Death toll climbs to 10 after fire in Spanish apartment complex with questions raised over how blaze spread so quickly

Experts said building’s cladding, similar to that used in London’s Grenfell Tower, may have been to blame for the fire’s ferocity



Firefighters work at the burned building in Valencia, Spain yesterday. Photo: AP

Huge apartment block fire in Spain kills 9 people

People look at an apartment building where a fire occurred, in Valencia, Spain, on Feb 23, 2024.
PHOTO: Reuters

PUBLISHED ON FEBRUARY 23, 2024

VALENCIA, Spain - At least nine people were killed by a huge fire that ripped through an apartment block in an affluent district of Spain's third largest city, Valencia, authorities said on Friday (Feb 23).

The blaze, fanned by strong winds, engulfed the block in Valencia's El Campanar district within half an hour on Thursday evening, witnesses said.

Still shaken, one of the surviving residents, 53-year-old Jose Carlos Perez, told Reuters he grabbed what he could and rushed out of his 12th floor apartment after he saw smoke outside his window.

"Physically, I'm dressed, but inside I'm naked because I have nothing, because everything I had was there," Perez, who lived alone, said as he stood outside the SH Valencia Palace hotel, where more than 100 survivors like himself are being temporarily housed.

Firefighters with masks and oxygen tanks worked their way through the charred building on Friday looking for bodies or survivors. Valencia Mayor Maria Jose Catala said later in the day that there were no more missing people.

On Friday evening, authorities confirmed on X police had revised the number of dead to nine from 10 in the process of identifying the bodies in the building.

Two firefighters suffered serious injuries and were hospitalised.

Valencians flocked to donate clothes, medicines and toys for surviving residents who lost all their belongings in the fire.

The director of the SH Valencia Palace hotel, Javier Valles, said they were temporarily housing 110 people and a regional official said they would receive money for daily costs. The majority of survivors are staying with relatives.

"People were very affected...the least we could do was help," Valles said.

'Lost everything'

A general view of an apartment building where a fire occurred in Valencia, Spain, on Feb 23, 2024.
PHOTO: Reuters

Visiting the scene on Friday, Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said residents "had lost everything in a matter of minutes in this terrible fire".

Emergency services said the fire began on the fourth floor of one of the towers but gave no cause. A local magistrate has opened an investigation into the blaze.

Esther Puchades, a representative of insurance inspection agency APCAS, told RTVE that a lack of firewalls and use of the plastic material polyurethane on the facade would have contributed to the rapid spread of the blaze, a comment evoking memories of the deadly Grenfell Tower fire in London in 2017.

The association for the polyurethane industry said in a statement no polyurethane was used in the building's cladding.

Emergency services work at the scene of a fire of apartment building in Valencia, Spain, on Feb 22, 2024.
PHOTO: Reuters file

A 2007 promotional video by the building's developers highlighted the "innovative aluminium material" used to clad the building's exterior, which passed "rigorous quality checks". It did not mention polyurethane.

The spread of the 2017 fire in the Grenfell Tower block in west London that killed 71 people after an electrical fault was blamed on the use of highly flammable external cladding.

Dental experts headed to Valencia from other parts of Spain to help identify charred bodies, while police collected DNA samples from relatives for the same purpose. An acrid smell hung in the air at the site of the fire.

Panicked residents had rushed to balconies to plead for help as burning embers fell to the ground during the fire. At least two people were rescued from their balconies on cranes.

The building, comprising two towers linked by what its developers described as a "panoramic lift", was completed in 2008, officials said. It had 138 apartments, newspaper El Pais reported.

Residents of another block of flats in Valencia by the same developers expressed concern over the materials used on their own building and urged authorities to investigate.

"Everyone is very worried," said 42-year-old resident Andrea Martinez, saying she would leave Valencia over the weekend as she needed to "disconnect" from what happened. "Things don't happen until they do."

Valencia decreed three days of mourning, cancelled local football matches and suspended the start of the city's month-long, annual "Fallas" festival which features the torching of large cardboard statues and a fireworks display.

ALSO READ: Spanish firefighters battle blaze engulfing apartment building in Valencia

UK

Social housing activist compelled to decline MBE as crisis ‘should not exist’

Hannah Cottrell, PA
Sat, June 17, 2023 



An activist who highlights the health and safety of tenants living in social housing across the UK said he has been “compelled” to decline an offer to become an MBE.

