THE government’s “abusive” response to the Grenfell Tower disaster is putting survivors’ lives at risk six years on, campaigners have warned.

The traumatised community’s anger at a lack of change is reaching boiling point during the cost-of-living crisis and worsening access to NHS care.

Ahead of tonight’s annual silent walk to remember the 72 lives in the west London tower block blaze, Yvette Williams MBE, of Justice4Grenfell, said: “We have lost people post the fire. 

“We lost Clarrie Mendy who was a staunch activist and she was clear that the trauma and toxicity exacerbated her illnesses, there have been a couple of suicides.

“The trauma and anger in the community at this time is still very high, obviously it peaks now coming up to the anniversary again.”

She told the Morning Star: “For me it feels like yesterday. I can tell you everything of what happened that night. You can’t ever unsee it.

“The stress that it puts on people as they are waiting isn’t good for their health.

“People can't get decent pay, we’ve got the cost-of-living crisis and fuel poverty and that’s pressure that government has left society in on top of the traumas caused by Grenfell.

“This is part and parcel of a whole list of things from the privatisation of public services and the managed decline of the NHS.

“It’s especially black and brown communities who suffer, and the Grenfell survivors fall into that category.

“It’s a serious indictment on this government that they don’t actually care, don’t realise their policies are leading to losing our lives early.”

She said the “most beautiful” part of the silent walk will be survivors embracing firefighters as they form a line in solidarity to them.

Edward Daffarn, of Grenfell United, who lived on the tower’s 16th floor and predicted the fire in a blog post seven months before it happened, said what should have been a “catalyst for societal change” on June 14 2017 has instead been reacted to with “incompetence and indifference and inaction.”

He branded the lack of criminal justice in relation to the fire not only unsatisfactory but also “abusive,” saying: “We can’t go on for much longer without people being held to account. And it feels very abusive, it feels very unsatisfactory.”

He highlighted that the final report of the Grenfell Tower Inquiry had been delayed with recommendations from its phase one report still “not enacted by this government.”

And he criticised ministers for not placing a legal obligation on landlords to prepare personal emergency evacuation plans (PEEPs) for disabled residents to ensure they know how to exit safely in the event of a fire.

Fire Brigades Union general secretary Matt Wrack said: “The Grenfell fire was not inevitable — it was a crime caused by decades of deregulation, privatisation and the prioritisation of profit over safety.

“Six years on and the community is still waiting for answers. No-one responsible has yet been held accountable.”

Then-Labour MP for Kensington Emma Dent Coad, now an independent councillor for the borough, said: “No-one wants their children to fight the same battles we are fighting now. 

“The council is still failing local residents, and government is still failing the hundreds of thousands around the country hit by the cladding crisis. Shame on them all.”

The Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities said: “Our thoughts are with the bereaved families, survivors and residents as they remember those who lost their lives in the Grenfell Tower tragedy.”

A Commons debate in the coming weeks is expected to include an update on the action government is taking in the areas of social housing, building safety and wider reform.

On PEEPs, a Home Office spokesperson said the government is “committed to delivering proposals that enhance the safety of residents whose ability to self-evacuate in an emergency may be compromised” and that it is currently analysing responses to a public consultation on emergency evacuation.