THE Government has given Oxford City Council with £1.1m for work that had to be carried out in the wake of the Grenfell Tower disaster.

Dangerous cladding on the council’s Evenlode and Windrush towers in Blackbird Leys was removed and replaced by June 2018.

The Government told the council it had to replace aluminium sheeting after tests found it and other insulation were combustible together.

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It had only been installed months before it was taken down because of the safety fears.

The work on both towers was part of a £20m flat refurbishment project led by the council.

The Government told councils it would stump up the costs for the work on local authorities’ buildings in the weeks following the Grenfell Tower disaster in June 2017.

But it then went back on that before deciding that, actually, it would compensate councils.

Yesterday the Government said it would spend another £200m to ensure cladding on private residential blocks is replaced and buildings made safe.

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Seventy-two people died in the fire in the West London tower block. A public inquiry into the fire was opened in September 2017.

There are 60 flats in both Evenlode and Windrush Towers. Both are 15 storeys tall.

Other Oxford tower blocks that were refurbished as part of the city council work, that started in 2016, were Hockmore, in Cowley, Plowman, in Northway, and Foresters in Wood Farm.

Both Evenlode and Windrush Towers were built in Blackbird Leys to house workers at Cowley’s car plant.