So, I’m trying to make things a little more interactive and here is my first (rather pathetic) attempt at video logging (or Vlogging).
This is me challenging every council in England to redefine what ‘affordable housing’ means.
Critique welcomed.

You can also vie it at this short link: http://youtu.be/uQMlSDjZM9w

Stokey Local campaign literature [http://stokeylocal.org.uk/]

I’ve lived in Stoke Newington for 15 years and there have been many changes in that time, some good, some bad.  Putting a large chain superstore right in the centre would definitely be filed under ‘bad’ and is plain wrong on so many counts.

I frequently walk around the Church Street/High Street junction area, and anyone familiar with central Stoke Newington will know the very busy bus stops and the alleyway to Wilmer Place, which is tucked between the High Street and the wonderful Abney Park Cemetery.

The development would rip out the existing Wilmer Industrial Estate at the back of Wilmer Place,  which currently houses 30-40 small local business units.  It would replace that with a new Sainsbury’s and some new housing.  It will also get rid of a small row of businesses and 6 flats on the High Street.

Not the housing we need

Stoke Newington, like the rest of Hackney and London generally, has a housing crisis, where truly affordable, secure housing is like gold-dust.  That’s the problem – it’s so sought after if you apply demand-supply market economics it becomes far too expensive for most local people.

The development promises only 18% affordable rental housing and 10% shared ownership, which primarily benefits middle income people but is usually included as part of the ‘affordable’ allocations.  Most of the housing units (72%) will be sold at market rates, and with ‘views over Abney Park’ I can imagine the pricetag.  The affordable rental allocation amounts to only 12 housing units, of which 4 will be rented at up to 60-70% market rates. Only 8 units will be rented at up to 50% market rates.  This is clearly not enough affordable housing and it isn’t truly affordable anyway.

If the housing crisis is to be properly dealt with, schemes must put local housing need before the profits of property developers.  People in Stoke Newington, like people in the rest of Hackney, need secure truly affordable rented housing, which probably means below 50% of market rates, not elite housing with a few so-called ‘affordable’ units added on.  Hackney Council is also part of the problem – it needs a housing policy which requires housing developments to meet local people’s actual housing needs.

Bad for the local economy

The new Sainsbury’s, it is claimed, would create jobs.  It’s true that it will take people to stack shelves and staff the checkouts – although with automated checkouts those jobs are diminishing.  But what about the small businesses that will be evicted when the 30-40 small business units are demolished to make way for the development?  Some will relocate, possibly out of the area, and the costs of relocation for small businesses in the current climate is not good.  But some may simply shut up shop.

Local community group Stokey Local has undertaken surveys showing that small-scale local businesses often trade with each other, which strengthens the local economy and helps other small businesses in the area.  This is backed up by new economics foundation studies, which show that the strength of the economy locally is bolstered by local businesses trading with each other, which keeps money circulating in the area.  (A local business uses a locally-based accountant, not an in-house professional based elsewhere, for example.)

A big supermarket chain is a different beast entirely.  It will, without a doubt, make money, but a ‘plc’ (public limited company) like Sainsbury’s is listed on the stock exchange and actually has a duty to its shareholders to return all profits to them.  That’s simply what it’s designed to do, and what its senior staff will be paid extremely high salaries to achieve.

Do we ‘need’ a supermarket?

Supermarket proposers always argue that the new store is something the local area ‘needs’ and they also argue that it will not have a negative impact on existing local businesses.  Neither is true.

Stokey Local undertook a very useful survey of existing local shops in the immediate locality.  They found that 24 shops sell fresh vegetables, 22 sell fresh fruit, 19 sell fresh meat, 9 sell fresh fish, 10 have deli counters 27 sell dairy products, 29 sell bread, 19 sell frozen food, 30 sell things for the larder, 25 sell alcohol, 22 sell household cleaning products, 2 are pharmacies, 20 sell newspapers and 32 sell confectionery.