Kwajo Tweneboa, 24, took to social media to say he was offered an MBE last month, but made the decision to decline it – saying he could not receive the title off the back of an issue which “should never have existed”.

Mr Tweneboa, from Mitcham, uses his online platform to highlight the issues of tenants living in social housing across the country, but he has also raised problems for those living in private and temporary accommodations.

Mr Tweneboa speaks out for tenants who feel their living conditions are unsafe, which can pertain to black mould, leaks, flooding, asbestos, pests and rodents, or other circumstances where they feel their rights are being challenged.

In a statement posted to Twitter, Mr Tweneboa said he felt “compelled” to turn down the offer, adding that some people across the UK are living in what he said could only be described as “slum conditions”.

Mr Tweneboa’s statement reads: “I want to start by thanking whoever chose to nominate me, as I have no doubt it came from a good place.

“So much grief and suffering has happened as a result of the poor state of Housing in the UK, with the vulnerable and poorest most ignored.

“Some living in, what can only be described as: slum conditions.

“On the 14th of June 2017, 72 innocent men, women and children, tragically – and prematurely – lost their lives in Grenfell Tower, through no fault of their own.

“A disaster that never should have happened.

“Since then, campaign groups like Grenfell United, Shelter and many others have stood side by side demanding systemic change.

“While brave tenants have shared their own experiences, in order to highlight the sheer lack of progress and accountability since Grenfell, many continue to suffer…

“Therefore, I cannot accept being honoured or receiving a title off the back of an issue, which realistically, should never have existed, and in saying that, I felt compelled to turn it down.”

Mr Tweneboa’s statement added that he has written to the Prince and Princess of Wales to inform them of his decision and to express his interest in working with them to raise awareness surrounding the social issues which he said cause “needless suffering to minority groups across the UK”.

He continued, saying he wished to acknowledge the Prince of Wales’ recent work surrounding homelessness.

“It can only be positive to see meaningful change across lots of other important Social issues, whilst giving a platform, an ear, and a hand to help those most ignored and neglected,” he wrote.

“Thanks to all who continue to support.”

In 2021, Mr Tweneboa was living in a council house in Mitcham with his two siblings.

At the time, he described the conditions to the PA news agency as being “unlivable” and “not even fit for animals”.

He said he was driven to share pictures on social media of his dilapidated housing out of sheer desperation, images which depicted his rotten kitchen, mouldy wallpaper and waterlogged cabinets.

The housing association responsible took action and as a result, the flat was repaired.

Since then, Mr Tweneboa has become a champion for those living in similar conditions up and down the country, prompting landlords and housing associations to take urgent action and make repairs.

Theresa May: I should have met Grenfell Tower survivors sooner



Former Prime Minister Theresa May (Hannah McKay /PA)

By Sam Hall, PA

Mon 27 May 2024 at 05:55


Former prime minister Theresa May has admitted in a documentary that she should have met Grenfell Tower survivors sooner after the 2017 fire.

Mrs May, who is standing down from Parliament at the election, also said she took responsibility for the Home Office’s hostile environment policies on immigration while she was Home Secretary.

The outgoing MP for Maidenhead described Donald Trump as an “unpredictable” president, adding that “unpredictability is difficult to deal with”.

Speaking during an ITV documentary on her 2016-2019 premiership, Mrs May said of initially not meeting survivors of the June 14 2017 blaze that claimed 72 lives: “I should have gone and met victims. I recognise that.”




More than 70 people died when the Grenfell Tower caught fire in June 2017 (Kirsty O’Connor/PA)

Her chief of staff, Gavin Barwell, told Theresa May: The Accidental Prime Minister, which will air on ITV1 at 10.25pm on Monday, that her team “got that call badly wrong”.

He added: “We served her very badly because it played on the perceptions that people already have from the election campaign, that she wasn’t comfortable with that kind of face-to-face contact.”

Discussing those caught up in the Windrush scandal, which followed her hostile environment policies while home secretary, Mrs May said: “Should we in the Home Office have had a greater sense of trying to identify whether there were other people, people who were going to get caught up in this way?

