to buy their flat.
But no bank would give them a mortgage as soon as they found out they were on the 22nd floor. This led me to believe that the banks were aware of something within high rise social housing that we were not aware of.”
His children were inseparable from their cousins. They were at staying at the 22nd floor Grenfell flat until 13 June, the day before the fire, because their mother was in hospital.
“If my wife had not been due out of hospital, they would be dead too.”
Updated
The inquiry heard a statement from Hisam Choucair who lost six close relatives in the fire: his mother, Sirria Choucair, his sister, Nadia Choucair, Nadia’s husband Bassem Choukair and their three daughters, Fatima, Zaynab and Mierra.
He started with a tribute to his mother. Sirria was good friends with Pily Burton, who also died in the fire, Hisam said. His mother was a great cook of Lebanese and English food. His favourite was courgette stuffed with yoghurt and mint.
Every day we would wake up to the smell of delicious food, he said. She then went to work and would return to do more housework. No one worked harder, Hisam said.
Because she couldn’t go to university, education was very important to her. She worked hard to send all her children to private school, he added: “Because she had not had the opportunity, she wanted it for us.” She brought them up to work hard, to be considerate, to be kind and to respect other people and other cultures.
Her husband died 13 years ago, aged 52. This was a huge strain on her. And her arthritis made eventually made it impossible for her to work.
She devoted herself to looking after her grandchildren. She was not just a grandmother but a mother to Zaynab, Hisam said.
“My mum was a proud, devout woman, who never said a bad word about anyone. She was kind and caring and I will miss her for ever.”
Updated
Moore-Bick presented with ‘Eyesore: the final store’
Damel Carayol, an artist and another cousin of Mary Mendy and Khadija Saye, presented Sir Martin Moore-Bick with copy of a painting he made of Grenfell Tower. It is entitled Eyesore. Final Straw and includes words by Moore-Bick.
Reading the inscription, Carayol said: “To Sir Martin Moore-Bick. ‘Work until truth is laid bare’, to quote your words, sir. Do it for humanity, do it led by love. It signed by myself, Damel, family and Grenfell community.”
He added: “This is just a gift to yourself to keep in the foremost of our minds what we are really here for. We are here for humanity. If we don’t care, take our eye off the ball, something like this can happen. It comes from a good place.”
Moore-Bick thanked Carayol for the work. He said: “Damel, thank you very much for your copy of a very fine work, with personal observations attached. I’m very pleased to be able to accept it on behalf of myself but more particularly on behalf of my whole inquiry team. As I have said more than once, we shall work until the truth is laid bare. Thank you very much indeed.”
Moore-Bick looked more pleased to receive the image than Theresa May was when Carayol presented her with a similar gift earlier this month.
Updated
Ambrose Mendy talked about listening to the words “love and fire” being used in a different context at the royal wedding last Saturday.
He ended his tribute by saying:
To Mary and Khadija to all those who lost family and friends. To all those who are gathered here today to try to make a change. You are making a change. A change has been made.
The Grenfell Tower inquiry heard more tributes to people who died in the fire, as the emotional process of commemorations continued to reveal the lives of those who called the tower home and stitch together a picture of a highly integrated, happy and now devastated community.
The last of 72 people to die as a result of the June 2017 disaster, a Spanish-born health worker, an Egyptian mother and her two daughters and a 45-year-old British woman who worked at Holland Park opera were all remembered on the second day of the inquiry on Tuesday at the Millennium Gloucester hotel in Kensington.
First to contribute was Miriam Lamprell, the mother of Debbie Lamprell, 45, who lived on the 16th floor of Grenfell tower. Miriam was present, but her statement was read by Michael Volpe, the director of the opera where Debbie worked. She described her daughter’s happy childhood, sledging with friends and picking blackberries with her father Reg, and her anguish that she had urged her to get a council flat because it would be safer than a private bedsit.
Clarrie Mendy, the cousin of Mary Mendy, said that if she had stayed in Gambia she would still be alive today.