This is an interesting finding in its own right, and also demonstrates the excellent breadth of independent shops in the area – something that many areas in London and across the UK have sadly lost.  But it also shows how much local shops are vulnerable to a new supermarket that would sell all these products.  Could it really be the case that these local businesses would not suffer as a result?

Supermarkets are not cheaper!

Stokey Local’s surveys also show that, contrary to many assumptions, the prices in these local shops were in fact cheaper than chain supermarkets’ prices. The problem for local shops isn’t that the supermarket goods are cheaper, it’s that people think they are and so adjust their shopping patterns, visiting local shops less.

Impact on Abney Park and bats

The proximity to Abney Park Cemetery, which is a local nature reserve, is also a worry.  Bats are well known to use the Park (I’ve seen them!), but no nocturnal bat survey has been undertaken.  The impact on heritage trees and seeing the development from the Park also concern local people and park users.

Let’s stop it!  Object no later than Friday 21st September.

This is a bad proposal on many fronts.  It’s not the answer to local housing or economic problems.  It’s not wanted, it’s not needed and it will damage Stoke Newington in many ways.  Please add your voice to the growing opposition to this disastrous proposal, and submit your objection before 16 September.  Make it a personal response, for maximum effect, and tell Stokey Local that you are objecting.

If Hackney Council values the views of the local community, it must listen to us and reject this unwanted scheme.

Danny Bates

Danny has lived in Hackney for 15 years, mostly in Stoke Newington.  He is an member and campaigner with the Green Party, and works in the London Green MEP Office, also based in Hackney.

Damien Clarkson writes for the case of a local currency for Hackney

Recently, I was pleased to read in the Hackney Citizen about the work currently underway to introduce a local currency (Hackney Pound). In the few areas where a local currency has been introduced in England, it has been proven to have a number of socio-economical benefits. Through a range of mutually beneficial product features, a local currency helps local businesses keep and even build on their existing customer base – customers get offered a range of special offers and discounts and with a local currency the money stays within the local area. In short everybody wins. Well, everyone except Tesco.

If you needed more convincing about the benefits of Hackney getting a local currency I’ve put together this useful local currency benefits list:

1. A Stronger Community: Local people getting to know their local businesses can only lead to good things. Many local businesses will personalise orders for customers and if you’re really nice they may even sponsor the local kids football team.
2. Low Carbon Hackney: Purchasing food sourced locally is a great way to cut your carbon footprint. Enterprises such as Growing Communities with their veg boxes and farmers market in Stoke Newington are already helping people in Hackney enjoy local and sustainably sourced food.
3. Pay by text: Ever wanted to shop in your local shop then to suddenly realise you have zero in good old-fashioned cash? If Hackney were to follow the example of the Brixton Pound and introduce text payments, this problem would be solved. And, as an added bonus every time you top up your text pay account you receive an extra 10% to your account. So, for example, if you topped up your account by £10 you would receive an extra £1 in your account, giving you £11 to spend in your local shop.
4. Pride in Hackney: I’m proud to live in such a vibrant area with lots of different cultures happily co-existing. Introducing a local currency will further build on our collective sense of civil pride.
5. Stronger Local Economy: The creation of a local currency would mean Hackney residents’ money stays within the borough with local businesses not corporations like Walmart. Ultimately, this should lead to wealth distribution throughout the Borough.

If you would like to get involved with the creation of the Hackney Pound, keep an eye out for events at Passing Clouds during the coming months where people will come together to start thinking about how a local currency for Hackney could work.

Follow Damien: @damienclarkson

There are times in life when you have to face up to what you are. Where you have to stop lying to yourself, and move on with your life. I’ve done this a few times in my life, and I’m going to do it again now.

My name is Andrew Tobert, and I’m posh.

