Council attemps to seal New Kent Road entrance to Heygate Estate. The people open new entrance in response.

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This morning Southwark Council unsuccessfully attempted to enclose more of our common wealth by sealing off the New Kent Road entrance to the Heygate Estate.

This is part of an ongoing process to gentrify the area which has already seen 1400 households displaced in favour of private property developers and the pursuit of profit.

Despite this, many members of the community still use and enjoy the green spaces shielded from the sight and noise of London by concrete high-rises: the 7 remaining households, the gardeners who seized allotments, disaffected youth, athletes who practice parkour and countless pedestrians who pass through.

This is part of the same attack which has seen large parts of Burgess Park sealed off and undergoing an entirely unnecessary £8m regeneration in an attempt to "improve" the image of Southwark and increase property prices and investment opportunities.

So this morning when the council welded the entrance shut we opened another gate.

Though the council will inevitably continue to try, with help and eagerness from the police, to control more of our public spaces and restrict our access to them we will continue to oppose this by any means necessary and we call on everyone to join us in tearing down the fences.

Signed,

Southwark Civic Unplanners (civicunplanners@gmail.com)

Militant Flâneurs of Peckham

UK Ungoverned

Federation of Direct Action Picnickers

The Radical Brutalism Appreciation Society