I pray you never died in vain, she said.
Clarrie then read a poem she wrote for her cousins. It was greeted with applause.
Another cousin, boxing promoter Ambrose Mendy, also read a poem he wrote for Mary Mendy and Khadija Saye. “We need healing and assurance that it will not happen again,” it said.
It ended saying: “May your souls rest in eternal peace dear Mary sister aunty, cousin, friend and neighbour, and Khadija daughter, niece, cousin, friend and neighbour. As we continue to seek the truth and respect for Grenfell. Gone but not forgotten.”
A statement from Pa Sarr, the brother of Mary Mendy and uncle of Khadija Saye, is read to the inquiry.
My sister showed me the sights of London. She was excellent tour guide. She was also an excellent cook and her food reminded me of our youth in Gambia.
When I heard about the fire at Grenfell, I was full of dread. When I found out that both Mary and Khadija were missing, I was devastated. I cannot come to terms with their loss. They were such lovely women. I can’t stop thinking about them and I don’t want to.
Their funeral was so packed that hundreds of people had to wait outside. They both died too soon and both had so much more to live for.
Updated
Grenfell inquiry holds a minute's silence for the Manchester Arena victims
The inquiry resumed with a minute’s silence for the victims of the Manchester Arena bombing last year. Sir Martin Moore-Bick invited everyone to stand for the silence.
Updated
While we wait for the inquiry to resume at 2pm, it’s worth highlighting a passage from Miriam Lamprell’s tribute to her daughter Debbie about the regeneration of Grenfell.
In her statement she talked about her concerns about Debbie housing before she moved in.
I was worried about her living in the bedsits. It really wasn’t appropriate for someone in her 30s. The conditions weren’t good and I used to badger her to put her name down with the council to get somewhere proper to live, somewhere safe and decent. Of course it feels terrible to have done that now, because she was given the flat in Grenfell.
Her mother added:
She loved her flat and she kept it lovely but the refurbishment became a nightmare. She had problems with the electricity, problems with the heating. She was very upset about having the boiler in the corridor right when you opened the front door. But I used to think at least when I go she’s got a roof over her head.
She would have me over to stay with her often for a week at at time. But recently as my legs got worse it was difficult to visit. The problems with the lifts made it not very nice to be in there when Debbie was at work, because you couldn’t get out easily.
When so many people have been killed, the destruction of possessions can seem relatively unimportant. But some objects mean a huge amount to people - Pily Burton’s parents’ ashes, referred to in her husband Nicholas Burton’s love-filled tribute this morning, are an example. Their loss, he said, deeply distressed her. Pily died in January, making her the disaster’s 72nd victim.
Last year I met another survivor, Adriana Zymberaj, who described how she lost all her stuff in the war in Kosovo in the 1990s, before coming to London and building a new life here.
Now she had lost everything - all her mementoes of her former life, all her photos of her parents and her children - all over again. Her son, she said, cried and cried in their hotel room about the loss of his toys and his bed. Another survivor lost a t-shirt belonging to her father - that she kept after his death because it held his smell.
It made me realise how much even those who escaped the fire had taken from them.
An incredibly moving filmed interview of Rasha was played to the inquiry. She mothered her sister Rania who was four years younger, according to the subtitled film.
The sisters played and fought together and when they made pizzas they got covered in flour after throwing it at each other. She also recalled a food fight involving eggs.
Later the sisters would communicate over Skype while Rania was cooking in London and share culinary tips.
The sisters went to the same school and then worked in the same pharmacy together, Rasha recalled.
Rania loved learning new things including when she moved to London.
The filmed showed Rasha scrolling through her phone looking at pictures of Rania. She also showed a gold bracelet that Rania had given her in 2014.
She was like her mother in looks and generosity, Rasha said. “I hear her voice in my head all the time,” she said. “Sometimes I speak to her now and I hear her voice replying. Usually whenever I got angry she would calm down. I still write to her and talk to her all the time even though she’s departed.”
