At least forty people protested at Lambeth Town Hall last night in a bid to ‘save’ their homes from demolition, and halt evictions.
Save Cressingham Gardens campaigners demonstrated with other local housing groups – from the Guinness Trust, Leigham Court, and others – supported by local residents and business owners.
“It’s a corporate council, not a cooperative council,” said local business owner and campaigner, Rashid Nix.
Nix and other protestors led the crowd in chants of ‘Social housing, not social cleansing’, while banners and placards bore the slogans ‘One whole community sold out by Labour’, and ‘Southwark says: Hands off our homes’.
The protest took place as a full council meeting went ahead inside the Town Hall, where a petition – now with over x signatures – was handed over to councillors.
The council has yet to make a decision on the contested redevelopment of the sites.
Residents of Loughborough Park have launched a petition against the eviction of vulnerable residents on the Guinness Trust estate.
Lambeth United Housing Co-operative’s petition has reached over 2,500 signatories.
I would like to have a contact with the Loughborough Estate as a Guinness South estate tenant living in Whitehawk, Brighton. I am now a 54 year old Southern Asian looking man and have lived in housing association homes and council homes since the age of 9 years old. I spent four years on the South Lambeth estate in Vauxhall in the 1980s as well as having friends in central Brixton behind the Ritzy and on Coldharbour Lane as well and again in co-operative housing. So my Brixton connections are previously strong and I grew up in neighbouring Balham.
I exchanged into this flat from Haringey and a London & Quadrant flat. I found London & Quadrant much better organised. There have been leaks into neighbouring flats in Dec 2013 that could have resulted in a more serious emergency. Guinness South seem almost incapable of organising basic repairs in this flat even after clear communications that reveal they were irresponsible as a landlord in regard to fixing the leak at the beginning of January. I have some very solid evidence of an e-mail conversation that indicates an attempt to avoid an environmental health officer visiting this and neighbouring flats even after the leak. As well, the fact I have allergies was practically ignored following this leak as well concerning my mental health problem. Subsequent repair of cistern was moved to a planning area leading to further problems. I have encountered regular racist verbal abuse and concerning problem my mental health. With changes in local care day centre care I asked for the flat to be improved including the mould removed so I could exchange back to London. This was nearly one year ago. What is very, very clear is that verbal harrassment as well has made this problem worse. The constant verbal abuse has significantly damaged.
[…] good media coverage. There was an long article in SWLondoner and two articles on the Brixton Blog. This article covers the protest, this article covers the council […]