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Artist News
Stormzy calls on “alien” Jacob Rees-Mogg to resign as an MP over controversial Grenfell comments
By Andy Malt | Published on Wednesday 6 November 2019
Stormzy has joined calls for British MP Jacob Rees-Mogg to resign after he suggested that the victims of the Grenfell fire died because they lacked the “common sense” to escape. “This ain’t about politics”, the rapper wrote on Twitter. “It’s about the people who govern us lacking the most basic level of humanity or empathy. It’s nuts to me”.
Rees-Mogg made his controversial comments in an interview with Nick Ferrari on radio station LBC earlier this week. Noting that the occupants of the building had been told by the fire brigade to stay in their homes even after the initial fire had been discovered – that being standard practice when dealing with tower block fires – he said: “I think if either of us were in a fire, whatever the fire brigade said, we would leave the burning building. It just seems the common sense thing to do and it is such a tragedy that that didn’t happen”.
In a long string of tweets, Stormzy responded: “Oi Jacob Rees Mogg, you need to resign. You’re an actual piece of shit … in a nutshell saying Grenfell victims should have had the common sense to escape. I can’t believe the cheek. Fucking hell, these politicians are actual aliens”.
“Let’s bear in mind for two seconds how horrifying and terrifying the situation would have been for the victims”, he went on. “And then imagine they’re being instructed by fire fighters – trusted government authorities – to stay put. This scumbag is saying, ‘well boy, you lot are dumb to have listened then’. Can you imagine?! Oi, get this prick out of here. These man are scumbags and they are wicked and evil”.
He also accused the government of attempting to shift the blame for the tragedy onto the Fire Brigade, saying: “This is blood on the British government’s hands. Grenfell was their fault and their fault alone”.
Rees-Mogg has since apologised for his comments, saying that he’d accidentally claimed that those who died lacked “common sense”. He told the Evening Standard: “What I meant to say is that I would have also listened to the fire brigade’s advice to stay and wait at the time. However, with what we know now, and with hindsight, I wouldn’t and I don’t think anyone else would. I would hate to upset the people of Grenfell if I was unclear in my comments”.
Stormzy, of course, has long been a vocal critic of the government over its response to the Grenfell tower block fire that occurred in West London in June 2017. At the 2018 BRIT Awards, he broke up a performance of his tracks ‘Blinded By Your Grace Part 2’ and ‘Big For Your Boots’ with a freestyle directed at the then UK Prime Minister.
He rapped: “Yo Theresa May, where’s the money for Grenfell? What, you thought we just forgot about Grenfell? You’re criminals, and you’ve got the cheek to call us savages, you should do some jail time, you should pay some damages, you should burn your house down and see if you can manage this”.
In his latest barrage of tweets on the subject he added that he would “never ever ever ever ever ever stop talking bout Grenfell”.
The total number of deaths caused by the fire was officially recorded as 72. More than 70 others were injured and 233 escaped. Whereas a small fire in a tower block would usually be contained – hence the stay-put policy – in this case the blaze spread quickly throughout the building due to the cladding on the outside of the tower being extremely flammable. In total the fire burned for two and a half days before being extinguished.
An inquiry into the disaster was launched in September 2017 and its initial findings were published last month, which is what Rees-Mogg was commenting upon.
