SAVE ALL OUR HOMES:
SAY NO TO DEMOLITION!
Our campaign is now two years old! The founding meeting was
held in March 2008 in the Maiden Lane Community Centre.
It was extremely well attended. A
hundred and seventy residents spoke to the local MP, Mr Frank Dobson and to Cllr Ben Rawlings. They made
clear their opposition to any demolition whatsoever taking place on the estate.
STOP PRESS:
Mayor of Camden arrested.
Camden's Liberal Democrat mayor, Cllr Ansari, has been arrested for alleged
benefit fraud. For further details see the BBC website.
____________________
2012 and the Decent Homes Standard.
The Council is in a fix. Maiden
Lane Estate has been neglected for so long by Camden that it has fallen way below the government's Decent Homes Standard.
The Council should have refurbished our homes years ago. But now there is a deadline. It is 2012: Camden Council must refurbish
our homes - and the process must be completed by 2012. That's a government requirement.
What this
means is that the Council is obliged to get on with the job immediately. No demolition, no endless discussions, no "taking
of soundings"; just good, honest hard work from the Council. They have less than two years to get the job completed
- and approved by the inspectors. Everything else, including talk of demolition, is just time wasting. We must
demand that the Council obeys the government and refurbishes our homes right now. We have waited long enough.
____________________
Open Communities:
they're back . . . with another misleading newsletter.
The so-called
"Independent" Tenants' Advisors, Open Communities - who are in fact paid by Camden Council
- are back. This is in spite of their having received a unanimous vote of no confidence from the Maiden Lane Estate
Management Board over their "survey" of residents' opinion. This survey concerned the regeneration of our
estate. What the EMB said was:
"The members of the Maiden Lane Estate Management Board have no confidence
that the survey carried out by Open Communities is a fair reflection of the opinion of the people of the Estate with regard
to the regeneration proposals."
Open Communities have put out another of their dreadful leaflets.
In it they quote the results of their so-called "survey". Don't believe the survey statistics they quote. The
EMB wasn't fooled - and neither is the Save All Our Homes campaign. We saw the way the "survey" was
conducted by Open Communities and have no confidence in it either.
Besides, our campaign demands not "dodgy"
opinion samples, we demand a proper vote among the residents - and not just any vote either. We demand that the residents
of the estate be given the chance to express their opinion in a block-by-block secret ballot organised by a
body we can all trust, such as the Electoral Reform Society.
Why is the Council - and Open Communities who
are on their payroll - afraid of an honest vote like this?
There is some confusion about the way
Open Communities uses the word "Regeneration". They should know the word does not mean "demolition".
Save All Our Homes is in favour of the refurbishment of the estate - who would not be? But we are opposed to all
demolition. Knocking down people's homes is threatening, divisive and unneccessary. In the articles on this website
we show why this is so. Basically, the Council already has the £17.1 million needed to refurbish all our homes, the
rest is Council "eyewash".
Open Communities refers to the meeting of the Council Executive on 9th December.
We were there at that meeting, they were not. We even spoke at the meeting. And no, the Council did not approve any
demolition of our estate. Far from it!
All that was decided was that the uninhabited industrial property
next to York Way could be redeveloped. Thus no one's home is presently at risk of demolition. Furthermore, there
will be no decision taken until around October of this year about the future of the estate. There will even have to be
a second interim report to Council - scheduled for after the local election around June of this year - before
they can even hold the October Decision Day meeting.
Nor will it have escaped anyone's notice that we will
have elections before either of these Council meetings - the interim meeting and the Decision Day one. It will be at these
local elections that we, the residents whose homes are at stake, can let our councillors know exactly how we feel about their
demolition plan. If they continue not to listen to us, then the option to vote them out of office is ours by right.
Should there be a change from the present administration in Camden, then of course, all bets will be off.
An incoming administration of a different political colour will not be tied in any way to the plans of the present Council
- and certainly not to their October deadline.
So, taking into account that the so-called "survey" upon
which this latest Open Communities newsletter is based has been rejected unanimously by the EMB as well as the Save
All Our Homes campaign, then the best thing that can be said about it is that the newsletter is misleading in the extreme.
