Residents face arrest for breach of cordon
Residents and business owners have been warned that they face arrest if they try to access their properties within the cordon around Glasgow School of Art.
Locals have been left frustrated and said they may try to breach the cordon to retrieve possessions.
Businesses and 33 homes remain evacuated following the blaze, which destroyed the Mackintosh Building on 15 June.
Glasgow City Council has said parts of the building are now at risk of “sudden, unannounced, collapse”
Residents and business owners have staged a protest demanding access to their properties within the cordon around Glasgow School of Art.
Businesses and 33 homes within the cordon zone remain evacuated following the blaze which tore through the Mackintosh Building on the night of 15 June.
Glasgow City Council said that parts of the building are at risk of “sudden, unannounced, collapse” and it is being dismantled on safety grounds.
Locals have been left frustrated that they cannot access their property to retrieve possessions.
Garnethill Displaced Residents Group and Sauchiehall Street Inner Cordon Business circulated A Notice of Entry form demanding entry to their properties yesterday. However, Glasgow City Council warned that anyone who tries to breach the cordon faces arrest.
Around 30 people took part in a protest at the cordon yesterday.
They included Iram Shafiq, 21, who has not been able to get into the property she shares with her mother and three siblings for the past five weeks.
She said: “I have a sister with autism and epilepsy and a brother with autism and they don’t understand what’s happened.
“We have lived there for over 12 years. We just want to get into our home for ten to 20 minutes just to get the essential stuff we need, put it in a bag and get out as soon as possi-
ble. It’s frustrating, it really is.” Chris Colins, community councillor for Blythswood and Broomielaw, said people were feeling angry about the situation.
He said: “People have not been allowed any access to their properties or businesses. There are people with car keys who cannot get to work, people cannot get their bank cards, passports, ID to show banks.
“There’s a man who tunes musical instruments and he
can’t get in to get his tools. Businesses are going to go under and 350 people could be out of a job.”
The fire took hold during a major restoration project following another large blaze at the Charles Rennie Mackintosh-designed art school in 2014.
Nearby properties including music venue the O2 ABC were also affected by the latest fire.
Annemarie O’donnell, chief executive of Glasgow City Council, wrote to the two
groups on Friday warning people they should not breach the cordon until Glasgow City Council’s building control officers have declared that the art school and ABC buildings are no longer dangerous.
She added: “This is because the building may be subject to a sudden, unannounced, collapse.”
She said that police may arrest anyone who tries to breach the cordon.
“We just want to get into our home for ten to 20 minutes just to get the essential stuff we need, pu ti tina bag and get out as soon as possible”
IRAM SHAFIQ
The frustration of business owners and residents denied access to their properties for the five weeks since fire tore through Glasgow School of Art is entirely understandable.
Of course, the safety of those evacuated from properties standing near damaged building must be a priority, but there must be some way in which the city council and local emergency services could, at the very least, facilitate the collection of belongings.
For more than a month these residents have had to do without any number of essentials, from passports to car keys to bank cards. Police Scotland’s position that they will be forced to arrest anyone who attempts to enter their properties for their own safety is not helping an already fraught situation.
So surely some compromise can be reached. Glasgow MSP Pauline Mcneill’s suggestion that some supervised access, with the use of adequate safety equipment, in order that necessary items may be retrieved seems to us to be a sensible one. The city council and Police Scotland should listen to the legitimate complaints of those locked out of homes and businesses..