“I don’t believe that question was ever asked. And that’s what lay behind the problems.”


They, I think there were many Brexiteers who, not to put too fine a point on it, didn't like a Remainer being in charge of BrexitTheresa May, former prime minister

Asked if she was home secretary when this was the case, she said: “I was. And as home secretary, you take responsibility.”

Mrs May, who served as David Cameron’s home secretary between 2010 and 2016, also admitted that sending out vans with “Go home or face arrest” written on them as part of a Home Office advertising campaign in 2013 targeting illegal immigrants was “wrong”.

Ms May said: “It was wrong, and we stopped it. We realised after a short period of time that we needed to stop that.”


During the documentary, directed by Sam Collyns, Mrs May recounted the time Mr Trump took her hand while they walked outside the White House in 2017.

She said: “We literally were just walking along and he said, ‘There’s a little slope around the corner. Take care.’

“And I thought, well, it’s fine. My heels are not that high. I’ll be fine.

“And next thing I knew, he was holding my hand as we walked up, and of course, I wasn’t able to reclaim my hand before we got the television cameras of the world upon us.”

Mr Barwell said the “most disheartening conversation” with the former president was over the 2018 poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal in Salisbury, adding: “His initial reaction was, well, why should I do anything?”


In the documentary, Penny Mordaunt said she was told that a key part of Mrs May’s Brexit deal was already set in stone after being agreed with former German chancellor Angela Merkel before Cabinet went to Chequers in 2018 to discuss it.

Asked if she felt politically-damaging resignations from her Cabinet over Brexit were a betrayal, Mrs May said: “Politics is politics. People had a different view.

“They, I think there were many Brexiteers who, not to put too fine a point on it, didn’t like a Remainer being in charge of Brexit.”

Mrs May said comments made by her 2016 Conservative leadership election rival Dame Andrea Leadsom that being a mother made her a better candidate in comparison to the then-home secretary were “unfortunate”.

Former chancellor Sir Sajid Javid told the documentary that Mrs May’s 2017 election campaign, which attempted to highlight her “strong and stable” leadership, was “a total disaster from day one” – with the Conservatives ultimately losing their small overall majority at the polls.


Amber Rudd, Mrs May’s initial home secretary, said her reputation had been enhanced in comparison to the conduct of subsequent prime ministers.

Ms Rudd said: “Given what’s followed, her reputation is enhanced.

“I didn’t know at the time that truth and decency wasn’t always going to be part of a prime minister’s make-up.”

Former home secretary Suella Braverman told the documentary: “I think history will remember Theresa as a dedicated public servant – who was probably in the wrong job at the wrong time.”

How do epidemics spread and persist before and after introduction of a vaccine?

Modeling 40 years of measles dynamics demonstrates the complexity of epidemic spread and the impact of vaccination

PENN STATE

CAPTION

Illustration of the observed measles epidemics in cities and towns of Enland and Wales from 1944-94 (vertical Z-axis represents the timeline) for the largest locations. New research reveals that, prior to the introduction of the measles vaccine, transmission patterns were likely driven by periodic epidemics from both large population centers CREDIT: MAX S. Y. LAU

In the most detailed study to date of epidemic spread, an international team of researchers has modeled measles dynamics based on over 40 years of data collected in England and Wales. The models--which span the prevaccination period, introduction of measles vaccination, and local elimination by vaccination in the 1990s--reveal that, before the introduction of a vaccine, measles could persist in both large population centers and by spread among sets of smaller towns. The study also provides critical data on the importance of spatial modeling for the long-term control of global epidemics and could help inform the long-term public health response to the current COVID-19 pandemic.

A paper describing the study appears April 27, 2020 in the journal Nature Ecology & Evolution.

"During the last 20 years there have been tremendous inroads towards eradicating measles--one of the major killers of children globally--as annual deaths have been driven down from more than a million to less than 200,000," said Ottar N. Bjørnstad, Distinguished Professor of Entomology and Biology at Penn State and one of the leaders of the research team. "However, previous efforts to eradicate smallpox and polio highlight the complexity of moving from local control to global eradication. Our study provides critical data on how long-term control efforts will need both general and detailed spatial models to finally stop this deadly disease."