The fight goes on - and we're winning. This is obvious because the Council is afraid to let the
residents express their opinion in a block-by-block secret ballot. If the Council thought they'd win, they would be happy
to let us vote on the question of demolition, wouldn't they?
____________________
Response to the letter in the CNJ of 5th November.
RESIDENTS
WILL NOT BE ALLOWED TO VOTE:
Open Communities is the company hired by Camden Council to communicate
with the residents of the estate over their demolition plan. In his letter to the Camden New Journal, their
managing director, Tom Hopkins, tries to suggest that there is very little support for Save All Our Homes.
Open Communities, a Liverpool-based company, is new to our estate and to the issues surrounding the Council's plan. This
is because they were only the third, not the first choice, for the role of independent tenants' advisor.
In fact, of course, they are paid by Camden Council so we can measure their so-called independence from this fact
alone. Mr Hopkins omits to mention any of this.
His company was not in Camden at the time when
170 residents angrily confronted Cllr Rawlings over the demolition plan. This he 'airbrushes' away, still
maintaining that Save All Our Homes has very little support. 170 residents know differently.
He
is also aware that the residents stayed away in droves from the exhibition his company recently mounted in
the Community Centre on behalf of the Council's demolition plan. Out of the 800 adults on the estate only 20 turned up,
97.5% therefore turned their backs on the demolition plan and stayed away. He makes no mention of this fact.
His company set up an unelected 'Steering Committee' of residents to 'advise' the Council over
the matter of the demolition. He omits to mention that this committee had to cancel its last meeting due to lack of support
- and that it has now collapsed completely.
But the most telling fact of all is that the Council has
put the word out that the residents are not to be allowed any vote on the issue of the demolition of their own homes.
Open Communities has fallen into line with this prohibition. Save All Our Homes on the other hand, insists
that the residents should be given the chance to vote. It is thus the Council that is afraid of a residents' ballot
and Save All Our Homes that is not. Could there be any clearer sign that we know we have widespread
support? We are eager to put our support to the test and demonstrate it in a democratic vote - but
the Council is not. Readers should draw their own conclusions.
__________________________
A message to the Council "Regeneration" Team.
In
the leaflet sent round to residents on the estate at Christmas, the new "Regeneration" Team said that any residents
forced to move out because their homes were being demolished would have the right to move back onto the estate should they
so wish at a later date. This was presented as some sort of a boon to worried residents.
In fact, of course it
is nothing of the sort. The Council is here ignoring the disruption in people's lives that enforced rehousing means
- to single people and families alike. What the Council is saying is that if your home is demolished you will have to move
home not once but twice if you want to stay on the estate, thus doubling the misery. Residents forcibly rehoused
will suffer one disruption in their lives when they move out while their homes are demolished - and then they
will have their lives disrupted a second time if they want to move back onto the estate to be close to friends,
the family GP, their children's schools or their own place of work. It's a lose-lose situation.
Besides, we already have the right to live on the Maiden Lane estate and enjoy our own homes. This is what is meant
by the legal term: secure tenancy. We all have secure tenancies. Indeed, leaseholders have even more protection
under the law. The "Regeneration" Team speaks as if it's giving us something new. It isn't, we have a right
to live in our own homes on the Maiden Lane estate unmolested and unthreatened by the bulldozer.
____________________
Lobbying the Council.
A Save All
Our Homes delegation went to the Executive Committee of the Council on Wednesday, 9th December. A speech
was made by one of our delegates opposing demolition. This took place in the Council Chamber itself. The delegation
included members of the Maiden Lane EMB. Under discussion by the Committee was an interim report by the Council's
"Regeneration" Team. It concerned only the industrial site next to the estate, thus no one's home was at risk
at this time. Indeed, a further interim report scheduled for the summer of 2010 will have to be made before any
final decision can be taken by the Council - and that not until October, 2010.