The film showed a copy of a text message Resha had sent to Rania six months after her death. It said: “Rania, I am pregnant. I am so happy that this might be a reason for me to be close to you ... if I have a boy, I will call him Khattab like you wanted my love and if it’s a boy I will either call her Rania or Hania.
In her last comments in the film Rasha said:
“She used to love live so much, she was all about being positive and active. She was happiness walking on earth. No one would sit with Rania and not smile. As soon as I spoke to her on the phone. If felt It got positive energy I needed to continue with life. Now that I’ve lost that. I feel older and weaker. I feel broken.”
After the video Moore-Bick said there would be a break until 2pm.
Updated
A statement by Rasha Ibrahim about her sister Rania Ibrahim, read by an interpreter, demanded answers about her death and the death of her two daughters Hania Hassan and Fethia Hassan.
She also talked about the trauma of “false hopes and rumours” about the family when they were missing.
It said:
Rania and I were born in Aswan a city on the banks of Nile to a large and loving family. In 2009 Rania moved to the UK while I stayed behind in Egypt. I felt her loss very keenly but we kept in close contact.
We both married in 2011. In 2012 Rania gave birth to her daughter Fethia. We always called her Fou-fou. My son Moaz was born just a few months later. In 2014 Rania had a second little daughter, Hania and then came to Egypt to attend our mother’s funeral in November that year.
In 2016 she visited Egypt twice in March and December for our brother Mahmoud’s wedding and for the birth of my little daughter Sedra. Then in January 2017 she had to go back to London with the children. That was the last time I saw them in person.
It is very difficult for me to think or talk about what came next. It has been so hard. After that terrible night came a cruel time of false hopes and rumours.
I came here thinking I would be able to lay my loved ones to rest but there were then months of uncertainty before they were identified and buried. To this day the questions remain in my mind and plague me about what exactly happened. It is very important for me to take part in the process of questions of finding out the truth. It is so important for me to understand how it could come about that I have lost Rania, my beloved sister, while my children, who are still so young have lost their little cousins. I cannot lay them to rest yet.
Updated
Seraphima Kennedy, who once worked as a housing officer in Kensington and Chelsea, was at the inquiry yesterday. In an opinion piece for the Guardian she says the pen portraits of the victims should be “required viewing” for everyone involved - including the prime minister.
That was a desperately sad and eloquent presentation on behalf of Debbie Lamprell’s mother, who didn’t shy away from pointing out how badly the refurbishment of Grenfell Tower was handled.
Debbie was extremely upset by having her boiler just inside the front door of her flat, she said, while failing lifts made it difficult to get out - meaning in recent years she had not been able to visit her daughter as often as they both would have liked.
Before she got her flat there, Debbie had lived in bedsits and her mother clearly felt she deserved better.
There is a ‘Hope for Grenfell’ fundraising gala at Holland Park Opera on June 13 – the eve of the disaster’s anniversary – in memory of Debbie Lamprell and the fire’s other victims, in aid of the Rugby Portobello Trust.
Debbie wasn’t the only Grenfell Tower resident to work in Holland Park; Berkti Haftom also worked there, in the cafe.
Updated
Nicholas Burton, paid tribute to his wife Maria del Pilar Burton, known as Pily, who died in January and was named as the 72nd victim on the eve of the opening of the inquiry.
He recalled meeting Pily at a disco. She was flamboyant, knew everybody, and loved dancing, Burton said. He thought she was out of his league because she was so much older.
Pily was born in the 1940s in Galicia in north-west Spain to a naval family, her husband said. She was brought up with the children of family friends who went on to become academics.
When the family moved to London she picked up in English quickly and spoke it without an accent.
She had son Victor, by her first marriage.
After her first marriage broke down Burton said he moved into Pily’s flat “sock by sock”. They were together for 34 years and enjoyed listening to Galician music together.