Prior to the introduction of a vaccine, the number of measles cases in England and Wales would undergo, periodic--often biennial--epidemics. This pattern, driven by herd immunity, is common among a number of diseases and in other locales. The researchers sought to locate the reservoirs where the virus persists in the dips between epidemics, which are the sources for reintroduction of the virus into the general populace in the next major epidemic. This persistence question is central to understanding the dynamics of measles and other viral diseases and for coordinating public health interventions.

The research team combined spatial modeling with the detailed historical data of measles cases in England and Wales to address these questions. The uniquely detailed dataset includes weekly measles reports from almost a thousand locations across England and Wales beginning in 1944 and continuing until the disease was all but locally eliminated by vaccination in the 1990s.

"Previous work stressed the importance of large centers as sources of infection," said Bryan T. Grenfell, the Kathryn Briger and Sarah Fenton Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and of Public Affairs at Princeton University and another leader of the research team. "However, our new modeling shows that local spread among smaller towns can also contribute to persistence of the virus."

The researchers' new model quantifies the relative influence of different sources of infection, including major cities, spread among smaller towns, and unidentifiable outside sources. Following the introduction of vaccination, the source of reintroduction shifted from a combination of large centers and local spread to mainly unidentifiable sources, possibly outside of England and Wales.

"Having access to this unique dataset allowed us to test these news models of measles dynamics with unprecedented rigor," said Max S. Y. Lau, assistant professor in the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University and first author of the paper. "Going forward, we can apply what we learn from this test case to understand disease spread beyond measles."

"Measles has always been the 'model organism' of epidemic dynamics--like C. elegans or the fruitfly are for evolution--and, along with influenza, a paradigm for understanding herd immunity," said Grenfell. "So, as COVID-19 approaches endemicity, these new models can help us understand and prepare for modeling its spatial spread, as well as understand the impact that the eventual development of a vaccine might have on its dynamics."

Beyond the COVID-19 pandemic, the models also could help scientists understand how diseases survive and spread at a time when a portion of the public is opposed to vaccines, said co-author C. Jessica E. Metcalf, assistant professor of ecology and evolutionary biology and public affairs. "Understanding the drivers of persistence is also of growing importance in a context of growing vaccine hesitancy, which further complicates dynamics and amplifies the challenges of control," she said.

The researchers added that wide perspective should be taken when applying the results to other diseases.

"Our model and previous experience highlights the complexity of globally eradicating a virus," said Bjørnstad. "Smallpox was eradicated by 1977 through a massive global effort of mass-vaccination of all children, followed by targeted efforts in regional hotspots and finally local quarantining and ring vaccination to squash the scourge. Polio, in contrast, while also targeted through vaccination for more than 50 years keeps escaping 'the final blow' as it successfully shifts and diffuses across regional pockets of susceptible individuals to evade eradication."

###

In addition to Bjørnstad, Grenfell, Lau, and Metcalf, the research team included, from Princeton, Ph.D. candidates Alexander Becker in ecology and evolutionary biology and Hannah M. Korevaar in the Office of Population Research, and postdoctoral researcher Quentin Caudron; and Darren J. Shaw at the University of Edinburgh.

The research was supported by the RAPIDD Program of the US Department of Homeland Security and the Fogarty International Centre, the US National Institutes of Health, the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health & Human Development of the National Institutes of Health, and the US National Science Foundation.

Grenfell survivors are taking legal action in the US against three firms they blame for the fire.

BBC.COM

Grenfell residents open US legal battle

UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES 

Outbreak of a rare, polio-like syndrome likely prevented, postponed by social distancing

PRINCETON UNIVERSITY, WOODROW WILSON SCHOOL OF PUBLIC AND INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS

Research News

 

Social distancing not only helped slow the spread of COVID-19 -- it also may have prevented the transmission of an outbreak of a rare polio-like syndrome, according to Princeton University researchers.

Though uncommon, acute flaccid myelitis (AFM) is a critical spinal condition that causes weakness in the limbs, seriously diminishes motor function, and can lead to lifelong disabilities. The syndrome was first reported in the United States in 2012 and has been coming back every two years, hinting it could strike again in 2020.

Using epidemiological surveillance tools, the researchers showed that an AFM outbreak was likely to occur in 2020, but social distancing prevented its spread.