Neverthless,
the lobby was successful in putting an early 'shot across the bows' of the Council and its "Regeneration"
Team. They are now in no doubt that an organized and determined body of residents is prepared to fight to prevent the
demolition of their homes. This is significant because our ward councillors will be asking for our votes in just a few months'
time at the May local elections . . .
During the Save All Our Homes speech, a statement was
read out on behalf of the Maiden Lane EMB which had unanimously passed the following motion on the previous night. The
EMB motion expresses a sentiment with which Save All Our Homes readily concurs. We have quoted the statement before
in this website, but it deserves to be repeated:
"The
members of the Maiden Lane Estate Management Board have no confidence that the survey carried out by Open Communities is a
fair reflection of the opinion of the people of the Estate with regard to the regeneration proposals."
__________________________
Over 18,000 people homeless
in Camden.
Camden's waiting list of homeless people looking
for a place to live in the borough is fast approaching 19,000. Yet residents on the Maiden Lane Estate are facing
demolition of their homes and forcible re-housing by the Council.
The Council offers inducements to get people
to agree to give up their flats but the cruel fact is that residents who surrender their homes will find themselves swamped
amid this huge waiting list. 'Extra points' are to be offered to people who agree to sacrifice themselves in this
way, but that just emphasises the fact that a resident who cuts himself - or herself - loose in this manner will
have to compete for a replacement home among nearly 19,000 others. The result could be a terrible let-down. Camden has flats
best described as 'rat-holes' that residents could find themselves forced to accept. When you are in competition in
the bidding process with over 18,000 other people to find a home what can you expect to end up with?
And
that assumes that the Council is acting honorably throughout. Many residents have had experience of being mistreated
by Camden and they will rightly be wary of the promises Council officials make. Read this website. In the next three articles
below, you will find examples of the way Camden has behaved to its residents. You will hear of at least one deception practised
upon the people of Maiden Lane Estate. Look at these articles yourself and decide if you want to place your faith in
the promises that Council officials make.
____________________
The Big Deception
It will require £17.1 million to regenerate our
estate. That sum will bring the estate up to the Decent Homes Standard. That much is agreed. But we have not been
told the truth.
Remember being told at the time of the Housing Needs Survey that only by accepting demolition
on the estate could this money be raised? We were told: no regeneration without demolition. We were meant to accept
this meekly and without question. Worse still, certain blocks on the York Way side of the estate were earmarked to make this
'ultimate sacrifice'. Residents there were to be bulldozed out of their homes.
Understandably, the residents
in the firing line objected to this and as a result the Save All Our Homes campaign was inaugurated.
But
the residents under threat did ask questions: awkward questions. They asked about other estates. What they found out proved
that the Council had not told the whole truth.
First, there are the cases of the Raglan Estate and the Torriano
Estate. Work on renovating the first of these began in September, 2008. Work on the second started a few months
later.
 Raglan Estate  Torriano Estate
Then there were the cases of the Brunswick Centre and the Ossulton
Street Estate. Regeneration work on these estates had not only begun, it has actually been completed. But
the curious thing about all these estates - which the Council had renovated before ours - is that for their residents
there had been no talk of demolition.
 Brunswick Centre  Ossulton Street Estate
The residents of these estates
were not 'blackmailed' into accepting the demolition of some of their blocks and the eviction of the residents so
as to benefit the rest. Nor were there lengthy 'consultations' delaying things for years. In the case of these
four estates all that happened is that workmen arrived one morning, set up their scaffolding, opened their toolboxes
- and got to work. It was that simple! The money for the regeneration of these estates came straightforwardly from
the Council's housing accounts.
No 'blackmail'. No delays.
But when it comes to the
Maiden Lane Estate, well, here the Council gets itself into all sorts of contortions. Instead of coughing up the £17.1
million and getting the work immediately underway, the Council pretends that it has no money left for us and that the
only way money can be found is if we accept that some of us have to be uprooted from our homes and forcibly re-housed.
But the residents under fire didn't stop there. They asked questions about the funding of such estate regeneration.
What they discovered was staggering:
We have all been told that the Council has £413 million for
regeneration of its Council housing. Cllrs King and Naylor wrote to us all about it, and it was later published in the 'Lib
Dem News'.
