A public meeting was held the other night Tue 27 July 2004 at Saint Cyprian’s church, which is situated on the corner of Edge Lane and Holt Road, Liverpool 7.

Everything connected with this NDC programme is spinning out of control now. Some of the issues discussed and how to address them was like listening to an actor reading from a script of Monty Python Flying Circus. Nearly five years into the projects estimated 10 year life span and nothing of any great relevance has been achieved

As per usual the same forty or fifty tired weary residents turned up (mostly homeowners). A hand full of regeneration administrators, two community board members, a couple of council officers and the Executive Director of Community 7 (C7), the new Registered Social Landlord (also known as housing association) also attended and periodically took the centre stage to answer questions.

The main purpose of C7, which is a subsidiary of the huge RSL, The Riverside Group, coming into the NDC community was to take over the other seven RSL’s properties that exist within the NDC zone (over half of the NDC area is comprised of RSL and private landlord tenants). The Executive Director of Community 7 told the meeting that although it was agreed by the NDC community that all the RSL and council properties would be taken over by them there was now a reluctance by the other RSL’s to swap over their properties to C7. This is now of great concern to the residents because it was felt that if one RSL controlled the area it would be easier for that RSL to monitor and put structures into place to address the issue of antisocial tenants. There are also many other benefits in having one social landlord..

The manager of the 10 community wardens was also in attendance and during the course of the meeting gave a run down on the progress of the wardens. Although the wardens are doing a good job in my opinion the city council, the police, and all the other service providers are not adequately backing them up.

Two senior policemen were at the meeting and one of them told me that there was a hard core of about 25 children, mostly teenagers, in the NDC community who were out of control, and causing much anguish to the residents. Apparently most of these kids, who hang about in different parts of the NDC area, have criminal records and have a large following of other local kids. Much of the talk was about putting Anti Social Orders (ASBO’s) on these kids, but in my opinion they need help, in whatever guise that help may come. Most of these kids suffer from social exclusion and all the negative by products of being excluded. In my opinion these children should be given special attention. Dragging these kids through the courts is defiantly not the way forward. Central government and local government need to address the issue of antisocial kids and provide adequate funding to positively help these children. most of these kids come from poor socially excluded families.

Many of the residents left before the meeting ended leaving a hard core of about twenty stalwarts. These somewhat naive stalwarts are the people who still cling onto the possibility that everything will turn out OK.

The usual slagging match took place between the service providers and the audience. The regeneration administrators and the two community board members had already set the agenda of the public meeting before the meeting took place.

There are ten community board members who represent five areas (two board members to each area) within the NDC zone, which consists of 4,000 properties where 13,000 residents live. These community board members, who were elected on to the board by the residents within the area that they represent (all sorts of undemocratic practice took place during these farce elections and it was quite obvious from the onset who was going to be elected before they were elected) all have hidden agendas and have now become strangers in their own community. One or two of them have even used their position to obtain employment with the council or agencies connected to the council. But this is the obvious outcome when community members show any organisational skills they are immediately singled out by the regeneration administrators and bought off in whatever way possible. These same board members have been indoctrinated by the service providers to work within the oppressive framework that the administrators have set into motion. On close observation all of the structures that have been put into place within the community contain within their centre an oppressive undemocratic order. These buzzwords, empowering the community, the community makes all the decisions, are just buzzwords, in reality there are only a hand full of community members (about 25 including the 10 community board members) along with 36 NDC administrators making all the decisions within this NDC community.

Six or seven issues were discussed at the meeting. The main issue concerned the 200 or so homeowners being CPO’d and offered a pittance for their houses (over 600 houses will be demolished in the Edge Hill area of the NDC zone, which will amount to over half of the Edge Hill community.

It is rather strange how these well meaning homeowners cannot come to terms with the fact that what is happening to them is insidious. I use the word insidious because it is insidious what is going on here. Every oppressive device that is being surreptitiously and stealthily imposed onto the largely unsuspecting community by the dominant culture that exists at local government level is being implemented onto the community using the oppressive philosophy of gradualism. In effect what we are witnessing here in the Kensington NDC area is local government and all its agencies. i.e: NDC administrators, elected members, senior council officers local Government Office civil servants, Registered Social Landlords, builders, such as Lovels, property developers, consultants of all different guises, the list could go on add infinite, using all the means at its disposal to oppress, indoctrinate and domesticate an entire community.

Of course the majority of the subordinate service providers do not know that they are acting in an oppressive manner and that all the structures that they work in and impose onto the community are not conducive with open democratic procedure, neither do they serve to empower or emancipate the community. In effect the subordinate service providers think that what they are doing is the natural coarse of events and there is no other way of doing things.
Quite a few members of the audience brought up the issue of the 24 or so CCTV cameras, which have been installed within the NDC area. Apparently it is now quite obvious to all the NDC residents that most if not all of theses cameras have not been working for over a month now. One guy in the audience called Allan, who lives with NDC community board member Norma Williams, told the NDC administrators, the community policemen and the Community 7 warden’s manager (there are 19 community wardens in the NDC area. They are paid for by Community 7 and NDC funding) that when the cameras were installed there was no mention of a maintenance contract put into place. Now we have a situation in which most of the cameras are broken and pointing down to the ground. It is rather uncanny to observe, the cameras give the observer the impression that they are dead. It was also pointed out to the administrators that the teenagers within the area have learnt that if they continually shake the post that the camera sits on the camera will malfunction, so the kids just shake the hell out of the CCTV camera post. No body ever comes anyway, especially the police.

It was reported to the meeting that only a couple of days before the meeting a gang of teenagers stole a car and drove it at a tremendous speed around and around Botanic Park. They eventually jammed a stick on to the accelerator and aimed the car at the park wall in the vicinity of the Botanic Road camera. The car hit the wall at high speed and blew up, nearly setting fire to the large trees that line Botanic Road. It was also explained that police knew about this incident ten minutes before the car struck the wall but they never bothered to come. The fire service eventually came and put the fire out, but there was never any police present throughout the whole incident.