She also loved reggae music and danced to everything. Her parents treated Nicholas like a son. Her son Victor was a year older than Pily’s new husband but accepted him into the family too.
Pily was big friends with Debbie Lamprell, who also died in the fire. The pair loved nattering together, Nicholas said. She knew everyone on Portobello market. “I don’t know why she chose me, but we were never apart,” Burton said.
“She had class and style, and just knew what worked,” he added. “I loved my wife and was in complete awe of her. She wasn’t a princess or anything. She was just a people person.”
She worked as contract manager in hospitals around London, Burton said.
She was extremely proud of her son, her grandchildren and great grandchildren, he said. When she became sick the family nursed her together.
Burton was with her, holding her hand, when she died. Her brother was killed in road accident before her death. “I’m not sure she ever recovered,” he said.
She suffered from dementia after the couple came back from a holiday. It was a terrible blow for her to give up work and not be surrounded by friends, Burton said.
The couple bought their flat in 1994 and were in a leasehold dispute with the council and the TMO during the refurbishment of the tower. This added to her stress, he said.
Nicholas and Pily were watching a DVD when the fire broke out. We had to wait to be rescued, he said. Pily was carried out by four firefighters. Burton was convinced she was dead, but said she “miraculously” survived. He was suffering from smoke inhalation and was in a panic about his wife who was being treated at the Royal Free in Hampstead. She was in a “terrible state” her body was “cut and bruised all over”. The trauma had a terrible affect on her dementia. He said: our dog was gone and many friends were missing. Her parents ashes were also destroyed in the fire.
Burton had heart surgery after his injuries. He talked about the difficulty of nursing her when he was also suffering from the trauma of the fire. Pily had a stroke late last year and there was nothing doctors could do, he said.
Pily took her last breath as her son Victor entered her room. Burton said: “I am truly blessed that I had 34 years with such a person. It was wonderful. My wife used to tell me don’t worry about it. She loved Bob Marley’s Three Little Birds.”
She was cremated in Ladbroke Grove. Firefighters laid white roses on her coffin. “There were hundreds of people there all wearing colourful outfits,” he said.
Burton ended by saying:
She was a unique beautiful, exceptional person, that this tragedy has taken away. It took away her dignity, everything that we had in this world. But no matter what indignities my wife had to suffer, my Pily was perfect.
He then broke down in tears to applause from the inquiry.
Moore-Bick thanked him for his statement. He said: “That was a very moving tribute and I feel very privileged to have heard it.”
The inquiry was then shown video footage and photographs of Pily.
Updated
After the video the second counsel to the inquiry, Bernard Richmond QC, asked for a minute’s break.
The inquiry is settling into a second day and the culture of this extraordinary event is become more evident. Presiding is the soft spoken and thoughtful Richmond who has asked people to call him Bernie.
Milling around are several ushers in long black cloaks and people wearing attractive green and orange scarves. These are the counsellors from a mental health charity who are here to support the bereaved and survivors of the fire.
There are three every day and the idea is that the scarf means anyone needing help can seek them out easily.
The inquiry was played video footage from a memorial service for Debbie Lamprell in Holland Park.
A choir sang a moving rendition of Amazing Grace at the event.
Her mother Miriam Lamprell watched the hymn from a bench where Debbie would sit. She was comforted at the end and thanked the choir.
Second day opens with tribute to Debbie Lamprell
At the start of the second day Michael Volpe, director of Holland Park Opera, read out a tribute to Debbie Lamprell by her frail mother Miriam Lamprell.
She had a whale of a time as a child growing up in Highams Park, north east London, her mother recalled. She complained of being asked to come in from playing early because she loved people so much, the statement said. She took ballet and tap dance lessons as a child and like sport.
Debbie was a big Spurs fan and loved watching the team with her dad Reg, who was a painter and decorator. “She was his treasure and she felt the same about him,” Miriam said. They also liked going blackberry picking together.