Did it strike you as strange that the Council could announce that it had all this money yet somehow found
it impossible to fund the £17.1 million for the Maiden Lane Estate regeneration without knocking down large parts of
the estate?
Yes? Well it struck us as strange too. We asked more awkward questions:
It appears that
the Council does not have all this £413 million available at the moment. At present, they admit to not
having some £242 million readily on line. This means, of course, that they do admit to having had the
remainder, £171 million. This sum was accessible right from the start.
Fine, we said,
but our estate needs only £17.1 million to bring it up to the legal Decent Homes Standard. Why are
you telling us that there is no money for Maiden Lane Estate unless we accept demolition as the price for regeneration?
What is going on?
The Council could have paid for our £17.1 million refurbishment ten times over and
still have £153.9 million immediately available for its commitments to other estates across the borough. Moreover,
this £153.9 million would be joined at a later date by the £242 million when that sum finally does become
available. This would make a total of £395.9 million - and we only need £17.1 million for our estate!
Yet the Council said it cannot regenerate our estate unless we submit to demolition!
What is going on? Why is
the Council pretending it has no money for us? After all, there was enough money to refurbish four other
estates before ours: the Raglan, Torriano, Ossulton Street and the Brunswick Centre. And the figures demonstrate
that they had £171 million available right from the start.
SUMMARY:
£413 million: Council says it has this amount to 'invest' in housing.
£242 million: Council admits
it has a 'shortfall' of this amount.
£171 million: Therefore Council had this sum available right from
the start.
£17.1 million: Sum needed by our estate.
£153.9 million: Sum that would have been left
to Council following our 'regeneration'.
£395.9 million: Total eventually available to Council for
all the other Council housing.
So where's the problem? Why is the Council not playing straight with
us? Why are they trying to fool us into accepting demolition? For the answer to these questions see the follow-up article
entitled: 'The Council's Secret'.
In the meantime, ask yourself: why should we put
up with any of this?
And you will come to the conclusion that there is no need for any demolition at all.
That is the secret the Council doesn't want us to know.
__________________________
The Council's Secret
What
is behind the Council's pretence that they do not have the money to regenerate Maiden Lane Estate without demolishing
a large number of our homes? Why have they tried to link regeneration in people's minds with the so-called 'need'
for demolition?
The answer lies in the value of the land that the Maiden Lane Estate occupies. Since the opening
of the Eurostar terminal at St Pancras - and the Kings Cross Development in general - the land beneath our feet has become
much more valuable. This has led the accountants in Town Hall to decide that this land is much too valuable to waste on 'mere'
Council tenants. These Town Hall 'bean-counters' didn't think about us as people, they lost
sight of the fact that the Council is a social landlord with all the responsibilities that that implies. They just
saw the rising land value and they got greedy.
Without Council tenants blocking the way they realized they
could build tower blocks of luxury apartments rather like the Barbican Centre in the City of London. The rents from rich
private tenants in these luxury apartments would provide a huge annual income for the Council. When they realized
this, the bean counters in the Town Hall got greedier and greedier. But how to get rid of the present Council tenants
in their dilapidated flats? That was the problem.
The idea they came up with was to confuse us with talk of
the regeneration our estate so badly needs. They decided to pull the wool over our eyes - and even try to divide and rule
us by setting the interests of one group of residents against another.
Do you remember at the time of the Housing
Needs Survey - and afterwards - the word was put out that there could be no regeneration without demolition?
They claimed there was no money for the much-needed renovation of our homes unless some of the residents sacrificed their flats
and were forcibly re-housed. This was the big deception.
It was simply not true.
We now know that there
was not only enough money to regenerate Maiden Lane Estate (£17.1 miilion) but also enough to regenerate as many as four
other estates before starting on ours! But again and again, the word was put out that no regeneration could take place unless
it was paid for by demolishing and replacing certain of our residential blocks. There was no truth in this claim. They simply
wanted to be rid of the Council flats which stood in their way so that they could build luxury apartments and make
lots of money from rich private tenants to spend on their favourite estates elsewhere - like the estates in Hampstead and
Bloomsbury.
