Wandsworth Action Against Empty Homes

A new group has been launched called Wandsworth Action Against Empty Homes which has called a protest for the Day of Action on Empty Homes on Saturday 22nd October and has put forward demands to deal with the housing crisis in the borough :

“Wandsworth Action Against Empty Homes is protesting on Saturday 22nd October at Battersea Power station apartments against the 977 Empty homes across the borough. The 9 Billion Battersea power station refurbishment has done nothing to solve the Housing crisis in Wandsworth with 11,000 Homeless and of those over 3,000 are families. It is disgraceful that the former Conservative administration allowed this development to go through knowing full well the numbers were rising for those seeking Housing assistance.

Out of the 4,000 homes up for grabs only 360 (9%) are ‘affordable’ homes when 600 (15%) was on the original plan. The excuse given by the developers for the decrease was that the refurbishment of the power station had taken up these funds. The new Labour administration refused to go to the opening night on Thursday 14th October in support of lack of council housing and not dining with property developers. The Conservatives are questioning this decision which is why they're in opposition because they're out of touch with what the community needs

Demands:

The new administration sits down with the property developers and London mayor to urge them to build more Green council homes 15% or above as there are still live contracts.

Council housing leader to ensure construction workers and workers on the site do not lose out on jobs, pay and conditions getting the best deal for the workers benefiting the community needs.

Council to take back control of the 977 Empty properties and to distribute to those in temporary accommodation, sofa surfing or living with friends or family ensuring they're fit for purpose and set to council rent tenancies.

Council leader to write to the Government to end no fault evictions section 21 and to put an end to No DSS discrimination in Wandsworth so people do no not have to leave the borough and lose their family and community links.”

Follow Wandsworth Against Empty Homes on Twitter @actionempty