[Osem]

I wouldn't be at all surprised if there were a number of people living/staying there who shouldn't have been. Sub-letting is an increasingly common problem in our major cities and then of course there could well have been family friends who were being put up unofficially. That'll be why the police said quite clearly the other day that people should report 'anyone' who'd been in the block at the time and they had no interest in why they were there.

I do think the authorities need to be 'interested' in this problem, however, because overcrowding tends to lead to rule breaking (e.g. overloaded electrical outlets) which can also be the cause of fires etc. Yes they do need to be sensitive in the circumstances but IMHO they also need to know that the people in those flats were supposed to be there and that occupancy rules were being followed.

Anyone who doubts the scale of this problem ought to check out some of the rogue landlord type TV documentaries which show how common serious sub-letting is - I've seen examples in which dozens of people, almost always foreign nationals, have been crammed into very modest, usually unsafe houses with just mattresses on the floor. They're being terribly exploited and put at severe risk by landlords who have no morals at all and they don't feel able to complain because they're either illegal immigrants or have no other choice of where to live.