Debbie got the idea of living in north Kensington when she visited museums in London, her mother said.
She loved her Grenfell flat but the refurbishment became a “nightmare”, her mother recalled. The death of her father Reg brought Debbie closer to her mother, the statement said. She would frequently text her mother at night. Her mother also frequently stayed at the Grenfell flat but the lift in the building made it difficult for her to stay.
Debbie loved exploring new places and travelled all over the world, including to Sri Lanka, Miriam said. She was happy with her friends, her job and her neighbours. Her neighbours knew she was home because they could hear the laughter of Debbie and her friends.
At the funeral one of Debbie’s friends told her mother “you would not believed how many people loved her,” she recalled. Her mother expressed gratitude at a stone step being laid in Holland Park in Debbie’s memory.
The statement added: “I am bereft without her. If she had a normal death I would have been able to comfort her. A part of me has been ripped out.”
Debbie texted her mother on the night of the fire to say she was home safely and said “God bless”.
Her mother statement: “I am an old woman with nothing left. I am completely blessed to have had her as a daughter.”
Updated
When proceedings get underway in the next few minutes you should be able to watch a live stream from the inquiry’s YouTube.
The stream will go live at 10am https://t.co/c452jAXyzI
— Grenfell Inquiry (@grenfellinquiry) May 22, 2018
The inquiry has updated today’s programme to include a further tribute to Mary Mendy who was commemorated on Monday along with her daughter the photographer Khadija Saye.
In a statement read to the inquiry yesterday her niece Marion Telfer said: “My aunt was my hero. She has been in my life for every major event. She was my mum as well as my aunt.”
An updated programme for today's commemorative hearing. pic.twitter.com/t6rHk14oeB
— Grenfell Inquiry (@grenfellinquiry) May 22, 2018
Grenfell survivor Eddie Daffarn, who a wrote a now famous blogpost warning of the risk of tragic fire months before it happened, has given a 30-minute broadcast interview to Channel 4 News.
He recounts how he was rescued by a fireman from his 16th floor flat. “Three breaths later and I wouldn’t have been there,” Daffarn said.
He said survivors were told to “go home” by emergency workers after the fire. He said he felt “alone and abandoned by the state, but not by the community”.
The head of the construction company behind the refurbishment of Grenfell Tower has said his firm did not test the cladding because it was thought to comply with regulations, PA reports.
Robert Bond, chief executive of Rydon, was questioned by BBC Panorama about the £8.6m regeneration project, which saw new cladding and windows installed at Grenfell, before the fire killed 72 people last June.
Asked by reporter Richard Bilton if he knew the cladding was “cheap and dangerous”, Bond replied: “No, no it wasn’t. But look, honestly, now is not the time, I’m with my family.”
When it was suggested it was his job to make Grenfell Tower safe, he said: “We did because we put the cladding that was specified up by Kensington and Chelsea council.
“It was approved by building control, it was approved by the local authority, it was approved by the architect.”
He denied the firm was required to do any testing on the cladding, saying: “No, we didn’t do any testing because we are not required, it was deemed to comply. We would work to the regulatory framework.”
Asked if he felt the Grenfell work was within that, he added: “Absolutely 100%.”
In the programme broadcast on Monday night, Rydon did not take any responsibility for the fire.
“I think it’s a terrible tragedy, an absolute terrible tragedy and my heart goes out to them,” he said.
The company previously said the partial refurbishment it completed in summer 2016 met all required building regulations, as well as fire regulations and health and safety standards.
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The second day will start with tributes to Debbie Lamprell, a 45-year-old opera lover who lived on the 16th floor.
On the night of the fire, Lamprell reportedly texted her mother at about 11.30pm to say she had got home safely. She was identified by dental records after her remains were found on the 23rd floor. In a statement, her mother, who asked not to be named, said Debbie was a “wonderful, precious daughter, always smiling and helping others”.