The shame of this is that our own ward councillors were behind this all. Instead of defending the homes
of the voters who put them in office, they promoted the false link between much-needed regeneration and demolition.
Let us make one thing clear: 'Save All Our Homes' is very much in favour of the true regeneration of our estate.
It is badly needed. But with £171 million in the bank there was no need for the Council to demolish anyone's home
at all. They need £17.1 million to regenerate our estate and that could have been found ten times over from the £171
million they originally had available.
We must not let the Council bamboozle us. They actually have ten
times the money they need to regenerate our estate available right now. The demolition is simply to clear the
way so as to build luxury apartments for rich private clients. That way they plan to make lots of money to
spend on favourite estates elsewhere.
The sad thing is that without all this discussion about demolition
there would have been no controversy at all. Without the controversy, the regeneration of our estate could have
been started years ago. By now, Maiden Lane Estate could be like the Brunswick Centre or the Ossulton Street Estate: our regeneration
could have been finished years ago. By now our windows could have been replaced and our new kitchens fitted. Our roofs
would be water-tight and the exterior walls would be gleaming: they would have been cleaned and painted. The estate would
be a decent place in which to live and raise children.
As it is, we are stuck with yet another six months
of 'discussions' stretching ahead of us. This talk of demolition has held up the renovation of our homes for
years. Without this false link being made between regeneration and demolition we could all be sitting pretty right now - like
the residents on those four other estates - with our homes refurbished.
This is the secret the Council didn't
want us to know. But we have worked it out for ourselves. We have seen through the story we were told. We have seen through
to the council's greed.
Don't let us be fooled like this again. Never again!
_________________________
Nasty, nasty. . .
The deviousness of Camden Council is something that many of us have experienced
for ourselves. But for those who have not yet encountered it, this website will provide examples.
This is not done gratuitously.
With serious matters to decide concerning the future of Maiden Lane Estate, it is important that residents have
a good grasp of the nature of the Council with which we are dealing. The two examples given are from the recent archives
of the Camden New Journal. They do not concern our estate itself, but they are very revealing nevertheless. They
concern the thinking processes and/or cover-ups indulged in by certain senior Council officials. They are useful
therefore to anyone dealing with other senior Council officials on behalf of our estate - either now or in the future. Such
Council officials control important aspects of our lives - and we all ought to know what some of them can
be like.
1. The case of the paedophiles and the primary school.
Click Here.
2. The case of the Council 'looters' and the Council 'cover up'. Click Here.
After reading these accounts of how senior Council officers
have behaved, we should ask ourselves: How far can we afford to trust any senior Council officers? To what
extent can we trust them in their future dealings with Maiden Lane Estate?
__________________________
The Council document: "Investing in Maiden Lane Estate: Exhibition No.2"
This Council booklet came through your letterbox in the summer. It is a misleading document as
it has the word "investing" in its title. From what has been said above, residents will be able to see
that what the Council is proposing is a money-making scheme in which the new buildings are basically for wealthy private
clients rather than for Council tenants. The Council is thinking of the money these luxury private apartments will
make. They are barely thinking at all of the disruption in the lives of the existing residents who, of
course, will be moved aside and forcibly re-housed.
The Council's plan is not to invest in Maiden
Lane Estate at all. They hope to make money from us instead. Under their scheme in the long run the
money flows out of the estate not into it.
Nor are they above deliberately trying to confuse
the picture. The 'rocket composter' they feature in the new document is a worthwhile thing in itself but
compared to the prospect of demolishing up to half the estate and forcibly re-housing up to two hundred decent families, then
it is something of a distraction, isn't it?
Take a look at one of their options. The diagram above is taken from this new document and shows how the
eastern half of the estate will look if the Council gets its way. Allensbury Place, Broadfield Lane, Maiden Lane and Elm
Friars Walk will all disappear. That means the present residents of these blocks will have to apply for new
homes and fight their way through more than 18,000 other applicants to get a replacement roof over their heads.