Actually, I’m really posh. You know the kind of inescapable, David Cameron poshness that everyone despises and no one can convincingly defend. Yeah, I’m that. My dad went to Harrow then Oxford. He sent me to boarding school. When I first moved to London, the first job I got was from my mother’s old school friend. Actually that’s a lie. I got a job before then off my own back. But I was sacked.

But being a wholesome liberal green, this puts me in a quandary. I accept, as the facts dictate, that I live in a heavily rigged society. A society where how much your daddy earns affects your life chances more than anything else. So then I have to own the fact that, bluntly, my dad earned quite a lot and by extension, my successes in life are much more down to his pay cheques that my own brilliantly sharp intellect. So what psychologists call ‘cognitive dissonance’ occurs. I don’t want to see myself in those terms, so I don’t. When I hear the braying toffs on London Fields, talking about their friend’s new band, or what’s on at Sadler’s Wells, I scoff. Don’t they know what they sound like? And, as I sip on my £2.20 Americano, roasted at Clipson and Sons with beans from Nicaragua, I don’t see myself. Genuinely, genuinely, I see myself as something other. As legitimately as much a part of Hackney as jerk chicken or Diane Abbott. This, at least, is the lie I tell myself.

But this life of perpetual denial can only last so long. It is not, to borrow a buzzword ‘sustainable’. Every so often something comes along and shattered the allusion. In my case, that someone was Mustafa.

Having been so cruelly murdered by his brother, you’d have been forgiven,  wait, what? Oops, sorry, wrong Mustafa.

Mustafa was bred Hackney. Un Hacknais as I hate myself for thinking. He’s written about the failed policies of gentrification and, even though he’s much too polite to say so directly, he implicated me. See, Hackney’s regeneration policy isn’t about improving things for people who already live here. It’s about getting more people in and, by extension, driving people out.

And as someone who has just bought a house here, I’m part of that process. There are people on my estate, my neighbours, for who life is a near-constant struggle. But I know nothing of their problems. I, who have been given every imaginable advantage in life, have bought a house in an area that my neighbours increasingly struggle to live in. And I’ve contributed to that. I, Andrew Tobert, am part of the problem. If there is anything that’s so brilliantly encapsulates everything that’s wrong with class-strangled in Britain, then surely it’s me, sitting in London fields with an expensive coffee, writing this.

On a MacBook Air, natch.

As the late Whitney Houston was so fond of saying, I feel those lyrics. Like Skynet, I’m fully self-aware, but what can I, should I, do about it?

I don’t honestly think the answer is move out. Conveniently. I may be posh but I’m not rich. I can’t afford to live in Fulham (and actually, REALLY wouldn’t want to), so the good people of Hackney (les hacknais?  I hate myself.) are stuck with me. Soz. And my grandparents lived in East London. Fleeing the death camps of Europe, they made their home here, so I feel like I’m returning to my roots.

OK, I don’t really, but it’s pretty much the only card I have to play.

But seriously, I’m going to stay here. But I also have to own my s***, I need to act in a way that mitigates the f**kery. So here’s what I’m going to do. Here’s my Posh People’s Pledge to make as positive an effect on Hackney as I can.

1) Don’t shop at Tesco
My house is two minutes walk from 2 Tescos (Tescoes?). These sap money out of the community by destroying local businesses. But there are better options. I don’t believe the local shops are more expensive (in fact, I’m pretty sure they’re not) but as that myth persists, I will shop there, to balance out the people who feel they can’t afford to.

2) I’ll make friends with my neighbours
London has a transient population so it’s a terrible place to build a community. But strong communities are resilient communities. And they make you happy. I’ve currently spoken to two neighbours, I will do more.

3) Don’t be scared of black people
I feel if there’s one thing I hate the media for, it’s the propagating the idea that groups of loitering black teenagers will mug me. I hate myself for thinking it, but think it, I do. But the kids on my estate, even the ones that are 9 foot tall and wear hoodies and call each other ‘blood’, are unfailingly nice. Not once have they failed to open the door for me as I struggle in with my bike. Not once have they not held the lift open, or said hi or thank you on the (rare) occasions when I do the same for them. The kids of my estate will go through life being treated like criminals just for walking down the street. It’s undeserved, and it shouldn’t happen anywhere. But especially not on their front door and especially not from me. That, I can do.

