Decent Homes For All!

Pic by Slaminsky

Yesterday myself and many others were outside the town hall all day going hungry for housing. The Hackney Housing Group, part of London Coalition Against Poverty have been working for over a year and a half now to raise awareness of living conditions in the borough’s ‘Temporary’ Accommodation Hostels, which many in the group have been or still are resident in, as well as Hackney’s housing crisis in general. The group is calling for Hackney Council to provide more social housing and provide decent homes for all.

The fasting day comes after a busy year and a half of events and protests to raise awareness of the direct effects of Hackney’s housing crisis and the councils damaging policies. The housing group have held protests and occupations at the Housing Office and Homeless People’s Unit to demand their rights and the respect they deserve. They have marched against the conditions in Hackney’s Hostels. They met with managers from the Housing Department as well as local MPs and they have hijacked council meetings to get their voices heard but as yet the council and others have not listened. And all this while Hackney Council spends over £1 million ‘regenerating’ Dalston. Building private, unaffordable flats.

The fight for decent housing for all continues.

And so, the Housing Group hosted a fasting day at the Town Hall Square. There were face paints and media galore! Adults and children a-like  painted their ideal house on our giant street. Come 6pm we all shared a beautiful meal cooked by Shirley and held a rally. More pictures coming soon….

You can read more about the Housing Group’s fast on the London Coalition Against Poverty website, Hackney Gazette, Hackney Citizen more coming soon including video hopefully.

Check out this animation about Temporary Accommodation made by children in Newham that I found on the Bad Housing Blog

 

Community art and protest go hand in hand. I think the event reached a lot of people yesterday. Well done all those involved and look out for it on BBC London News!

And now this Fool is getting ready for a week of Playwork before setting back to the printing.