Second game of inquiry at Grenfell Tower to put Eric Pickles in the spotlight | Grenfell Tower Inquiry

A play that dramatizes “money carousel” At Grenfell Tower, a public inquiry will begin in February and actors will be cast to play Eric Pickles, the former housing minister, and Hissam Shuker, who lost six members of his family in a fire in 2017.

Grenfell: System Failure will be the sequel to the critically acclaimed play about the disastrous construction project that led to the west London the council block was clad in plastic panels that burned like petrol.

Lord Pickles, who stunned the dead when he complained that an inquest at the coroner might be delayed until the next appointment, he was accused of failing to tighten building regulations after an earlier fire, despite being instructed to do so by the coroner.

The play will feature the cross-examination of Richard Millett, QC, who last month closed the court hearings by saying that after four years of hearings in which various companies, government agencies and institutions blamed each other, “the merry-go-round is turning still”.

David Cameron “attack on red tape”which he launched in the coalition government and prevented ministers from introducing rules unless they overturned at least one other rule, will also be scrutinised.

The show was the latest cultural response to the request, which included several other plays, books, podcasts and television programs.

Written by Richard Norton-Taylor, a playwright and former Guardian journalist, and directed by Nicholas Kent, the show focuses on the stories of two families devastated by the fire – the Shukers and Shabli Neda’s relatives, an Afghan army officer who came to the UK in 1998 after fleeing the Taliban and worked as a minicab driver. His wife and son escaped from the 23rd floor apartment through thick smoke; he was going to follow him but stayed behind to help the other two women. He fell from the top floor.

Previous game of the couple, Grenfell: Value Engineering did not show any of the dead or survivors, but focused on construction companies, council officials, experts and firefighters.

Shuker told the inquest he was not contacted by the council in the days after the fire as he searched for his mother, sister, brother-in-law and their three daughters – all of whom died.

He called the prospect of a dramatization of his testimony “a bit strange” but told the Guardian: “I hope that what has been said will be understood and taken seriously. I hope that the seriousness of what was said enters the theater.”

The show will also feature current London Fire Brigade Commissioner Andy Roe being cross-examined about institutional failings, as well as senior government officials and safety experts.

The play opens on February 18 at the Playground Theatre, Tabernacle and Marylebone Theatres, all in west London, as the inquiry’s chairman, Sir Martin Moore-Bick, continues to consider the evidence ahead of his final report, which is not due until October 2023.

Norton-Taylor said he hopes the play will help “keep the thing alive” in the public mind. “Evidence should be heard and heard as much as possible,” he said. “It was completely avoidable but it is a reflection of other parts of British society that we are still dealing with.”

Kent said: “During the run of the previous play in October 2021, we were under a lot of pressure from the Grenfell community and the audience to complete the story for the final phase Grenfell Tower Inquiry. This second play focuses on the vital questions of how the cladding/insulation manufacturers, the London Fire Brigade, public regulators and politicians could have prevented this horrific fire, and how they failed the local community in the chaos that followed.”