And hopefully, maybe with time, I won’t see myself as the class-entrenching a***hole I currently do. And maybe more people could do the same. Maybe if more people did these three things when they come to hackney, rather than just visiting Burberry then leaving, things might, y’know, actually improve for people in Hackney. Maybe then, just maybe, having a few poshos in this part of the world might be a little bit OK. We can, in our 1400 spring mattresses, but dream.

We’ll work with you to develop your blogging skills, how to communicate to a wide audience, how to edit effectively and what to do with your sources.

To become a community blogger or to find out more, get in touch with Mustafa either by e-mail to mustafa.korel@hackney.greenparty.org.uk or call/text 07446 135 495.

Image courtesy of Surian Soosay [http://www.flickr.com/photos/ssoosay/]

And in relation to young people, too. Is it fairness young people want or is it social  justice? Or more opportunities? Or to have their say in affairs that will ultimately affect them?

I am not young anymore, but I tell you something, I had it rough when I was growing up, a pale comparison to what children and young people go through today.

For me, there’s nothing nostalgic about my youth.

There were days we couldn’t afford to go to school. I got beaten, I got knives pointed at me. I got stoned (with rocks, not the chemical), spat on, had fireworks shoved through the letterbox at our family home. I had a father who had an addiction to gambling and was not soft with his hand, who would tell me to look in the mirror and repeat ‘I am a man a hundred times’, as if that’s what makes a man. I am still in a quandary about what it does mean to be a man.

I’ve been in care for nine months and hated it.

Too much? Is it making you uncomfortable yet?

I won’t tell you about the failings of the youth service when I was in their care, not ready to.

My school closed down a few years after I left, the GSCE pass rate was 20% and by pass, I mean G grades.

As if grades mattered when putting up with all this crap that is going on around me.

I think of myself as lucky, and for turning out  the way I did.

I didn’t ask for any of it. All I asked for was the chance to just get on with it and be young, have opportunities and above all for people around me to give a s*** about me.

This has nothing to do with my mum or my sister, they stayed strong where I could not. As trying as it was for them, they did right by me.

In comparison to what young people go through today, frankly, it does not compare. From central government to local government, there is no one with the vision to do what’s right by young people.

In Hackney, the cuts hit an already stretched youth service hard. The worst is yet to come and it’s women, children and young people that will be hit the hardest.

Against such a cold government, who slashes and burns thinking that’s what will make the economic wheel turn.

Against such a disconnected Council, where the Mayor of Hackney thinks it’s ok for the Mayor of London to invest the town renewal fund of £5.3m after the riots for a fashion hub. Bring on the further divide of the haves and have nots.

Why did this town renewal not go to something that is inter-generational and multi-cultural?

Does Hackney need fashion when people tell me they can only afford to eat twice a day. Feed their children twice a day.

Hackney folk, both young and old, don’t want to be one of the two London Boroughs who are in the top 5% of deprivation, the second being Newham.

Hackney people don’t want to live in housing that is above the national average of overcrowding rates.

Young people in Hackney do not need to be ‘told off’ for taking affirmative action and doing something that brings them together to have a good time, as young people should, with the Austeristy Games.

This makes me angry, everything that’s happened to me and 15 years on nothing has changed. What do I do with this anger, well I write and I ask you to read and to see what those in power don’t want you to see.

There are massive problems and inequalities in Hackney. I just wish someone could stand up for people in Hackney, instead doing all these PR exercises.

I hope you can be one of those people who stands firm and speaks truth to power.

How?

Come forward and help volunteer on a campaign for young people – by speaking to them and getting them actively involved in all aspects of decision making and to link in with other youth led organisations that do amazing work in Hackney already.

