Thousands pushed from home as 60 London high-rises fail safety tests

LONDON (Reuters) - Sixty high-rise buildings have failed safety tests carried out after a fire killed at least 79 people in London earlier this month, the British government said on Sunday.

British officials are conducting tests on some 600 high-rise buildings across England after fire ravaged the Grenfell tower block in west London on June 14, prompting public anger over the Conservative government's budget cuts.

On Friday some 4,000 residents were forced to evacuate their homes in north London after the fire brigade ruled that their blocks were unsafe.

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The Department for Communities said in a statement that 60 high rise buildings across 25 local authority areas had now failed the tests.

The deadly fire started in a fridge freezer, and the outside cladding engulfed by the blaze has since been shown to fail all safety tests, London police said on Friday.

Investigators said they would consider bringing manslaughter charges over the disaster and had already seized material from a number of undisclosed organizations.

Detective Superintendent Fiona McCormack said experts had now concluded the fire, the mostly deadly blaze in London since World War Two, had started in a Hotpoint fridge freezer, model FF175BP, which had not been subject to any recall.

The blaze has provoked anger and heaped pressure on Prime Minister Theresa May, who is fighting for her political survival after her party lost its parliamentary majority in a snap election at a time when Britain is beginning divorce talks with the European Union.

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