Communities have no Voice!

A group of concerned Registered Social Landlord tenants put together a 52-minute film documentary consisting of interviews with RSL tenants, private landlord tenants and homeowners. Thousands of tenants and homeowners face demolition and just a handful of local government council officers; rich property developers and builders are behind it all.

The documentary, which has been burnt to DVD is being distributed around the area known as the Liverpool Kensington New Deal for Communities area, which consists of over 4,000 houses where 13,000 people live. Already hundreds of homeowners are defying CPO’s, which have recently been delivered to them.

Link to recent Liverpool Echo article about the above issue:

 http://icliverpool.icnetwork.co.uk/0100news/0100regionalnews/tm_objectid=15118523%26method=full%26siteid=50061-name_page.html

DVD’s of the documentary have been given to the Liverpool Echo’s news desk and to various journalists within the Echo and as they always do, they ignored them. Here we have a situation in which community members are so concerned about what is happening in their community that they decide to make a film documentary yet the Liverpool Echo ignores it. Yet the same newspaper will give front-page coverage of Johnny Vegas plying rugby in a fun game.

 http://icliverpool.icnetwork.co.uk/0100news/0100regionalnews/tm_objectid=15149438%26method=full%26siteid=50061-name_page.html

This is just like the local media. Right across the whole region of Merseyside residents are fighting against injustice but they never get a mention in the Liverpool Echo. Even when the Echo does criticise the council the next day it praises them.

The chairman of the Tenants Action Group and community activist Mike Lane has had his car petrol bombed by people unknown and is now living under practical house arrest because he can’t walk around the community neither can he park his replacement second hand car outside the house in fear of it to being petrol bombed.

Mike Lane’s Housing Association has agreed to move him, but as yet have made no offers whatsoever. It is quite obvious that Mike’s Housing Association will drag its feet because of Mike’s history of fighting social injustice and highlighting the oppressive behaviour of Housing Association officers. Mike believes that even if they do offer him another place it will be in an area, which is worse than the area in which he now lives. This is how vindictive RSL housing officers are, they care absolutely nothing about the lives of their tenants, is all they care about is making profit even though they claim to be charitable organisations, a term in which they hide behind and use to cover up their despicable behaviour. If you go to Mike Lane’s RSL office the first thing you will notice is the chairs in the interview room have been rigorously bolted to the floor. This is because oppressed powerless working class tenants have either threatened to throw them at the housing officers or have actually thrown them.

Activists must now come to terms with the fact that RSL’s or Housing Associations are now an oppressive force within poor working class communities.