To do so, e-mail me on mustafa.korel@hackney.greenparty.org.uk.

Picture courtesy of Russell Higgs [http://www.flickr.com/photos/russell-higgs/]

Preamble and context

Before I start, I wanted to mention briefly that I have come under attack for my opinions: for not supporting high-rise, for pretending to be middle-class, for not understanding the issues that face long-standing residents and for not relating to new people who move in to the area. And is nonsense – please get to know me and my politics before you make remarks like these.

Coming under attack is one part of the politics we see today, though I wish it was more about representing and creating positive changes instead of spending all that time to attack or to be aggressive with people until they submit to your opinion.

On regeneration

Regeneration is one of the best things that can happen to an area that is in economic poverty. What is not cool is the displacement that a badly thought out regeneration strategy causes and caters for only one type of person, those who have a little bit more disposable income, who are property developers looking to make a buck or those who have a higher education. We can call this homogenisation of an area gentrification.

The definition of gentrification is the restoration of run-down urban areas by the middle class (resulting in the displacement of low-income residents). It doesn’t have to be this way.

For me, it boils down to bad regeneration strategies, and the Council thinks that the only way to ‘lift people out of poverty’ is through investment in property, is through getting more people to move in to Hackney who have more money and to cater for an influx of new people whilst seemingly ignoring those that have lived here for generations. It’s a short-sighted objective.

On displacement

People who are displaced in these areas DO NOT move out of Hackney, instead, they move in to homes that are of poorer quality for more money, alternatively, they move in to extended family homes, causing more overcrowding in a borough that has above average overcrowding rates.

On the property developers and investors

There is money to be made in run-down area by displacing ‘the poor people’ who have their communities in such areas. It makes me angry that there are guides for this sort of exploitation – and if you are a property developer/investor and would like to exploit money from people who are living in poverty in run-down areas, here are a few hints and tips of what to look out for from this global property investment company.

On the frictions between new residents and long-standing residents

The sort of regeneration we see in Hackney is purely gentrification – it is the economic and cultural restructuring of an area, rather than welcoming both new and old residents or in the facilitation of cultural exchanges both parties have to offer. Most importantly, regeneration should really be about lifting everyone out of poverty in the area whilst welcoming people who are that bit better off to add economic diversity rather than the displacement that we are seeing.

This causes a rift between the new and old in Hackney. There is mutual resentment from both sides. Whether you see it or not, whether you admit it or not, it exists.

Well how do you get new and old to mix? Listen, if you are a new resident, introduce yourself to your neighbours. If you are a long-standing resident, welcome new residents in to the TRA.

Even better, start a community garden – minimum investment, but one in which residents from all backgrounds can get involved in.

I admit there is a missing link and it is not your fault – it is the short-sightedness of our elected officials in the Council.

On who makes decisions

It’s not us – but we can. If we want to make a difference, get together and go to these new ward forums and have your concerns heard, let’s speak to each other and see what common ground we have, let’s make objections to planning policies and let’s do our best to make sure that the Council is held to account.

But I don’t know how?

That’s because the systems in place are the most bureaucratic and not the easiest form of getting your voice heard. It reminds me of the Vogons from The Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.

Joking aside, get in touch with me and we’ll find a way.

On the solutions

Regeneration, gentrification and planning strategy broadly falls in to planning and housing themes and ties in to the ‘Housing Justice’ campaign we’re launching in November. To get involved, please e-mail me on mustafa.korel@hackney.greenparty.org.uk or call 07446135495.

Campaigns Coordinator, Mustafa Korel, writes his personal view on developments in Hackney.

This entry was in response to the proposed ‘Bard Tower’ on Curtain Road: http://j.mp/lovingdalston020

There are some general observations that I’ve been making in new developments in Hackney – bear with me as there are several issues here.

Firstly, affordable housing promises are vague at best.

