Grenfell: clad in climate-change politics

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..But few people have asked why so many tower blocks and housing estates in the UK have been clad in recent years. Some have argued that the refurbishments were cosmetic, added to appease private investors by prettifying housing estates. But this is not the main reason for the cladding. In fact, it was added to meet the government’s targets for reducing CO2 emissions.  .........The programme of refurbishing local-authority and social-housing stock was augmented by the ‘green new deal’, under which local authorities and companies could get government funding to insulate houses. Householders were bombarded with phone calls and visits touting loft insulation, under the green-deal home-improvement fund. This was the small-scale equivalent of the cladding fad in social housing.     .......
The fad for recladding tower blocks in London and the rest of the country looks increasingly like a hysterical response to international obligations for action over climate change. Social-housing tenants were the people who could most easily be made to carry the responsibility for energy efficiency because they had little control over their estates.
The government push for action on insulation encouraged shoddy workmanship and cowboy operators, who took advantage of the moral fervour of the climate-change campaign to make money."