The reason was that social distancing reduced the occurrence of a respiratory illness known as enterovirus 68 (EV-D68), which the researchers found is strongly associated with AFM. EV-D68 is a virus found in infants and children that typically causes respiratory issues such as a runny nose, cough, or sneezing. While the definite cause of AFM remains inconclusive, it has been linked to viral infections and past studies have specifically identified a link to EV-68.

The Princeton-led research team sought to better understand the connection between AFM and EV-D68 and whether another outbreak might occur. Their findings, published in the journal Science Translational Medicine, suggest that vaccines targeting EV-D68 could lessen future outbreaks of AFM.

"Though currently uncommon, this syndrome has been increasing in frequency with each successive outbreak since 2014, making it critically important to better understand the patterns and drivers behind it," said first author Sang Woo Park, a Ph.D. student in Princeton's Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology.

"Our results underline the importance of epidemic surveillance for projecting future impact of infectious diseases," said Bryan Grenfell, the Kathryn Briger and Sarah Fenton Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and Public Affairs and an associated faculty member in Princeton's High Meadows Environmental Institute.

Grenfell and Park conducted the study with Kevin Messacar of the Children's Hospital at the University of Colorado; Margarita Pons-Salort of Imperial College London; Lindsay Meyers and Camille Cook, former and current employees, respectively, of bioMérieux Inc. or its subsidiaries; and Jeremy Farrar of the Wellcome Trust.

EV-D68 outbreaks have been reported every two years, coinciding with the outbreak pattern of AFM, the researchers said. To confirm this connection, they analyzed patterns of EV-D68 outbreaks using unique surveillance data acquired from BioFire® Syndromic Trends (Trend), a cloud-based network of de-identified pathogen results from around the world collected in near-real time.

The results revealed that EV-D68 outbreaks were occurring every two years in many states, though not all. In states such as Ohio, EV-D68 outbreaks revealed more intricate patterns. Still, the association between EV-D68 and AFM syndrome was strong.

Likely thanks to social distancing, AFM cases remained low in 2020. There were only 31 cases in 2020 compared to 153 cases in 2016 and 238 cases in 2018.

"Fortunately, we saw very little EV-D68 circulation in 2020 and few cases of AFM compared to what was expected, but that makes it even more important to be as prepared as possible for what could be coming in 2021 or beyond," said Park.

###

The paper, "Epidemiological dynamics of enterovirus D68 in the US and implications for acute flaccid myelitis," first appeared online in Science Translational Medicine on March 10. The work was supported by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, the Wellcome Trust, and the Royal Society.

Experts demand fire safety policy change over health impact of widely used flame retardants

Leading environmental health experts have called for a comprehensive review of the UK's fire safety regulations, with a focus on the environmental and health risks of current chemical flame retardants.

Peer-Reviewed Publication

LANCASTER UNIVERSITY

Leading environmental health experts have called for a comprehensive review of the UK's fire safety regulations, with a focus on the environmental and health risks of current chemical flame retardants.

The health dangers of substances meant to improve fire safety have prompted experts to demand a range of new measures to reduce risk.

Flame retardants are widely used to slow down or stop the spread of fire. They are used regularly in a range of products – from sofas and textiles, to building materials. However, hundreds of studies have reported on the adverse effects of these chemicals, many of which are bioaccumulative and have been linked to wide-ranging health risks including cancer, developmental disorders, and DNA damage.

The UK has some of the highest use of flame retardants in the world and we are all being exposed in our daily lives. Retardants have been found in a range of places – including homes, schools, offices, and vehicles. They have been found in air and dust, in food and drinking water, and on indoor surfaces and textiles, where they can be absorbed through contact with the skin. The authors add this exposure is particularly noted in young children, who crawl around and pick up objects.

They are also found in natural environments, including rivers, lakes, oceans and sediments, as well as in fish, mammals and birds.

Such widespread use has in part been attributed to the flame ignition tests that are a primary focus of current fire safety regulations. Experts have questioned whether these tests are fit for purpose in reducing fire risk and believe the government’s emphasis on these tests incentivises the addition of large amounts of fire retardants to products.

The experts say there is also “significant uncertainty” about the extent flame retardants contribute to fire safety, and that there is evidence that flame retardants exacerbate smoke and fire toxicity.

