Former tenants of Westminster council have demanded a fuller investigation into a decision to house them in asbestos-riddled flats in the 1980s.
The calls come amid a row over whether Barry Legg, who was chief whip at Westminster at the time, should resign as Conservative party chief executive now that his connection to the scandal has arisen.

Jonathan Rosenberg, former leader of the Walterton & Elgin Community Homes Tenants' Group, said the details that have emerged in the past week over a secret committee's decision to house homeless people in the two 22-storey blocks did not properly expose the findings of previous inquiries into the procedures followed by Westminster council.

He is to call on the district auditor, John McGill, to compile a "public interest report", which he says will show "the full picture". The deadline for doing this, set by the auditor, is 15 May.

Rosenberg said: "The decision to house people in these flats was so appalling that there has to be a public interest report produced by the auditor.

"This has to acknowledge all the work done by John Barratt [who conducted a previous inquiry on behalf of the council] and set out the facts to say 'this is who was involved and this is what they did'."

Barratt's 642-page report, published in 1996, concluded that it was "abundantly clear" that senior councillors knew the blocks were in a bad condition with an asbestos problem.

Calls for Legg's resignation have been prompted not only by the asbestos row but also by reports linking him to Westminster's homes-for-votes scandal of the 1980s, in which homes were allocated in order to influence voting in marginal wards.

He is also the subject of controversy among Conservatives because his appointment just three months ago was made by party leader Iain Duncan Smith without the approval of the party board.

Source

Housing Today