Category: HOUSING

A LOTTA SQUATTER BOOKS

ONE OF THE first of our services the Tories lined up for destruction was libraries. To your average Tory, too rich to need a public library, it was easy to spread the ‘no-one uses libraries anymore’ lie. However, those less well-off know that libraries play a massive part in the lives of the community, young and old. It is a place where those of us without private school educations can develop and nurture a love of reading. But all over the country, resistance has been seemingly futile, and dozens of libraries have been closed. However, at least one community is showing us all how to hit back and keep hitting the books. In 2011, Barnet Council took the unpopular decision to close the Friern Barnet library; immediately, a campaign group was set up, protesting outside and inside council sessions and spreading the word. When the library closure went ahead anyway, (with pro-closure councillor Judith Beckman admitting “I don’t know where the library is”), locals refused to give up, mounting round the clock pickets of the library. And when council vans turned up to remove the books, locals used a phone tree call-out and soon dozens of people were blocking the entrance, keeping the books where they belong. Since then, the group has been deadlocked in negotiations with Barnet Council, who are offering a replacement ‘library’ in a small room miles from the original building. Locals refused, and so the stand-off continued.

That is until a small group of squatters entered the library, immediately re-opening it with a collection of donated books, and were welcomed with open arms. Today, the library remains open four days a week, staffed by local volunteers, and is as well used as before the shut down. The library squatters, and the residents of Barnet, have set an example for us all. The government has never been interested in the average person and has been quite happy to rob us of the things we want and need, hiding behind banner of ‘deficit reduction’. Protesting has a time and a place, but like the residents of Barnet, if we want to win back our public services, we need to stop asking nicely and rip our libraries, schools, hospitals and workplaces back from the hands of sell-out politicians and run them by ourselves, for ourselves.

THE TADPOLES OF TOADY HALL

NORTH SWINDON RESIDENTS have been left furious at their council’s decision to push ahead with the building of nearly 1,700 new homes on greenfield land. Despite worries that the new Tadpole Farm development will bulldoze yet more of the town’s green spaces and create a serious flooding hazard, Crest Nicholson (who have a long history of building on flood plains, and recently tried to concrete over 150 allotments in Bath) and an assortment of Tory Councillors have pushed the project through. The decision comes despite the new South Swindon Wichelstowe development laying more or less empty, with no signs of filling up. Add this to the fact that, as of the last count, there were 2,518 empty residential properties falling into disrepair around Swindon (with a further 5,000 throughout Wiltshire), and the case for new build starts to fall apart. Local politicians and construction companies will always play the ‘creating new jobs’ card when defending their plans, but this argument has never added up. With regulations on the quality of new buildings at an all-time low, planning regulations governing green land more meaningless than ever, and provisions for building ‘affordable’ housing practically non-existent, new builds represent a license for construction companies to print money, while foisting cowboy constructed, overpriced housing on the rest of us.

If local councillors and housing companies really cared about Swindon, and job creation, they would be far more willing to invest in sprucing up the town’s empties and offering them as social housing to ease an already overflowing council-house waiting list of over 13,000. The development at Tadpole farm is nothing more than big business exploring more ways to rake in massive profits at our expense, all with the eager help of their Tory toadies.

 

DIDDLY SQUAT?

THE LIVES OF squatters and the vulnerably housed will be made ever more interesting from 1st September, thanks to the Coalition’s new law – the tongue-tying s144 LASPO 2012. According to the Advisory Service for Squatters: “Not everyone who is squatting, or considered by others to be squatting, will be affected by the new law, but people will need to be prepared to explain, quite forcefully at times, why they are not affected.” For the exact wording of the law, see A.S.S.’s site (http://www.squatter.org.uk). Adding further to this, an internal police Powerpoint presentation is doing the rounds with the Met and other forces, on how to deal with the new law and the superpowers it bestows. Crucially, in situations where the new law has no impact (such as in non-residential buildings, or in buildings where the occupiers have been tricked into entering by bogus letting agents), police who desperately want to make an arrest are given a list of other crimes to try to fit up with.

SPAIN IN THE ARSE

Spanish Unions Get All Robin Hood Against The Cuts

ACROSS EUROPE, MILLIONS of ordinary people have been fighting back against massive cuts to jobs, wages and welfare. There have been protests, occupations, strikes, direct actions and even the odd riot. But now, members of the Spanish field workers’ union, Sindicato Andaluz de Trabajadores, along with supporters, have stepped it up by raiding one supermarket and forcing another to ‘donate’ most of its produce, before distributing the looted groceries to impoverished families. Hundreds of union members entered supermarkets in the towns of Seville and Cadiz, filled up their trolleys and, after a tussle with security, left without paying. The food was distributed via locally co-ordinated food banks. The actions saw only two arrests, one being the mayor of Marinaleda, who stated “If I end up in jail because I highlighted the crisis, it will be an honour.” A second supermarket raider said “we are taking some food and giving it to families who are having a really hard time. If this is stealing, then I’m guilty.” These food runs follow in the footsteps of similar actions by Greek anarchists which have become increasingly widespread over the past five years.

The week after the supermarket sweep, hundreds of union members in hard-hit Andalusia (where unemployment has risen to 40%) broke down the fencing of an estate owned by the Duke of Segobore, occupied the land and set up a ‘communal agriculture project’. Diego Canamero, of the Andalusian Union of Workers, said: “We’re here to denounce a social class who leave such a place to waste”. The lavish well-kept gardens, house, and pool are left empty, as the Duke lives in Seville, more than 60 miles away. Commenting on this, an unemployed farm-worker taking part in the occupation said “Nobody lives here now, but the sprinklers are functioning and keeping the lawns beautifully green. Just imagine how many farmers’ wages you could pay instead of watering empty gardens.”

Mostly, the situation in Spain is dire, with the top 10% earning 12 times the average wage. Unemployment stands at 25%, higher amongst the youth, and 22% of families have plunged below the poverty line. And if planned cuts over the next decade go ahead, things look set to get much worse.

In light of this, the looters and occupiers have realised that, while protesting against cuts is important, if we are to survive, we need to start taking what we need from the rich, who would let us go homeless and starve rather than sharing the wealth. All we should care about is the fact that we need food, housing, healthcare and, hell, some entertainment once in a while, and we still live in a continent of plenty. Despite (or because of) the recession, whilst we’ve all been tightening our belts, the richest in our country – and all across Europe – have been hoarding even more wealth. Soon the time will come when we have to start taking some of it back for ourselves: trip to Tesco’s anyone?