Nor is the Council above confusing the picture with some pretty 'dodgy' statistics either. Look at the
bar chart below which is taken from the new document.
Look at the left-hand column. There we are told that approximately 30% of the respondants agree 'strongly'
that some areas of the estate should be demolished. But 30% of what? We are given no absolute figures. These statistics were
compiled not from a proper block-by-block ballot of the estate. Far from it. They were compiled at a workshop
that Open Communities held sometime in the summer. Typically at such workshops, some eight or nine people might gather
in a room to listen to a seminar and two or three of them might agree that demolition should take place. Three out of nine
gives the thirty percent mentioned here, but it is in no way a proper and fair way to test opinion for a whole estate.
Open Communities and the Council know this but presumably they hope we won't spot it.
But we have spotted
it, haven't we?
Besides, of the two or three people in the workshop who might have accepted
demolition, did any of them actually stand to lose their own house or flat? Were they simply saying
that someone else should have their home knocked down so that they could get money spent on their own kitchens or
bathrooms? Would they still feel the same if they themselves were the ones to be bulldozed out of their homes? We think
not!
At present it is only the eastern third of the estate that is being threatened with demolition, but Camden
Council and Open Communities have been careful to question people "widely across the estate". This sounds very fair
and democratic but actually it is quite the opposite. The best way to understand that this is a Council trick is to visualize the
following situation: there is a lifeboat, say, with twelve survivors in it. They are running out of fresh water
so they decide someone has to be thrown overboard. They hold a vote to decide if the ship's cabin boy should be sacrificed.
Not surprisingly, the vote goes 11-1 against the boy. The Council would declare this to be democratic which, superficially
it appears to be. But it is not. It is monstrously unfair on the cabin boy if only his name is to be voted upon. What about
the other eleven? They run no risk of being thrown overboard yet get to vote on whether the cabin boy lives or dies.
In our present situation on Maiden Lane Estate, only the eastern residents are under threat of demolition but
the Council cleverly sets up a situation where it appears their "survey" is democratic. People on the western side
of the estate are invited to say whether their eastern neighbours get to be evicted or not. But it doesn't work
the other way round. The easterners are like the cabin boy. Where is the fairness in asking the westerners if only the easterners
should lose their homes?
If you then go on to suggest to the westerners that their flats would be "regenerated"
if they would only agree that easterners should be forced out of their homes, then the stage is set for a great injustice
against the easterners, but one masquerading as a "democratic" survey. Do you see how devious the Council can be?
The document extolls the advantages of what they term 'regeneration'. We agree that regeneration or more
accurately 'refurbishment' would be a good thing for our estate. But there does not have to be any demolition
to achieve this regeneration. In fact, as described above, these endless 'consultations' are actually delaying the
start of our regeneration.
The Council is bound by law to refurbish our estate and raise our flats
and houses to the Decent Homes Standard. They have to have this completed by 2012: it's the law. All
we, as residents, need to do is refuse to accept any demolition, sit tight, and the Council will be compelled to
renovate our estate anyway. The money will then come out of their own funds - the £171 million mentioned earlier
- just like it did for the other four estates described above!
__________________________
September
3rd: Night of Horror
At the Thursday meeting with Open Communities,
Tom Hopkins, their managing director, announced to the nine residents present that the Council's plan is
not to allow the people of the estate any vote on the issue of demolition. He said the Council wants to take
their decision after the May local election this year and if they get their way no vote of residents at all
will be held. This atrocious and undemocratic plan will be fought tooth and nail by the Save All Our Homes
campaign, of course. We will demand that the residents be consulted in a properly constituted vote - and that it be conducted
not by the Council but by an organization everyone can trust such as the Electoral Reform Society.
 We have been here before, of course. At the founding meeting of Save All Our Homes, Cllr Rawlings gave his
word to us all that the residents would be given a vote on the matter of demolition. Save All Our Homes wrote to
Cllr Rawlings months ago and followed it up with other messages. But the councillor has gone to ground and will not answer
our letter.
