HASL’s 2015 – getting ready for 2016

It’s been another busy year for HASL. It’s exciting to see how we’re growing and how much we’ve achieved together this year. Despite our efforts, the housing crisis is undoubtedly getting worse but we are getting important wins, looking out for each other, building collective support and solidarity, and challenging the root causes of the housing crisis and poverty together.

Everyone in HASL gives their time for free. We are a group largely made up of people facing homeless and bad housing, so we organise HASL whilst struggling with housing and poverty issues – making our achievements even more impressive. We know that by struggling together and supporting each other we can fight for good housing for ourselves and everyone. We know this works because we’ve seen the direct impacts of our collective actions winning housing for people, getting people housed back in their community, and stopping bailiffs. As we often say to people ‘don’t struggle alone’. We want to do even more in 2016 and we hope you can join us! Come along to our regular meetings and lunch clubs to meet the group and organise together!

These are just some of the things we’ve been up to this year. It doesn’t include  the numerous letters we’ve written to councils together demanding homeless appointments, advice and rights information we’ve shared, buddying at the housing office, legal workshops we’ve organised, and the vital support and understanding people give to each other in meetings.

A massive thanks to everyone who has been involved in HASL and everyone who has supported us!

January

We joined thousands of others from across London at the March for Homes and showed support for the Aylesbury estate occupation.

February

Town hall occupation to challenge Lambeth council’s social housing allocations policy which pushes homeless people into the private rented sector. We called for social housing not social cleansing!

Bailiffs were having a fancy ball – housing groups from across London disrupted it.

March

Our first HASL lunch club at Art Nouveau in Brixton

We buddied one of our members for days at Southwark’s Peckham housing office and finally got her housed. Some of the most aggressive gatekeeping we have come across and the beginning of our campaign at Southwark to put an end to this and the culture of disrespect there.

Yum – coco pops outside the Marriot hotel, County Hall

We gatecrashed Lambeth council leader Lib Peck’s fancy breakfast with developers.

After a number of protests at the housing office and town hall with HASL and Lambeth Housing Activists, Lambeth council accept a full homeless duty for Gustavo. Later on in the year, with our support, Gustavo finally got secure social housing in his local area.

April

HASL on the march.

We joined thousands of people at the Reclaim Brixton anti-gentrification protest

HASL is two years old! Birthday celebration and lunch club.

We joined the launch of the Oxford Tenants Union to talk about London Coalition Against Poverty (which we’re a part of) and how we organsie.

May

We ran a housing rights workshop with English for Action students.

photo credit: People’s Republic of Southwark

Eviction resistance with Aminata stopping Southwark council evicting her from their own temporary accommodation.

June

We joined an ESOL and housing conference attended by ESOL teachers and students and by housing groups across London to discuss and plan how we can work together more.

Caught Southwark gatekeeping as someone was being unlawfully turned away. Supported the man and his young son to get the housing they were entitled to.

During a leafleting session, we met someone who was due to be evicted by bailiffs a couple of days later. We were able to point her to the local law centre Advising London to get legal support to stop the eviction.

Lunch club at Bike Curious, Elephant and Castle

Freedom of Information request research by HASL published on Novara Wire showing how councils are forcing homeless households out of London.

July

Summer lunch club with London Campaign Against Police and State Violence in Burgess Park

A week of leafleting outside Southwark’s Peckham housing office to talk with people, hand out Know Your Rights information and to challenge gatekeeping.

August

Antenna collective organised a benefit night for us at Brixton East.

Summer lunch club with London Campaign Against Police and State Violence and screen printing HASL t-shirts and bags!

We occupied Southwark town hall to demand Ruth and her family are housed back in Southwark.

September

We joined a panel at Right to Remain’s annual conference

Lunch club at DIY Space for London and Homelessness rights training

October

We did a housing rights workshop with the Independent Workers of Great Britain Language Exchange class

Supported Aminata resist eviction from Southwark council’s temporary housing

Month of leafleting and support outside Southwark’s Peckham housing office to challenge gatekeeping

November

Month of leafleting at Southwark housing office continued

We spoke at Radical Housing Network conference

Shut down a Lend Lease Sales Event for Elephant Park (built on the ruins of the Heygate Estate) with our friends, Fight For Aylesbury.

