Kensington and Chelsea Council has outlined how it intends to spend more than £150 million into finding homes for survivors and victims of the Grenfell Tower fire .
Speaking ahead of a senior leadership team meeting next week, council leader Elizabeth Campbell said the money would be spent on buying and building housing, and is on top of the £80m already spent on the response.
Her comments come after Communities Secretary Sajid Javid told MPs the council was aiming to have all former residents of Grenfell Tower moved out of emergency hotel accommodation by Christmas , unless they want to stay.
Grenfell rehousing in the news
Cllr Campbell said: “ Grenfell is a humanitarian and housing crisis on an unprecedented scale.
"The council has already invested over £80m in response, but we will need to spend an additional £155m on buying and building housing.
“These sums are vast, but it is right that we do all we can to help those in need.
“To put this into context, we will be spending more on the recovery than the Government has promised to invest in housing across the entire UK in one quarter.
“We are committed to securing at least 300 new homes by Christmas, and 400 by the end of next year.”
She revealed plans to move North Kensington Library have been ditched following feedback from the community, which will allow £17m to be channelled straight into recovery efforts.
Cllr Campbell continued: “We will also be using £20m from our Section 106 funds to keep many council projects and services on track and over £10m from our parking funds to help fund highways projects.
“We remain in discussion with Government on the overall funding for the Grenfell response and we will continue to review our finances to see where funding can be put back in for capital projects in future.”
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