{"id":2583,"date":"2014-12-22T14:42:46","date_gmt":"2014-12-22T14:42:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unitelive.org\/?p=2583"},"modified":"2014-12-23T12:47:54","modified_gmt":"2014-12-23T12:47:54","slug":"never-back","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/?p=2583","title":{"rendered":"Never back down"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The New Era residents will be enjoying Christmas in their own homes this year after winning their battle to save their homes in Hackney from the clutches of American investment firm Westbrook Partners.<\/p>\n

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The residents fought hard when their estate was bought out from under them back in March this year, enlisting the help of comedian Russell Brand and their union Unite along the way.<\/p>\n

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Westbrook had planned to renovate the two bedroom flats and then raise the rent to \u00e2\u20ac\u0098market value\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 making them unaffordable to the estates 93 families and therefore driving them to the streets.<\/p>\n

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People power<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

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\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThese residents are a tribute to people power. They have shown that if you come together you can beat a corporation,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 said Steve Turner, Unite assistant general secretary.<\/p>\n

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Their campaign had a clear goal \u00e2\u20ac\u201c to get the estate sold on to a housing association facility. Last week it was bought by Dolphin Square Charitable Foundation, an affordable housing group which says it is committed to delivering low cost rents to Londoners on low to middle incomes.<\/p>\n

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According to John Gooding, the chief executive of Dolphin Living (the foundation\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s customer facing department) rents at New Era will be kept at current levels for the next year, meaning tenants \u00e2\u20ac\u015bdo not need to worry about this Christmas or next Christmas.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

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On December 1 more than 500 people joined the New Era residents in a protest outside Westbrook\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Mayfair offices and a march to Downing Street to hand in a 300,000 strong petition to David Cameron calling on the estate to be sold to a social landlord.<\/p>\n

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Landlords cash in<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

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\u00e2\u20ac\u015bShockingly we are seeing more and more of these cases across the Capital,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 said Pilgrim Tucker, a community coordinator for Unite.<\/p>\n

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\u00e2\u20ac\u015bLower income families are being forced from the areas they have called home for generations as house prices rocket and private landlords cash in.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

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Unite\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s community membership \u00e2\u20ac\u201c a platform for a fairer society \u00e2\u20ac\u201c continues to work with people facing comparable problems because of London\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s growing housing crisis.<\/p>\n

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New Era of hope<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

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\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThe New Era residents are an inspiration and should give hope to those facing similar threat to their homes. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a wonderful example of a community coming together to put an end to corporate greed,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 said Steve.<\/p>\n

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In an interview with Russell Brand following the win for the estate some of the residents gave advice to communities facing eviction.<\/p>\n

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\u00e2\u20ac\u015bHave a goal. What you want to achieve. Ours was to get the estate sold to a housing association. If you don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know your neighbours, get to know them. You need to come together. Be positive, keep everybody strong. If your families are threatened you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re going to come out fighting. Never back down.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

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In order to stop this happening Unite believes it is essential that a Labour government is elected to power at the general election in May 2015.<\/p>\n

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Single biggest issue<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

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\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThis is the single biggest issue that politicians and people of my generation must address,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 said Sadiq Khan, shadow minister for London.<\/p>\n

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\u00e2\u20ac\u015bWe need long term tenancies \u00e2\u20ac\u201c a minimum of three years. Rent increases must be in line with inflation. We need protection from rip-off letting agencies. We must build more houses to cope with the demand. Not just affordable houses but to include council houses,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 he added.<\/p>\n

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But the fight doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t end with the New Era victory.<\/p>\n

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\u00e2\u20ac\u015bUnite\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s community team are working closely with hundreds of families across London to try and stop the social cleansing of our city,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 added Pilgrim.<\/p>\n

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Stay tuned to UNITElive to see what Unite\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s community team is doing to save more of London\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s housing estates in the New Year.<\/p>\n

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 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The New Era residents will be enjoying Christmas in their own homes this year after winning their battle to save their homes in Hackney from the clutches of American investment firm Westbrook Partners.   The residents fought hard when their estate was bought out from under them back in March this year, enlisting the help […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2468,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[17],"tags":[131],"wps_subtitle":"Christmas victory for New Era residents ","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2583"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2583"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2583\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2585,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2583\/revisions\/2585"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2468"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2583"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2583"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2583"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}