December

Benefit gig at the beautiful Downtown squat

Eviction resistance at Dorchester court in support of Roz

London Coalition Against Poverty end of year celebration lunch club

Action to support ML challenge Lambeth council’s gatekeeping

Eviction resistance success at Dorchester court

Big thanks to everyone who turned out to support Roz and the Dorchester court residents turn away the bailiffs yesterday morning! On seeing our gathering and banners, the bailiffs made no effort to evict and simply left. A few people were still inside munching on breakfast and missed the bailiffs’ brief visit completely! But Roz, and many other residents still have the threat of eviction hanging over them from private landlord company Manaquel so we’ll be planning more action to support the residents to fight for their homes, their estate and their community.

Manaquel is a company which owns the estate in Herne Hill and rents out private rented flats there. For the last couple of years Manaquel have let the estate fall into disrepair whilst at the same time massively increasing the rents for the tenants. Unable to pay the increased rents, tenants have been receiving possession orders for their homes and bailiffs at their doors. Residents are calling for the rents to be brought down and for all evictions to be stopped.

You can read a bit of background information about Dorchester court here https://lambethrenters.wordpress.com/2015/03/30/save-the-dorchester-court-community/ and http://www.brixtonbuzz.com/2015/05/dorchester-court-residents-plan-day-of-action-against-rent-rises-and-evictions-sat-2nd-may-noon/

Eviction resistance Tuesday 8th December

Tuesday 8th December meet 8.30am

Dorchester Court, Herne Hill, SE24 9QX

Support Roz resist the bailiffs tomorrow morning. Roz is one of a number of residents who have already or are about to face eviction from Dorchester Court. The private landlord decided he could make even more money out of these homes so he’s raising the rents and evicting many of the current residents on the estate. Show your support for Roz and the other residents to fight for their homes.

Everyone welcome. We’ll bring breakfast snacks and refreshments.

‘Homelessness – get your rights’ now available in Spanish!

 

¿Sin hogar? ¡Reclama tus derechos!

Los departamentos responsables dentro de los ayuntamientos para las personas sin hogar adecuado (‘Council Homeless Person Units’, HPUs) tienen fama de negarse a atender tantas personas como puedan, diciéndoles que no entran dentro de los criterios para que les otorguen una vivienda social. La realidad es que la ley reconoce el derecho a ayuda de muchas de estas personas: puede que seas una de ellas.

Para decidir si tienes derecho legal a ayuda, el ayuntamiento tiene que investigar cinco criterios. Si cumples con todos, tienes derecho a una vivienda temporal y cierta prioridad en la lista de espera para las viviendas sociales permanentes. Incluso si no cumples con los cinco criterios, es posible que tengas derecho legal a alguna ayuda de vivienda.

Los cinco criterios

1 ¿Estás “homeless”, sin hogar?

La categoría “homeless” incluye las personas que se van a encontrar sin hogar en los próximos 28 días y las personas que vivan en condiciones no aptas o no seguras (si no te puedes quedar en tu hogar porque sufres violencia allí, por ejemplo). “Homeless” no quiere decir sin techo. Aunque tengas un techo temporal, aún te pueden calificar como “homeless”.

2 ¿Cuál es tu estatus de inmigración?

El estado no permite que los ayuntamientos ofrezcan viviendas a las personas cuyo visado solo les permite quedarse en el reino unido temporalmente, ni a las personas cuyo permiso de permanencia conlleve la condición que no pidan ayudas del estado.

3 ¿Tienes una necesidad especial (una “priority need”)?

Los ayuntamientos consideran que ciertas personas tienen una necesidad especial. Las categorías preestablecidas incluyen (entre otras): las mujeres embarazadas, las personas con niñ@s a su cargo, las personas que tienen 16 y 17 años, las personas que tienen entre 18 y 20 años que han estado en guarda del estado, y las personas que se encuentren sin techo a causa de una emergencia (por ejemplo, una inundación). Las que no quepan en las categorías preestablecidas (por ejemplo, las personas con problemas graves de salud mental, o l@s ancian@s) tendrán que demostrar que sus problemas les hacen “vulnerables”.

4 ¿Estás “homeless” a causa de intención propia?

Si el ayuntamiento cree que estás “homeless” por tu propia culpa, es posible que solo tengan que alojarte temporalmente mientras que te ayudan encontrar tu propia solución habitacional.

