Woodberry down guardian article

dion

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/may/18/-sp-truth-about-gentrification-how-woodberry-down-became-woodberry-park

Arkady

Pretty one-sided, but it does highlight many of the lessons that need to be learned from this kind of scheme – not least that promises to residents absolutely must be kept, and development must not be used as an excuse to increase rents.

JoeV

Why do you consider it one-sided?<div><br></div><div><br></div>

Arkady

A number of things. The one thing that kept striking me was how they kept describing the new development as a ghetto. The reality is that an area previously dominated by a single disadvantaged socioeconomic class is being transformed into a much more mixed neighbourhood, in which social, affordable and private tenants all live on the same streets (if not in the same buildings) – the opposite of ghettoisation. Rather, it represents the transformation of the estate into a more typical London neighbourhood, with all of the positives that brings in terms of aspiration and social mobility, pride, reduction in crime, etc.<br><br>As I noted, there are many lessons to learn from this and similar projects – indeed some of the lessons should have been learned already. (Labour) Hackney have some hard questions to answer about why some of the most vulnerable have been left disadvantaged. But this article struck me as only a partial account.<br><br>Remember also that Hackney, just like everywhere else in London, is *required* to intensify and build more housing in accordance with the London Plan. Failing to do so will make everyone’s living costs more expensive. If not at Woodberry Downs, where? This wasn’t addressed by the article as far as I recall.<br><br>Worth noting that Clegg announced more significant borrow-to-build powers for local authorities last week. That may mean that local authorities can build more housing without being as reliant on private developers – which in turn could mean a higher percentage of council and affordable housing.<br>

dion

and it was written by Guardian journalists.

kreuzkav

Ben is really charging in on his anti-labour horse here.  Have to admire him for seizing the day on this forum.

JoeV

@BenMyring -- I don't like the word ghetto either, or least how it's casually used, like Nazi, but segregation is segregation. What this development essentially does is place a private gated community in the middle of an area than has housed lower income Londoners. This is a land grab pure and simple. leaving aside the issue of class and income and broken promises, two quotes from the article stand out:<div><br></div><div>'By 2031, around 2,000 council or former council homes will have been demolished and replaced with more than 5,500 units on the estate.'</div><div><br></div><div>'Before Woodberry Down began its metamorphosis into Woodberry Park, it had 1,555 social rented homes: 78.5% of the entire estate. By the time it finishes, it will have only 1,088 socially rented homes.'</div><div><br></div><div>I'm not a mathematician but based on the numbers who gains and who loses?</div><div><br></div><div>An example of how it could be done:</div><div><br></div><div>http://www.theguardian.com/society/2012/dec/04/london-homes-rich-poor-communities</div>;

dion

It was a land grab when the big houses there were compulsory purchased by the labour government in the 30s, the residents forced to leave the area and poor compensation for them having to leave the homes that they had often lived in for generations

David Barry

What jumped out to me about the article was the way in which, so far, 61 per cent of the  open market properties, mostly sold as buy to let investments, were sold to overseas buyers, with the hint that, in at least some cases, some of the buyers may have been led by slick marketing to pay more than they ought.<div><br></div><div>If this sort of thing has become really widespread, and there are other stories of it, it would explain:-</div><div><br></div><div>1. Why there is so much talk now about a house price "bubble"</div><div><br></div><div>2. Why prices seem to be rising in a way disconnected from Londoners ability to pay</div><div><br></div><div>3. Why this time, as house prices rise in London they are still failing to rise in the rest of the country.</div><div><br></div><div>It cant go on.......</div>

miss annie

People want to live here. For as long as there are rich people or people with generous parents (and there are plenty of them), house prices will rise. Also, a house in central London is a safer investment than gold bars for foreign money. The obsession with, and possibility of, owning a house in London is a relatively new thing for the working classes. Ask your parents/grandparents.

David Barry

Actually my point is that the market is being dominated by people who want to OWN property here, rather than by people who want to LIVE here.<div><br></div><div>Now obviously there is an overlap between the two groups, but possibly we are in a period where this overlap is smaller than usual...</div>

graeme

@Miss Annie, the obsession you mention is more a desire for self-reliance and self-determination, which is now purposefully being denied generations of reasonably well-off working/middle-class Londoners, to repay banks their losses from 2008- (see HtB and faked low IR).     <div><br></div><div>It's not the obsession with owning somewhere to live that's killing parts of the economy - it's the obsession with people expecting to be made rich because they saw it on Location Location Location.  If value is added to the property, fine.  If an improving economy, with rising wages allows prices to go up, fine.  But that is not the case.  <div><br></div><div><div>If HtB-taxpayer-supported-housing, land grabs, sweeteners for developers with little social responsibility, tax-breaks for BTL, empty flats with unrealistic rents, stretched public services etc. is the kind of city/country we want, we'll be there soon enough.  </div><div><br></div><div>Rich parents and their rich offspring are likely to have tax-efficient/offshore means of paying less than the 28-50% your average worker pays to the Treasury - does that sound like a reasonable proposition for any developed nation to base growth on?  "Yes, come to the financial engine of our country, don't bother paying the same taxes as perhaps a working population would pay - they've started to leave now anyway.  But that's ok - we just take 4% Stamp Duty on that luxury one-bed flat you're buying in Seven Sisters..."<div><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><br></span></div><div>I think David Barry is looking at the wider picture of wanting to live somewhere with a functioning economy, which raises all ships.  Currently, all but the rich, the investors, and some of the old people, appear to be drowning.</div><div><div><br></div></div></div></div></div>

kreuzkav

@ Graeme, well put.  My parents, aspiring working class just wanted to have a home and back in the 70s could afford as double incomers on modest wages to mortgage a house, not as an investment but as a place to live. The 70s fantasy about people 40 years from now living on space stations didn't come true but the cramped conditions were spot on. It's crazy the government allow this city to be bought up by foreign investors as <span style="font-size: 10pt;">a commodity to trade.</span>

