Coming up: on Saturday 31 January a big protest “March for Homes” has been called to City Hall. There will be two feeder marches for South and East London, starting at Elephant & Castle and Shoreditch respectively.
Recent high profile campaigns like E15, New Era, and Poor Doors have just put a media spotlight on what has been one of the biggest faultlines in our city for decades. Development land grabs, gentrification, rent rises and squatting bans are socially cleansing inner London. Every little space is swallowed up for profit. Homelessness is rocketing. The “lucky” among us are turned into drones slaving our lives away to pay the landlord and the banks for the privilege of bedding down in a damp box room in zone five. Fuck that shit.
This march is called by some left groups and trade unions, headed up by Defend Council Housing and The People’ Assembly, a couple of soul-eating Labour Party / Trotskyist fronts. As usual, trying to hijack our struggles for their own political ends. Though for sure there are also more genuine local groups involved too. (See list of “sponsors” here.) Below you can see the official call-out text and “demands”.
If we don’t let them, there’s no way these wannabe politicians can control our anger and creativity. These are our streets, our lives. If we don’t want to surrender every last pocket of freedom in this city, we need to start fighting for it.
We haven’t yet heard of any autonomous call-outs from anarchos, squatters or other rabbles for 31 Jan. Who’s up for it?
March for Homes
On 31.01.15 people are meeting in East London and South London to march on Boris in City Hall to demand better homes for Londoners and an end to the housing crisis:
Control rents
Hands off council housing
Stop demolition of quality council homes
Affordable and secure homes for all
Cut rents not benefits
End Bedroom Tax and welfare caps
Build new council houses
Better pay & conditions, better housing services
The East London march is led by community campaigns from across the area including Focus E15. The route is from Shoreditch via Brick Lane to the Mayor’s Office at City Hall.
The March for Homes is supported by hundreds of groups and individuals including Unite Housing Workers, People’s Assembly (London), Defend Council Housing, DPAC, Generation Rent, St. Mungo’s Broadway, Hackney Digs, Tower Hamlets Renters, the Focus E15 campaign and many more. www.marchforhomes.org/sponsors
For details of the South London march start point see: https://www.facebook.com/events/576375515827729/
For details of the East London march start point see:https://www.facebook.com/events/1584117861819976/
Please visit www.marchforhomes.org or https://www.facebook.com/MarchforHomes for updates.