Reform UK’s housing spokesperson sacked after comments made about Grenfell in Inside Housing interview

Problems of delays at the Building Safety Regulator are well documented, and there is cross-party interest in ensuring the regulator is working properly.

Mr Dudley’s comments came after the Regulator of Social Housing published statistics showing that 1,924 social housing blocks taller than 11 metres still have “life-critical fire safety” defects relating to their exterior walls.

In the interview, Inside Housing asked whether Grenfell was not an awful warning about insufficient regulation. “That was a tragedy. It was a failure,” Mr Dudley told our deputy editor, Jess McCabe.

He continued: “Sadly, you know, everyone dies in the end. It’s just how you go, right?” he said.

Not long after the interview was published, the Grenfell Next of Kin group of victims’ families posted on X: “Dudley and Reform should apologise to the next of kin of the deceased.

“Worse than what he thinks and said, is the oxygen of publicity such vile, ignorant speech gets. The next of kin of those killed in the fire are torn between responding or not giving it the dignity of a response.

“The death of our parents, partners, children, siblings, grandparents and grandchildren in the most horrific circumstances was gross negligent manslaughter, NOT fate.

“Dudley has made Reform’s position crystal clear: safety is inconvenient, regulation is a nuisance, and death is just one of those things. His idea of ‘balance’ is relaxed... as long as it’s not his family on the wrong side of it. Nothing says leadership like shrugging at preventable deaths.”

Grenfell United posted: “Our loved ones did not simply ‘die’. They were failed. They were trapped in their homes, in a building that should have been safe, in a fire that should never have happened.

“Reducing their deaths to an inevitability strips away the truth: this was preventable.

“To speak about Grenfell in this way is to erase responsibility. It suggests this was just fate, just ‘how it goes’, rather than the result of years of ignored warnings, poor decisions, and a failure to value the lives of residents, and is deeply offensive and ill informed.

“Everyone deserves the right to a safe home. But this attitude clearly show Simon Dudley is not the man to ensure that happens.”

Prime minister Sir Keir Starmer also took to X to condemn the remarks. He said: “Shameful. Nigel Farage should do the decent thing and sack him.”

In response to the backlash, Mr Dudley said: “Grenfell was an utter tragedy and quite rightly prompted a wholesale review and tightening of fire regulations.

“I said it was a tragedy in my interview with Inside Housing and in no shape or form am I belittling that disaster or the huge loss of life. It must never happen again. I reiterate that, and am sorry if it was not sufficiently clear. 

“Within the last 24 hours, the Berkeley Group, one of Britain’s biggest house builders, has paused new land purchases and announced a hiring freeze. They blame ‘an unprecedented surge in costs and regulation’.

“These concerns are felt across the industry. The result? The UK’s long-running housing crisis is getting worse.

“To address the national housing crisis, we must ensure that regulation remains safe, sensible and proportionate. My concern is the introduction of numerous measures that do nothing to protect life and are throttling housebuilding.”