5 Vínculo local

¡Según la ley, esto es lo último que un ayuntamiento debe considerar, no lo primero! Si no tienes un vínculo con el borough (distrito) en que solicitas ayuda y sí tienes un vínculo con otro, es posible que el ayuntamiento al que has solicitado ayuda pida que el ayuntamiento con el que tienes un vínculo te ofrezca una vivienda. Pero solo pueden hacerlo después de que hayan investigado tu caso y verificado si cumples con las primeras 4 pruebas.

¿Qué debe hacer el ayuntamiento?

Si el ayuntamiento sospecha (según la ley, tiene “reason to believe”) que estás homeless ahora o que estarás homeless dentro de 28 días, tienen que aceptar tu solicitud y empezar investigar estas 5 pruebas. La solicitud no te pone en el “registro de vivienda”, la lista de espera de una vivienda social. Al fin de la investigación tienen la obligación a darte una decisión sobre tu caso por escrito.

Si el ayuntamiento sospecha que tienes un derecho a ayuda y que tienes una necesidad especial, tienen que alojarte temporalmente mientras investigan las cinco pruebas.

Sospechar (tener “reason to believe”) no es igual a tener evidencia fija. Un caso en el juzgado superior concluyó que ir a visitar el departamento del ayuntamiento para personas sin hogar (HPU) es suficiente para que el ayuntamiento deba sospechar que estás “homeless”.

Lo que hacen en realidad

Los ayuntamientos suelen hacer todo que puedan para negar o retrasar alojamiento incluso si hay una razón clara para creer que la/el solicitante no tiene hogar, tiene derecho legal a ayuda y tiene una necesidad especial. Los ayuntamientos suelen decir frases así para intentar despistarte:

• Que no te pueden ayudar hasta que hayan visitado tu casa
• Que no te pueden ayudar hasta que te hayan desalojado
• No te van a ayudar hasta que les des un informe médico
• No te van a ayudar hasta que hayas intentado un proceso de mediación (por ejemplo, con tus padres si tus padres te hubieran pedido irte de su casa)
• No te van a ayudar hasta que les enseñes un informe policial sobre la violencia que has sufrido

Lo que puedes hacer

La mayoría de estas tácticas para despistarte son ilegales. Si lo descrito te pasa a ti, diles con certeza que conoces tus derechos y que no se pueden negar a atenderte. Si te siguen negando ayuda, pide una carta en papel que explique su decisión y lleva esta carta a una agencia de consejo, o contacta con nosotras.

London Coalition Against Poverty (Coalición Contra la Pobreza)

Creemos que practicar la acción directa juntas, dentro de nuestras comunidades, puede asegurar que consigamos los servicios que nos faltan cuando los necesitemos. Los derechos legales que tenemos no son suficientes pero por ahí empezamos.

Somos tod@s voluntari@s y te podemos apoyar en tomar acción para conseguir lo que necesites. No somos consejeros legales a tiempo completo. Si buscas consejo legal, te podemos proporcionar los detalles de consejeros legales. Si quieres involucrarte o si necesitas conseguir tus derechos:

Contacta con nosotras: +44 7932 241 737

londoncoalitionagainstpoverty@gmail.com

http://www.lcap.org.uk

Thanks to our camaradas Tom at Haringey Housing Action group and Violeta from the housing assembly in Latina, Madrid (@canabales, @latinavivienda) for the translation!

December events! HASL fundraiser and end of year celebration

We’ve got a benefit gig and an end of year celebration happening in December! We hope you can join us and get involved. Save the dates and bring your friends, family and neighbours!

HASL fundraiser with bands, cake and other good stuff on Friday 4th December 8pm, location in Surrey Quays/Rotherithe.

Then it’s the London Coalition Against Poverty end of year celebration that we’re hosting on Saturday 12th December 12pm-5pm in Walworth, Elephant and Castle. Delicious, nutritious food, social, and kids activities. Eat together, fight together!

It’d be great if people have time to help out running these events – if you do – come to our next meeting, or drop us an email – haslemail@gmail.com

For the LCAP end of year celebration we need extra help with –

Organising and running kids activities on the day

Collecting food donations from local shops (we’ll organise teams in our local areas and do collections together)

Cooking on the day

Leafleting the local area

If you’d be up for helping, get in touch!!

