Fire rages on the 11th floor of Lakanal House in Camberwell PAUL WOOD

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FIVE of the six victims of the Camberwell tower block fire have been named by police.

Helen Udoaka, 34, her three-week-old daughter Michelle, Dayana Francisquini, 26, Filipe Francisquini, 3, and Catherine Hickman, 31, all died when a fire started on the ninth floor of the building in south London. Police are treating the incident as suspicious.

Three of the victims – baby Michelle, Dayana and Filipe – had been positively identified and died in hospital.

The other two had not yet been positively identified while the identity of the sixth person remains unknown.

The bodies of those three casualties were still in the tower block, according to Chief Superintendent Wayne Chance, who added that the rescue operation was “proving slightly more difficult”.

He also said: “Information showed the fire started on the ninth floor and that all of the victims were discovered on the 11th floor.

"The efforts to make the scene of the fire safe are continuing and are progressing well."

Ian Wingfield, a local Labour councillor and the spokesperson for public housing in the borough, said he believed it was the worst tower block disaster in London's history.

He called for a full public investigation into such housing across Britain.

He went on: "We're living in the 21st century and people are still living in housing like this. Unless we get that investigated, people lives are under threat."

Talking about the blaze, Wingfield said: "It's very disturbing. All the events around this fire are extremely tragic. This is a horrendous incident.

"My heart goes out to the families of all those who've lost loved ones.

"We need to ensure justice is given for these needless deaths and insure that nothing like this happens again."

London Mayor Boris Johnson said: "It does seem suspicious that the fire was spreading so quickly and clearly that will be one the prime subjects for the investigation."

He added: "Obviously we will want to know whether there was any suspicion, whether there was any arson, whether the fire was set, whether there was any malign intent, and what we will also be trying to get to the bottom of is to what extent there were design failures in the block of flats.

"And the issue really for us - is there anything we should be doing now as we go forward with our design guides for new properties. Is there anything we should be doing to ensure that we don't have a repeat of such tragic blazes.

"There are things that we want to see in design guides, larger rooms, we want to have spacious accommodation for people, but safety has got to be paramount and we will certainly be looking at this to see if there are any lessons that can be drawn to make modern buildings even safer than they are."

Thirty people were rescued from the burning tower at the Sceaux Gardens Estate, including three who later died. More than 100 firefighters fought the blaze. One firefighter remains in hospital, but his condition is not believed to be serious.