A banner saying that the former Euro car parts depot at 34 Acre Lane has been squatted has appeared outside the building.
It lists some of the grievances many hold against Lambeth council, including Cressingham Gardens and the Network Rail arches, and displays a good grasp of local history by foregrounding the great Olive Morris, a squatters’ leader in Brixton from the seventies who has, ironically, given her name to the council’s nearby offices and also features on Brixton Pound notes.
Thanks Tom. I had been handing out the latest Bugle outside Brixton tube and was lugging a bundle up Acre Lane when I snapped the sign on my phone otherwise I’d have popped in to get more details. Opposite we’ve just lost Diamond Merchants (major south London plumbing suppliers for over 25 years) and their partners Diamond (Tool) Hire.
It’s been there since Monday actually, and the squatters have been there about a month.
I’m informed by my housemate that a bunch of yuppy idiots were shouting in the street last night, doing coke in plain sight and jumping all over someone’s car. One of the squatters came down and shooed them away – something like “Get the F-out of Brixton.”
The squatters don’t smash bottles under our bedroom windows our piss all over the street; they’re even in bed before us usually. Much nicer neighbours than some of the (sorry to name names but v true) Blues Kitchen and Barrio crowd.
Fractiousness and fragmentation, and anger and unrest will always be bubbling close to the surface in Brixton while you have this clash of cultures living such different lives so close together (and what hope is there under a Brexiteer Labour MP?).
*’or piss’. Definitely not ‘our piss’…