HASL guide to gatekeeping

What is gatekeeping?

Gatekeeping is when people are denied the help, services and support they are legally entitled to by council staff employing different tactics to turn us away and make us give up. Gatekeeping is very common is housing offices when people go to make homeless applications and also in social services when people try to access housing help.

Southwark housing office has a particularly bad reputation for gatekeeping. In February, a High Court judge ordered Southwark council ‘to cease with immediate effect the policies and practices’ which had seen a homeless family refused help by the council and told to look for their own accommodation in the private sector.  In May, a homeless man, Mr Kanu, who had been denied help by Southwark council, won in the Supreme Court where the judge ruled that Mr Kanu was entitled to housing. Sadly, Mr Kanu died shortly after this victory. Despite these legal cases, we know that Southwark housing office still continues to gatekeep homeless people.

What does it mean? What are the impacts?

The effects of gatekeeping are to keep vulnerable homeless people homeless or in unsafe, overcrowded housing.  It denies them the immediate housing help they need and their place on the housing register so that they might eventually access secure social housing.

Charities are predicting a particularly bad winter with high street homelessness this year with gatekeeping playing a role in this.

Women trying to escape violence have nowhere safe to go.

For the housing office, it means that their homelessness statistics are kept low so that the true scale of homelessness is hidden.

How do you spot it?

Housing office staff say things like: “I can tell you now, you are intentionally homeless”

“You need to bring more evidence before we can start a homeless application and give you interim housing.”

“We can’t help you, you need to find your own housing in the private sector.”

“You’re not homeless until the bailiffs evict you.”

“If you have a roof, then you are not homeless.”

“If they have a pulse, then they’re not vulnerable”

How can we challenge it?

London Coalition Against Poverty has been going since 2007 and is made up of local groups who meet up and provide support and action on each others housing issues. LCAP groups have long been challenging gatekeeping at their local housing offices by:

Making sure that people know their rights

Providing buddies for each other to attend the housing office together

Visiting the housing office as a big group and refusing to leave until a homeless application has been accepted.

Regular leafleting outside housing offices to talk to people about their rights and the housing group and local campaigns and actions challenging gatekeeping at a local housing office.

 

Don’t struggle alone! It’s easy for them to turn one person away, but if we stand up for each other, we can fight for the support and services that we all need and deserve. We welcome you to get involved and help us organise more ways to challenge gatekeeping.

 

We’ve stopped the eviction, now Southwark – stop trying to make people homeless!

This morning over 50 local people came together to stop the eviction of Aminata and her family from their temporary accommodation by Southwark council. Even though bailiffs had told the family they would arrive at 8am, they had coordinated beforehand with police to evict them at 11am. Lots of people returned to scupper the bailiffs plans and prevent the eviction. Another important win with collective action!

The eviction attempt was being watched over by the head of temporary housing at Southwark Council. He refused to speak to Sky News about why he had come to watch a family get evicted by police and bailiffs and he offered no solution that did not result in further homelessness for Animata and her family.

This was gross behaviour from Southwark council – calling police and bailiffs on local residents and using their staff time to come and watch a family be turfed onto the street. We were able to stop the bailiffs today but Aminata and her family were served with a court notice that puts them under 24/7 threat of eviction – another sickening move by the council. Southwark council need to stop this threat, drop their ‘intentionally homeless’ decision and continue to house the family until suitable social housing is given to them.

Why are Southwark council trying to make people who are already homeless, homeless again?

Aminata and her family, like all of us, needs secure, truly affordable and quality social housing. We must keep the pressure on Southwark council to drop their claims on ‘intentionally homeless’ and to continue to house the family until suitable social housing is provided.

Join us tweeting Southwark council and Councillor for housing Richard Livingstone.

Help us to organise an action to show our support for the family and tell Southwark council that no one is intentionally homeless! Get in touch and keep a watch on our website and social media.

Tweet to @lb_southwark

Eviction resistance callout! – Breakfast not Bailiffs

7.30am Tuesday 13^th October at 51 Benhill Road, Elmington Estate, Camberwell SE5 7QY

A family are facing eviction this Tuesday morning in Camberwell. This is the second time Southwark council are trying to throw the family on the street and have caused enormous stress for them. We stopped the bailiffs the first time and we can do it again – with your help and support! With enough people standing in the way we can stop the eviction.