miss annie

Yours must have been better off than mine Kreuzkav, my mum had to borrow money from my nan to buy our house in the 70s. I don't think the situation is good, or that it is right but I do not see how it is likely to change under any party. The Tories have plenty to answer for but do you think a Labour government would block foreign investors? Who would then buy all the 'luxury flats'? I doubt developers would reduce the prices for the middle classes as they will have banked on achieving a high price. So what...yet more empty buildings? And which party will be brave enough to hike a hefty whack of tax onto the middle class (in my experience that is generally the case), buy to letters? Think what a vote loser that would be. I'm prepared to bet that half the members of this forum are landlords. When I said rich parents I didn't mean millionaires, I meant those with well off retired parents with good pensions, that own houses now worth a million, and are happy to dip into the pension pot to help their offspring out. I know quite a few of those. I have never imagined that I might own a flat in London. They have always been out of my price range, even in the 80s. Why people on modest salaries imagine that they should automatically be able to afford to buy property in zone 1&2 is beyond me. I would be massively in favour of rent control. I am happy to rent and the system that exists in other cities would suit me just fine, although I don't suppose that will ever happen. I don't know how you tackle the housing crisis. I would heftily tax buy to let, use the cash to fund building council housing, relax the stringent council referrals to housing association rules slightly and force councils trace owners of empty properties so that they can be massively taxed.

kreuzkav

Miss Annie.  Both my parents had working class jobs.  Post office and nurse.  Jobs anyone who had a backbone and a few braincells could do.  The 70s were a time for working class people to aspire.  You love that word. And they did, and did well.<div><br></div><div>And their parents were Irish piss poor peasants who they didn't have the luxury of borrowing from.</div>

miss annie

Clearly my mum was a spineless, brainless loser then, rather than a parent with two jobs. My nan was a widow who worked at the Post Office too when she gave up being a bus conductor. Thank you for choosing which words I do and don't like, I'll make sure I consult you when I next need to write something important.

kreuzkav

Miss Annie, I never said she was loaded but you insinuated my parents got some backhander when if anything they were eldest kids who sent home money.  You stated that your parents got a leg up.  My parents paid their mortgage through working class graft, no inheritance.  You have stated before that you like working class aspiring class. My parents were and it was possible then.  Now it's harder, especially when it comes to housing.

miss annie

You keep using that word insinuate. I don't think it means what you think it means.

kreuzkav

If you're from such a hard working class background why are you such an apologist for the royal family and other trust funders who've had it easy.  It baffles me.  You seem to hate your own hard working class background.

ADGS

The idea that the working classes are all republicans doesn't stand up to the least bit of scrutiny. 

kreuzkav

I agree.  What idiot do you think I am.  A lot of Tory voters are working class.  And ADGS most of my friends are middle<span style="font-size: 10pt;"> class.  I just use the Kreuzkav character as a weapon to attack the growing creep of poshness in this area.  And I have posh friends. I like who I like.  But on here I attack the growing nature of Stroud Green poshness.</span>

kreuzkav

Back to Woodberry Down.  I used to pass Woodberry Down in the early 90s on the 253 from Hackney and think that it was a bit edgy.  Shortly after this I got to know a couple there and visited their flat every week or two.  Sometimes we'd walk their dog to the resevoir .  I met a lot of the people on the estate who were very lovely. the flats were very well built in a bauhaus style.  Lots of trees.  Lovely green space behind.  Now it's been carved up for an elite to buy up.

Perflexed

<span class="Apple-style-span">As far as Working class aspiration goes, I think Simon Cowell perceived it </span>perfectly- <span class="Apple-style-span"> as if a sculptor would, "the angel within the block of marble". As far as the rest of this thread goes you may as well rail against the tide. I agree it's depressing, there are many wrongs going on here, shameless profiteering with state sanctioned largess, (in recent history from both left & right), but the linked article is clumsy & lopsided and does not even manage to explain the complexity of the problem let alone offer a solution. </span>

kreuzkav

The solution is social housing and state intervention. Why do you associate working class with Simon Cowell and x factor.  Bowie, Bolan and lots of the most amazing artist were from working class background.  <div><br></div><div>Real Labour intervention.  NHS, a take over of blocks of housing, Giving it back to the people who work here. It's not rocket science but as long as the apologists go, oh those were the old days and let the investors in, London is ruined</div>

Perflexed

Oops! I meant Disraeli, easy mistake.

kreuzkav

Disraeli, assimilation, big society to shut down post war dreams.  Before you patronise.  I know Disraeli existed before that time.  And I don't have a tv or watch x-factor.

Perflexed

Oh! FFS I was trying to bring some levity to a grim reality, and for what it's worth, I don't have a TV either, nor as it would seem, a fridge packed with tins of lager. 

kreuzkav

Well, let's push for a better fairer world then.  

Perflexed

Agreed. I was looking for something to do tomorrow anyway.

kreuzkav

Don't give up, we can change it. I thought I was negative. Are you really that LibDem guy called Ben, Arky?  The guy who is going to ruin Stroud Green with his big developments.

kreuzkav

And this is my message to Arky, BenMyring.   You told me I'm negative but you've spent your campain attacking Labour.  I'm sure you will get a few potholes covered but your LibDem ideology is crass and you joined up with the Conservatives.  You want to make Stroud Green middle class with a nod to the working class.  They're there to be tolerated.  <div><br></div><div>Advice to people. don't vote for him or the other middle class Lib Dem candidates.  They want to turn this area into a development.  </div><div><br></div><div>Just say NO NO NO.  </div><div><br></div><div><br></div>