Dr Paul Whaley, from Lancaster University and a corresponding author of the statement, said: "There are longstanding concerns about the effectiveness of flame retardants and the health risks associated with them, which the UK Government has never adequately reconciled. This needs to change: there has to be a proper balancing of the harms and benefits of flame retardants, that includes a comprehensive evaluation of the effectiveness of flame retardants as a fire safety measure, with serious attention paid to unintended harms of UK fire safety policy."

The evidence-based call to action, by a group of 13 experts, comes in the form of “A New Consensus on Reconciling Fire Safety with Environmental & Health Impacts of Chemical Flame Retardants”, published today (February 28) in the journal Environment International.

The authors set out six measures for the Government to urgently take in a thorough review of the need for chemical flame retardants, including an end to incentivising their use.

The authors instead call for incentivising industry to develop "benign-by-design" furniture and materials that are inherently less flammable.

They also call for developing a labelling system to track retardants’ use, allowing them to be identified and disposed of safely.

Also among their recommendations is the need to adopt a systemic approach to fire safety rather than a reductionist approach relying on ignition tests.

Professor Ruth Garside, from the University of Exeter said: “The use of flame retardants is problematic at all stages of the lifecycle, potentially even exacerbating smoke and toxicity during the fires when they are supposed to provide a safety measure. With no clear labelling system, these substances are not disposed of correctly, which means they end up in recycled products.

“A significant proportion of fire deaths are caused by inhaling toxic fumes, so there’s no time to delay in reviewing the fire safety regulations. We urge the government to take prompt action for the benefit of all our health.”

UK Furnishing and Fire Regulations have been under review since 2014 but no revised policy has yet been formally proposed.

Professor Frank Kelly of Imperial College London, and co-author of the paper, said: "There is understandable concern surrounding the weakening of existing fire regulations, especially in the wake of tragedies such as the Grenfell Tower fire.

"However, it is vital that the use of these chemicals and their effectiveness in preventing fires is balanced with the serious long-term impacts on our health and environment."

Jamie Page of the Cancer Prevention & Education Society said: “Fire safety is a complex, multidisciplinary issue, but processes are largely dominated by industry. Well-reasoned challenges to current approaches need to be heeded. This will require more inclusive and transparent public consultation processes that will bring together views of different stakeholders.” 

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.envint.2023.107782

---

JOURNAL

Environment International

DOI

10.1016/j.envint.2023.107782 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Commentary/editorial

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

A New Consensus on Reconciling Fire Safety with Environmental & Health Impacts of Chemical Flame Retardants

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

28-Feb-2023

The Radical Legacy of New York’s Winter Rent Strike

By Glyn Robbins

On 26 December 1907, 10,000 New York families led by teenager Pauline Newman began a historic rent strike – more than a century later, their struggle remains as relevant as ever.


An open market on New York City's Lower East Side, photographed in 1905. (Hulton Archive / Getty Images)

From 26 December 1907 to 9 January 1908, 10,000 tenants, predominantly Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe living in New York City’s Lower East Side, took part in a historic rent strike. During an economic depression causing mass unemployment and grinding poverty, landlords tried to hike rents by thirty-three percent. With their cry to ‘fight the landlord as they had the Czar’, the tenants won a partial victory, with rents significantly reduced for 2,000 households.

The movement established a tradition of militant working-class housing campaigns that eventually contributed to winning vital rent controls that still protect millions of the city’s tenants today. But as the Covid crisis continues, New York City renters are again organising against rapacious landlordism.

The 1907-8 rent strike was led by a remarkable woman, Pauline Newman, who had arrived in the US from Lithuania in 1901, aged about nine (her birth certificate was lost along the way). She was one of two million Jews who arrived in the country between 1881 and 1924, escaping antisemitic pogroms. Still a child, she started work, first making hairbrushes and then in the notorious Triangle Shirtwaist Factory.

Women discussing the rent strike, 1908.

Newman had been exposed to radical ideas in her homeland, where one trade unionist commented that ‘behind every volume of the Talmud was a volume of Marx’. Still young, she argued against gender segregation in the synagogue and demanded the schooling that was often denied girls. Her political education continued in America through the pages of the mass circulation Yiddish-language socialist newspaper the Daily Forward, and in discussion groups that included some of the left luminaries of the time.