But resisting the eviction isn’t enough. Southwark council must drop their claim that the family is ‘intentionally homeless’ – which is their excuse for evicting the family and getting rid of the legal duty they have to house them. We know that no one is intentionally homeless and we must make Southwark see that too! In this case it looks like the council have dragged up events from 2012 in desperation to prevent the family from accessing the help Southwark should be providing.

This family has been in temporary accommodation for years, Southwark should be providing them with stable, secure, council housing – not pushing them into further homelessness.

Bring yourself, your friends, neighbours – we’ll bring the breakfast! If you can’t make it on the day, please support us online on the day by retweeting and tweeting Southwark council to keep the family housed.

As we said, the eviction resistance will be the first action – there will be more until the family are guaranteed their homelessness duty with the intentionally homeless threat removed. Please join us!

Stop another social housing sell off! Join our twitter storm this Friday.

This Friday, housing associations will vote on whether to go ahead with selling off their/our social housing under an extended Right to Buy. Only, the decision has been made already. Either housing associations vote YES and allow their social housing stock to be sold off, or the government plans to push this Right to Buy of Housing Association homes through Parliament.

Thatcher’s original Right to Buy decimated social housing, contributing to the huge housing crisis we now face. There is massive demand for quality, secure, social housing but housing associations and the government are looking to sell-off the little we have left.

As a group of homeless people, badly and precariously housed people, and social housing tenants, this proposed sell-off affects us all. We totally oppose any sell-off of social housing. Many of us are in desperate need of quality, secure, social housing in our communities.

As part of these plans, the discount given to tenants to buy their housing association home will be paid for by the sell-off of COUNCIL HOUSING. We expect that council housing in Lambeth and Southwark (areas that now have become incredibly valuable) will be under threat for selling off to pay for discounts to help with the sell-off of housing association homes. This means more social cleansing as council homes in high value areas will be lost – meaning poor people can no longer live here.

We probably can’t stop the housing associations voting YES this Friday, lots of them have made their minds up already – but we will continue to organise, take action, and make our voices heard in our communities to make the sell-off as difficult as possible.

Twitter storm this Friday anyone? Are you a social housing tenant or someone in housing need? Angry at social cleansing and profiteering private landlords? Why not let your council and the housing associations know your opposition to the Housing Association Right to Buy this Friday as the Housing Associations go to vote. You can contact them on social media, and be sure to include us @housingactionsl.

HASL get member housed back in her community!

Yesterday morning, about thirty HASL members and ESOL group English for Action, visited Southwark council’s town hall in support of our member Ruth and her family who had been housed by the council all the way out in Woolwich.

This accommodation was far away from their school, community and work places. To get to school her children had to travel on 3 buses for 2 hours, and then they had to do this after school to get home again. That’s 20 hours commuting each week on 30 buses! This was having an extremely negative impact on the children’s education and well being. Everyone needs and deserves decent housing in their community. We won’t let people be forced out.

We went to demand ‘A home near school’ and after a short time in the town hall’s lobby – where we played Twister, Jenga, and talked with staff about the housing crisis and our group – we were told that alternative temporary accommodation on the Aylesbury estate* had been found for the family. Ruth was relieved and happy at the outcome, as we all are that Ruth and her family are now back home.

But it shouldn’t take 30 people occupying the town hall for homeless people and families to be treated well and provided with suitable temporary accommodation. And we were appalled by one housing managers comments when we asked him why no furniture (no beds!) was provided in the accommodation – “it’s got a roof, it’s liveable”. We doubt he’d call this liveable if it were provided for him and his family. This is no standard or way to treat homeless people.

We want to challenge the poor treatment and provision for homeless people in Southwark and fight social cleansing! Get involved in HASL to help us do this!

Thank you to everyone who came and supported Ruth. Don’t struggle alone! Together we can win!

*The Aylesbury estate is in the process of ‘regeneration’ (demolition of council housing and its replacement with unaffordable private housing = social cleansing). Secure tenants are being moved/forced out leaving perfectly habitable flats empty. Southwark is using some of these flats to house homeless people (and collect rent from them!).  This seems sensible enough as it keeps people in their home borough (and makes Southwark council money). We oppose the demolition of the Aylesbury estate and support all residents and locals who are fighting for it. Check out Fight for the Aylesbury for more information and action.