Secondly, massive inequalities exist in Hackney, that aren’t helped or improved by such developments.

Thirdly, developers’ wants outweigh local needs on every count, from the Wilmer Place development to the Dalston development. The latter, successful in being rejected, but expect them to come back with a Section 106.

Finally, it seems that the Council’s strategic vision for creating wealth and improving the borough is by destroying its heritage, vacating the borough of council housing and focusing on new in favour doing its duty to both repair the old and build the new.

As for this, and many other such developments, they are in prime locations for the developers to get a high return on investment, with a pittance being offered for the economic development and sustainability of the borough.

On to housing, if the Council were serious about their housing strategy, they would build council run housing using local labourers, keep to their promise of 50% affordable housing in new builds and at the same time address the massive inequalities that exist in the borough by supporting the economy in a developmental way rather than a derisive way.

I should also note, that the Council has yet to comment on child poverty figures in Hackney released back in January 2012 and what their ‘big plan’ is.

The last independent count of empty homes in Hackney has shown that there are over 3,000 empty homes in Hackney, that there is over 10,000 people who are on the council waiting list, around 2,000 people registered homeless and that an additional 17,000 live in homes that are unsuitable, mainly overcrowding. This development does not have the scope to address this.

As you see, a lot of different issues can come to play with new developments, not mentioning the potential for this location to become a hub for cultural activity.

However, in Hackney, there are different issues to take into account when the Council’s vision is to promote sky-rise over real action that re-balances the inequalities in the borough.

Such new developments are not the way to address these issues and whilst they may look good on the books, I should hope that the Council will take a moment to reflect on those of us who are living just above the bread line and striving for a ‘better life’ through socioeconomic mobility that has been instilled in us as a measure of my success and my happiness.

Hackney Green Party’s campaigns team will be taking a short break for about four weeks.

When we say break, we mean a week off and three weeks of going back to residents and looking at other campaigns to help improve Hackney.

If you would like to get in touch or have any comments about what we should be focusing on next, please contact Campaigns Coordinator, Mustafa Korel at mustafa.korel@hackney.greenparty.org.uk or 07411 076 607.

Caroline Allen, Green Party Assembly candidate for North East London

Thank you to the 29,677 people who voted for me in the London Elections!

It’s a fantastic result; we came a very comfortable third in the North East constituency with 15.46% , the LibDems trailing in 4th with 6.09%.

For much of the day I was actually in 2nd, until the ballot boxes from Chingford were opened! In the event the Conservatives were only a few percent ahead, at 18.6%.
I am very much looking forward to seeing the ward breakdowns.
I would also like to take this opportunity to congratulate Jeanette Arnold, the Labour Party candidate, on her victory.

In the Mayoral election Greens gained 14,498 1st preference vote (7.5%) in the North East constituency, a massive contribution towards Jenny Jones’ 3rd place. We also gained 41,074 2nd preference votes (26.7%) in the region.

I have been lucky to have worked alongside the most amazing and inspirational team of volunteers across the constituency and to have met many residents working, often against the odds, to improve their local area and help their community.

A special mention should go to Mustafa Korel, the Hackney Greens campaigns coordinator, who came a fantastic 2nd in the Hackney Central by-election, increasing our vote share, in spite of heavy campaigning by the Libdems.

I’m sorry I wasn’t always able to make every event and was sometimes frustrated not to do be able to do more, but like many people I have to work full-time to pay the bills. I am really proud of our positive campaign.

What is clear is that when people get to hear about our policies and see our hard work they vote for us. Our messages on key issues such as housing, inequality, policing and small business were very well received and of course people know that we are the only party to really understand how to make our streets safer for pedestrians and cyclists, reduce killer levels of pollution and protect our precious green space.

I look forward to continuing our campaigning across the North East of London with my amazing team and residents who want to make North London a more equal, healthy and affordable place to live. Unfortunately with Boris in City Hall our efforts are going to be needed more than ever.