Pauline Newman was the epitome of ‘intersectionality’ long before the term was coined. She became known as ‘the East Side Joan of Arc’, combining housing activism with trade unionism, socialism, the fight for women’s suffrage, and gender and sexual equality. As a gay woman who raised a child with her partner and assumed a non-traditional style of dress, she lived in a way that challenged patriarchal orthodoxy, and died in 1986 after a lifetime devoted to the struggle that saw her go from ‘the garment shop floor to positions of influence in the American labour movement’, according to Annelise Orleck’s 1991 book Common Sense and a Little Fire.

The legacy and contemporary relevance of Pauline Newman abounds. Inspired by the 1907 rent strike, in November 1909, she helped build the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union (ILGWU) and its ‘Uprising of 20,000’ against the exploitation of the textile industry. After two hours of indecision at a mass meeting at the Cooper Union, one of the workers, Clara Lemlich Shavelson, famously said, ‘I am tired of listening to speakers… I offer a resolution that a general strike be declared—now!’ Once again, the strikers’ demands were only partially met—but their women-led grassroots campaigning challenged both the employers and the male-dominated union hierarchy, leading to a wave of industrial action by textile workers across the US.

Pauline Newman, photographed c.1912. (Wikimedia Commons)

The tradition of working-class New Yorkers fighting for a better life extended beyond housing. ILGWU members were also heavily involved in a succession of protests and boycotts against excessive food prices, beginning with a boycott of a Kosher butchers in 1902. As the New York Times put it, ‘when East Siders don’t like something, they strike’. In 1914, the ILGWU founded the Union Health Center to provide medical care to its members; they also promoted education projects in the same period, including a successful Workers’ University.

By March 1911, Pauline Newman was working with the US Socialist Party alongside Eugene Debs, when the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire killed 146 workers. The negligence of the factory’s bosses was yet another example of the corporate manslaughter that still puts working class lives at risk, from the sweatshops of Dhaka to Grenfell Tower. But the ILGWU kept up the struggle for better conditions, at work and at home. The union was part of a highly significant movement to build co-operative housing for New York City workers, several of which survive today: the Penn South development in central Manhattan, for example, was sponsored by the ILGWU, and continues to provide 2,820 truly affordable homes in the heart of one of the world’s most unaffordable cities.
A Radical Legacy

Rent strikes have been a recurring theme in New York City’s working-class history and a vital weapon in the ongoing fight for better housing conditions. As Ronald Lawson writes in the introduction to his history of the city’s tenant movement, ‘elites do not always have their way… ordinary people—working class and poor, women, immigrants, minorities—do help shape political agendas when they are organized and mobilized.’

This year has brought new evidence of this. With millions losing income and unable to pay rent during the pandemic, a huge increase in evictions and homelessness was threatened. But a vibrant, well-organised coalition of housing campaigners fought to ensure that the state of New York has been virtually eviction-free for eighteen months. This reversal of a cornerstone of capitalism is a remarkable achievement—one that has not yet been replicated in other places. It results from the same kind of assertive—and often women-led—mobilisation that Pauline Newman personified, including rent strikes. The early role of trade unions in building these movements was vital, too, and needs urgently to be revived

A CASA anti-eviction protest outside the Bronx housing court, 15 December 2021. (Glyn Robbins / CASA)

Another recurring theme of housing and social justice movements in New York’s history is the role of radical Jewish socialists. Much of the city’s truly affordable housing was inspired and built by them. Sadly, the ILGWU fell foul to the red scares and infighting that have so often afflicted the US labour movement, and it’s a horrible irony that, as we remember the 1907-8 rent strike, the leadership of the UK Labour Party is busy purging itself of people following in the tradition of Pauline Newman.

In New York City today, the call for unity to defend workers at work and at home continues. Community Action for Safe Apartments (CASA) in the Bronx is just one of numerous tenant organisations fighting against the renewed threat of mass evictions, as Covid enters its second year. Some CASA members are on rent strike, demanding their landlord carries out repairs, and the organisation is spearheading a campaign demanding that the anti-eviction protections are extended for as long as the pandemic is with us.