Her funeral was attended by former school friends, according to Michael Volpe, general director of Opera Holland Park, where she worked. “Debbie was still close to people she grew up with; they’d stayed friends. She was just an incredibly nice person.”
He told the Guardian: “She knew everyone; all the singers knew her, all the orchestra knew her. Everyone loved her because she was so chirpy, and she remembered things. She’d ask after someone’s mum, or their children.”
Then the inquiry ill hear about Maria del Pilar Burton, known as Pily, who was rescued on the night of the fire but who suffered from previous health complications, remained in hospital for months and died on 29 January.
She was finally recognised as the 72nd victim of the fire on the eve of the public inquiry.
She was 74 and lived on the 19th floor of the 24-storey block.
Her husband wrote in a statement: “Pily was well known in our community, she was what people call a real character. A character in the best sense of the word – she was flamboyant, colourful, passionate and friendly.”
Before the Choucair family the inquiry will hear commemorations to Rania Ibrahim and her two young daughters Hania Hassan (3) and Fethia Hassan (5), who all lived on 23rd floor.
Originally from Aswan in southern Egypt, Rania was the youngest of five girls. She settled in the UK in 2009 after meeting her husband, Hassan Hassan.
He was in Cairo at the time of the fire owing to his brother’s ill health. He watched footage his wife posted online showing that the tower had caught fire.
One of her sisters Rasha said Rania recounted a dream about the tower a month before the fire. Rasha told the Guardian: “She dreamt that her parents were on different levels of the building. She heard them asking her to go to a higher floor. She believed this meant she will be in a higher place in heaven. Then she laughed.”
Rasha believes her sister was reticent to finish decorating her flat because she felt something bad would happen there, “as if she sensed the danger”.
The second day will close with a tribute to Hesham Rahman, a 57-year-old Egyptian who lived on the 23rd floor for almost five years.
“He was so proud of that flat,” his nephew Karim Mussilhy told the Guardian. “I remember when he first got it – all the furniture he bought, and how much effort he put into decorating.”
Rahman’s extended family has longstanding links to the area around the tower and he was thrilled to get an apartment on the top floor.
Born in Cairo, Rahman emigrated to the UK aged 18 with his aunt and her husband, who cared for him after he became estranged from his father’s family.
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Second day to hear tributes to the Choucair family
The second day will hear tributes to the Choucair family who lost six members from three generations, according to a running order of today’s proceedings published by the inquiry.
Zaynab Choucair, who at aged three was one of the youngest victims of the fire, died alongside her sisters Fatima (11) and Mierna (13) and their mother Nadia Choucair, father Bassem Choukair and their grandmother Sirria Choucair.
The programme for today's commemorative hearing. A link to the stream will be posted at 9:45. pic.twitter.com/qdreZClyEP
— Grenfell Inquiry (@grenfellinquiry) May 22, 2018
Welcome to our live coverage of the second day of the public inquiry into the Grenfell Tower fire.
After a harrowing opening day of tributes to six of the victims, today is unlikely to be any easier for those people involved and those listening in, as more commemorations are read out by families and their representatives.
Transcripts of the opening day have been published on the inquiry’s website.
Sir Martin Moore-Bick, the retired judge who is chairing the inquiry, said the tributes were an integral part of the process. “They will remind us of its fundamental purpose and the reason why it is so important that the truth be laid bare,” he said in his opening remarks on Monday.
Today is likely to be longer than the opening day. It is due to start earlier at 10am and finish later at around 4pm.
The commemorations, taking place at the conference centre at the Millennium Gloucester hotel in South Kensington, central London, are expected to continue until the end of next week. No time limit has been imposed for the tributes, with some expected to be as short as a few minutes and others lasting up to an hour.
After the tributes, the inquiry will move on to Holborn Bars, in the legal heart of London, and begin examining the night of the fire itself and the response of emergency services.
The Guardian’s portraits of the all 72 people who died in the fire are being updated each day of the commemorations as more details emerge about them.