Could it be that Cllr Rawlings has reneged on the promise he gave to 170 of his constituents - and
just before an election, too?
Surely not!
__________________________
April Fool!
 On April 1st 2009, there was an Executive Committee Meeting of the Council. At the meeting,
the so-called "Regeneration Plan" for Maiden Lane Estate was discussed. Our ward councillor, Paul Braithwaite, spoke
in glowing terms of this plan to demolish up to half the estate and so evict his own voters. He even tried
to suggest that only one resident opposed the scheme!
Before shooting himself in the foot like this, Cllr Braithwaite should have consulted Ben Rawlings, his fellow ward
councillor. Cllr Rawlings, unlike Paul Braithwaite, actually did have to face up to the hundred and seventy
angry Maiden Lane Estate residents at the March 2008 meeting. Paul Braithwaite should also have spoken to our MP,
Frank Dobson, who would no doubt have put him properly in the picture, too.
 At the December 9th Executive Committee
meeting it happened again. This time Cllr Braithwaite was joined by Cllr Carver. Ignoring the delegation of their own voters,
both these "representatives of the people" proceeded to praise the demolition scheme to the skies. This continued
until they were brought up short by another councillor who read out to the whole Chamber the EMB's statement for a second
time. To the consternation of Cllrs Braithwaite and Carver this was received with applause by their assembled voters
whose interests they were meant to be representing.
Do
Cllrs Braithwaite and Carver not realize that in only two months' time they will have to
face the same voters they are presently planning to bulldoze out of their homes?
__________________________
Support
from Unison
Philip
Lewis is co-convenor of the Unison Culture &
Environment Directorate. He writes:
"Best
of luck in your campaign to keep your
community centre
- and stopping
the demolition of 215 homes on your estate."
__________________________
|
 |
|
THE COUNCIL WANTS TO DEMOLISH HALF THE ESTATE!
WHY DO THEY WANT TO DO THIS?
For decades Camden Council has been starving our estate of funds. We all know this. The exterior walls
of our properties, for example, have never been re-painted - even though the estate is over thirty years old!
These walls are grimy and mildewed. Our roofs leak and the windows keep falling out. Interior repairs to our homes seem
never to get done either. We can see this neglect of the property all around us: it is plain to see. At the same
time other Council estates have had money lavished on them. The Brunswick Centre in Bloomsbury has been renovated
- and has even had the latest Pilkington nanotechnology windows fitted. These windows are so advanced they even clean
themselves! Near Agar Grove, Gairloch House has only just been renovated too. Why not our estate?
The answer is that years ago, senior Council officials found that they were
not up to the task of managing such a large estate and they long ago planned to get rid of us. The best way they thought was
to palm us off to a financial consortium which would take over the management - at a price. This was the ill-starred Private
Finance Initiative which was soundly rejected in a ballot by the estate residents.
But the problem is the senior Council officials had gambled on the PFI going ahead. On the assumption that
they would no longer have to worry about us at all they began starving our estate of funds - which they thought would
be wasted on us. This money came in handy for renovating all the smaller estates nearby which the Council officials
were happy to retain under their control.
This
gamble went on for years and the Council made hardly any provision for repairs and maintenance of Maiden Lane Estate. When
the new administration took over the Council following the election, nothing changed. The promise of getting over £280
million from central government came to nothing. The Council was in a fix. The government Decent Homes Standard was
being broken every day on our estate - and Council officials estimated it would take some £17-18 million to bring our
estate up to this legal minimum. This was our money but they had spent it on other estates over some ten or more
years, not on us.
So they came up with a new plan.
Not a PFI this time. No, the Council thought they'd knock down half the estate and build high tower blocks of luxury
apartments for rich people instead. This way they could use the rent from these wealthy tenants for the so-called
'Regeneration' of the lucky half of the estate.
And what would happen to the unlucky half of the estate? Well, these residents would be kicked out of their
homes, of course. The community would thus be split in two. Unlucky residents on the York Way side would be 'redistributed'
wherever the Council could find a place to put them. Thus elderly, sick and disabled - as well as children and working parents
would be uprooted and moved around Camden just because Council officials had gambled wrongly some ten or more years ago -
and had starved us of so much money that our estate was now breaking the Decent Homes Standard and needed £17-18 million
to bring it up to the legal minimum for civilized living.
