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 Houses are built by developers. We are looking to rebuild communities.
London CITIZENS is the most diverse community alliance in the UK with over 100 institutions - Churches, Mosques, Schools, Universities, Trades Unions and Community Agencies - in membership working for the common good. The London Citizens network comprises TELCO in East London, South London Citizens, and West London Citizens. These networks establish and then coordinate campaigns, which are democratically decided depending on members’ needs.
At peoples assemblies across London throughout 2006/07, our membership unanimously voted to make affordable housing – through the ‘Our Homes, Our London’ campaign – a chief focus of community organising efforts through the 2012 Olympics and beyond. As such, in May 2007, London CITIZENS established the East London Citizens Community Land Trust as an Industrial/Provident Society regulated by the Financial Services Authority. We are now campaigning to establish the capital’s first Community Land Trust and to set a precedent for community-owned, community-orientated, perpetually affordable housing across the capital.
Despite the recent and relatively slight slump in house prices, the cost of housing in London has increased exponentially in recent years, even in the poorest boroughs in East London. The average cost of a home is now just under £350,000 (well above the £200,415 average for the remainder of the country). Tower Hamlets Housing Services have informed us that the average wait for a one bedroom flat is from 5 to 10 years; from 7 to 10 years for a two bedroom flat; and more than ten years for a family home. In a recent survey we conducted in Stepney Green and Mile End, 47% of the households say they want to move house because they are currently overcrowded. Official statistics show that more than 260,000 children in London live in homes without enough bedrooms. In some parts of London as many as one household in four is overcrowded.
Severe overcrowding in London increased by 60 per cent between the 1991 and 2001 censuses. In 2004 a government review concluded that there were strong links between overcrowding and particular health conditions, in both children and adults; including respiratory conditions, meningitis and helicobacter pylori which is a cause of stomach ulcers. The stress of sharing bedrooms and inadequate cooking, cleaning, and toilet facilities is well documented as a cause of tension between family members in overcrowded homes. In some circumstances, it can lead to a breakdown in family relationships and to homelessness for older ‘children’.
The CLT model overcomes problems with other affordable housing schemes. It is ownership rather than rent orientated so low-income families accumulate an exchangeable asset over time. The subsidy is locked into the land which cannot be sold on the open market, only back to the housing cooperative, keeping the benefit available to the local community. The houses are built in accordance with local need, not maximizing profit, making otherwise negated family sized units available, rather than just the most profitable one and two bed flats.
The project is part of a pioneering new effort in Britain to provide genuinely innovative, affordable, sustainable, co-operative housing through the model of Community Land Trust. Our local communities are currently creating proposals for a pilot CLT scheme at the former site of St. Clement's Hospital, Mile End, and an Olympic Housing Legacy proposal on the Olympic Park. We are also working very closely with our friends in Brixton Green to support them in the development of their proposals in South London; with experts from the University of Brighton and the University of Salford, and with our colleagues at the Champlain Housing Trust in Vermont, in the USA, to further the cause of perpetual, affordable community-orientated, family-homes across the globe.
For further details regarding London Citizens and London 2012 Community Land Trust Proposals, press enquiries, to join our mailing list or to find out more on how to get involved, please contact:
Dave Smith
Community Organiser
London Citizens
112, Cavell Street,
Whitechapel,
London.
E1 2JA.
020 3355 6508 / 07525 326 239
david.smith@londoncitizens.org.uk
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