Private landlords have filed 240,000 cases against New York tenants with rent arrears, threatening a huge spike in homelessness next year, particularly among the city’s poor people of colour and immigrants. It’s a situation Pauline Newman would instantly recognise. But CASA and others like them are determined to fight in a way she’d recognise, too.
About the Author

Glyn Robbins is a housing worker, campaigner, writer and academic.

Our Christmas issue is out – subscribe today for just £10!

 

UK 

Bibby Stockholm: Legionella is not the only health threat on the asylum barge

by Amy Clair, The Conversation

Credit: shutterstock

Just days after being moved in, people seeking asylum were removed from the Bibby Stockholm accommodation barge due to legionella bacteria on board. Dorset council, where the barge is located, has raised concerns that delays in removing people increased their risk of exposure to the potentially fatal bacteria.

Even before this development, the use of the barge to house people seeking asylum was controversial. This is both because of the impact on the local community, and conditions for the people living on board. The barge has been used in the past to house workers, including military personnel. But when being used for asylum seekers, the cabins on the barge—originally designed for one person and only "slightly larger" than a prison cell—will be used to house at least two.

People seeking asylum will be expected to share their small accommodation with a stranger. This is a situation that few would find desirable. It does not meet the government's own bedroom standard, which is itself not overly generous.

Crowded conditions such as these are associated with a range of negative health consequences including anxiety, depression and psychological distress. They are also associated with increased risk of respiratory illness, including COVID-19 and tuberculosis, as well as infectious disease.

These diseases include diarrhea and gastroenteritis. We often hear stories of norovirus, a common cause of gastroenteritis, spreading through other high-density spaces such as cruise ships and resorts. However, these are usually much less densely populated than the Bibby Stockholm is expected to be.

The effect of crowding on health is notable. A review of evidence found that around one-fifth of hospital admissions due to infectious disease in New Zealand were attributable to crowded conditions in the home.

Links between crowding and mental health problems have been established among the general population, but risks are likely higher for those that have recently fled their home country due to the trauma that they have already experienced.

Life in lockdown

Another important difference between the experience of asylum seekers on the barge compared to others that have lived onboard is the restricted movement and high security they will experience. Residents will be unable to freely leave the barge or the nearby containment area.

Like most asylum seekers in the UK, they are prohibited from working, and the very low levels of financial support they receive would severely limit any activities they could take part in. They will probably spend much of their time onboard in their small, cramped rooms (with disconnected TVs) or the limited space onboard.

The lockdowns of the COVID pandemic demonstrated the importance of safe, secure and suitable housing for protecting our health and well-being as well as the challenges of restricted movement. People seeking asylum and housed on the Bibby Stockholm will experience lockdown-like conditions, and evidence suggests that lockdown had greater negative effect on those in smaller homes and without outside space.

The facilities on the Bibby Stockholm are not just bleak, but dangerous. The Fire Brigades Union has raised concerns about fire safety on board the vessel, a worry familiar to those that spent lockdown in homes covered in flammable cladding identified after the Grenfell Tower fire.

Further, there are concerns about a lack of life jackets. This worry is likely to be particularly severe for people who may not be able to swim. And for those who may have arrived via a dangerous sea-crossing journey, simply being housed on the water could be traumatic.

Savings, at what cost?

The government has argued that the Bibby Stockholm is needed to save money on housing asylum seekers as it works through the backlog of applications. But there is little evidence for this—and the potential health costs of housing people on the barge could easily wipe out any savings.

Among the general population, the health effects of poor housing in England are thought to cost the NHS £1.4 billion a year. Overcrowding is the third highest contributor to this figure.

While conditions on the barge are particularly likely to harm the health of people living there, many of the issues will also apply to other asylum seeker "containment sites." The Bibby Stockholm is the latest in a long history of housing asylum seekers in the poorest conditions, including more recent trends of using "quasi-detention" sites, which are isolated, have high security and reduce people's access to privacy, freedom and legal advice.

Government ministers have said that the use of hotels as temporary housing is a "pull factor" for asylum seekers, attracting them to Britain. Housing is a basic, essential need and shouldn't be used punitively—as a deterrent or punishment. In fact, any deterrent is unlikely to work, so long as the push factors forcing people to seek asylum in the first place remain.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

High self-harm rates among detained asylum seekers prompts calls for action