Why should the unlucky residents be made to pay for the mistakes and short-sightedness of Council officials over all these
years?
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BUT WHAT IF I'M NOT THREATENED BY DEMOLITION?
If you are not presently threatened
with demolition, you are perhaps unluckiest of all. Be warned: this is a rolling plan. The Council want to isolate a
few blocks on the York Way side of the estate and cram in their new tower blocks. Then when they're making their
money from the extra rents they'll pick off another group of residents in other blocks and kick them out in the same way
- so making even more money for the Council. Do
you believe that once the extra rents start coming in they'll stop at just one or two unlucky blocks? Of course they won't!
Their unstated plans are to do more and more of this demolition so as to make more and more money to spend on their favourite
estates elsewhere. And in the meantime? For the people not affected by the first
wave of evictions, what will life be like? Well, there'll be lorries coming and going all day - and possibly at night,
too. There'll be pile-driving, noise, dirt and disturbance. And it will go on for years. This is because the residents
who are left will find themselves living on a building site - for years and years into the future. BUT IS THERE REALLY NO MONEY FOR OUR ESTATE? Each
year the Council takes in approximately £4 million in rents from residents on our estate. But owing to past mistakes
by senior housing officials, a 'historic debt' hangs round the neck of Maiden Lane. The effect of this
is that a quarter of this annual rent income has to be spent each year in simply servicing this past debt. This means £1
million from your rents goes straight back to the bank each year and this sum is never seen by the residents
at all. Worse still, as reported by Kate Purcell and Rachel Zatz in their excellent Forum article (March 13, 2008 issue
of the Camden New Journal), there is something else that the Council would definitely prefer us not
to think about. Kate and Rachel, former vice-chairs of the EMB, point out that the Council is prepared
to spend £10 million refurbishing its own offices in Bidborough House while simultaneously planning
the demolition of our own homes - even though the Council has some £50 million in reserve completely
untouched.
WHAT ABOUT THE £413 MILLION?
So why is there so little money left for the Maiden Lane Estate that they need
to start knocking it down and uprooting residents from their homes? In August 2008, Maiden Lane Estate residents
got their answer. There is enough money! Indeed, in their letter to all Camden residents, Cllrs Naylor and King
wrote that the council was now committed to spending nothing less than £413 million in the next few years in bringing
Camden homes up to the legal standard. They said that work would begin in September, 2008 and even named the building contractors
involved!
So why do residents on our estate have to put up with being evicted when there's nearly half
a billion pounds earmarked for refurbishment of Camden council housing? The answer is, we don't! We don't
have to put up with it at all!
And equally obviously the Council must have been misleading us over the years -
as well as diverting our money to other estates - when they pleaded that there was no money left for Maiden Lane. The
newly-announced £413 million makes clear they were being 'economical with the truth' all along!
So what is the Council's real intention? The answer to this must lie in the value of the land that
our estate sits on. As we are right next to the new Eurostar terminal, they have clearly calculated that they could make more
money by evicting "mere council tenants" and replacing us with rich people in tower-block luxury
apartments. It is this intention - and this greed - that we are up against and that is why we must fight.
LEASEHOLDERS AND THE CREDIT CRUNCH.
Ten percent of
residents on the estate are leaseholders. For these residents, the suggestion that they should willingly submit their homes
to compulsory purchase by the Council makes very poor financial sense. Compulsory purchase is always a bad recompense for
the roof over one's head. In essence, the Council decides how much they are prepared to give you for your home and
you will not have any further say in the matter. Worse still, with the recession; the credit crunch, international
banks collapsing about our ears - and, of course, the mortgage drought - now is not the time to submit your family to
the not-so-tender mercies of Camden Council's compulsory purchase department!
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THE COUNCIL'S ORIGINAL PLAN
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Frank Dobson writes from the House of Commons: 
