THE HOLIDAY HOME PARADOX: WE LOVE CORNWALL BUT FEEL COMPELLED TO DESTROY IT

Posted on June 26, 2021 by Norwich Radical in Community, Perspectives and tagged Airbnb, coast, Community, conservatives, featured, foodbanks, holiday, home, homeless, house, housing, landlord, padstow, penzance, private housing, st mawes, Tories, uk, Zoopla.

by Sarah Edgcumbe

“Stop whining, you ungrateful inbred bastards, it’s our money that keeps you afloat” or some variant of that sentiment is regularly heard by Cornish people and permanent residents of Cornwall. Particularly in the summer. Particularly when we register our frustration at being priced out of communities we grew up in; at pristine green land being built upon, despite the presence of thousands of empty homes; and particularly when we dare to register our opinion that people are not entitled to as many houses as they like, no matter how wealthy they are. The severe levels of poverty experienced in parts of Cornwall are completely overlooked by wealthy holiday home-owners and the government (the two being far from mutually exclusive). It is hidden from view sufficiently that it will not dirty their holiday photos, it will not visibly encroach upon the sandy beaches or the pristine sea. They can pretend that everybody in Cornwall is as thick as portrayed in the TV show Doc Martin while maintaining a wilful ignorance about the devastating effects their Airbnb accommodation or holiday home is wreaking upon the county they proclaim to love.

TAKING WHAT’S OURS: ACORN NORWICH’S FIGHT FOR TENANTS’ RIGHTS

Posted on December 31, 2020 by Norwich Radical in Community and tagged abbotFox, acorn, Acorn Norwich, ACORN renters' union, ACORN Tenants' Union, community union, direct action, estate agents, housing, illegal evictions, landlords, letting agents, Northwood, Norwich City Council, pandemic, rent, rent strike, trade union.

By Sean Meleady

ACORN Norwich, a community union which focuses particularly on tenants’ rights, has been dealing with member defence cases against two Norwich estate agents: abbotFox and Northwood.

NEW TOWNS TO POOR DOORS: SOCIAL HOUSING OVER THE DECADES

Posted on December 26, 2020 by Norwich Radical in Community, Perspectives and tagged acorn, City, city planning, class, classism, council flat, council tenants, economy, featured, hierarchy, housing, housing crisis, milton keynes, neighbourhood plans, new town, post war, social housing, tenant.

by Kasper Hassett

To most people, thinking of social housing might typically invoke one of two images: kids weaving big-wheeled bikes between identical high rises; or post-war ‘new town’ developments, which historically placed workers and their families in entirely new communities in industrial areas. These possibilities may ring true for some people’s lived experiences, but with the decline of new social housing developments at a time when they are needed most, the few new properties being released to social housing tenants are often nestled among more expensive housing only available to more affluent residents, in ways which alienate the poor. In fact, social housing now is so far removed from dominant expectations of cohesive, mono-class communities that it is hard to spot.

RIGHT TO THE CITY: AN ANGLIA SQUARE FOR PEOPLE, NOT PROFIT

Posted on November 29, 2020 by Norwich Radical in Community, Perspectives and tagged Anglia Square, Angrier Square, capitalist class, cities, class politics, Columbia Threadneedle, David Harvey, featured, gentrification, Grenfell tower, Henri Lefebvre, heritage, housing, local campaign, norwich, Norwich City Council, redevelopment, right to the city, Robert Jenrick, urban, urban regeneration, Weston Homes, working class.

by Yali Banton-Heath

For the past 8 years the future of Anglia Square – a 1960’s-built shopping complex in Norwich’s north city – has been a contentious local concern. In 2018 Norwich City Council approved a £250 million development planning application submitted by asset management group Columbia Threadneedle, who bought the site in 2012, and property developers Weston Homes. The proposal included plans for a new shopping centre, hotel, cinema, and 20-storey apartment block. After receiving over 700 objections, which collectively led to a government inquiry, earlier this month Secretary of State Robert Jenrick officially rejected the plans, on the basis that they “did not protect and enhance the heritage assets of the city”.

SHELTERED, BUT NOT FROM MUCH: CLASS-BASED BARRIERS TO STUDENT HOUSING

Posted on September 19, 2020 by Norwich Radical in Student and tagged acorn, campaign, Community, coronavirus, covid, Covid-19, featured, guarantor, house, housing, international students, landlord, norwich, private accommodation, rent, social status, students, UEA, UEA SU, uk, university, University of East Anglia, working class.

by Kasper Hassett

This month, many returning university students are settling into house-shares in the private rental sector, as the first-year intake prepares to move into halls of residence shortly after. However, for students whose families live in poverty, there are a number of barriers to accessing rental homes, which have worsened this year due to the coronavirus pandemic, which has also constructed new obstacles to prevent poorer students from relying on campus accommodation.

ACORN NORWICH – THE UNION TAKING ON DODGY LANDLORDS

Posted on June 19, 2020 by Norwich Radical in Community and tagged Acorn Norwich, ACORN Tenants' Union, activism, austerity, Brighton, Bristol, campaigning, coronavirus, Covid-19, Dereham, direct action, featured, flatfair, Generation Rent, Goldsmith street, grassroots, health and safety, housing, housing costs, landlords, letting agents, manchester, member defense, norwich, Norwich City Council, online activism, renting, residents, Sheffield, student accommodation, students, UEA, unions, wages, workers.

By Sean Meleady

Norwich may call itself a ‘fine city’, but this isn’t always the case for renters. Despite some positive stories, such as the Goldsmith Street social housing project, many tenants find life in the city tough.

LAND JUSTICE AND THE 2019 LABOUR MANIFESTO: A LOCAL PERSPECTIVE

Posted on November 24, 2019 by Norwich Radical in Community, Perspectives and tagged 2019 election, 2019 Labour Manifesto, agriculture, environment, featured, ge2019, homelessness, housing, Labour, land, land justice, Land Justice Network, norfolk, norwich, social justice.

by Yali Banton-Heath

A massive issue facing the UK at the moment is right under our noses and indeed right under our feet. That issue is land. Though land injustice may stem from historical legislation such as the Enclosure Acts and the shrinking of the commons through large-scale land grabs over past centuries, the phenomenon continues today, with land inequality becoming ever-increasingly stark. Land is moving more and more from public control into wealthy private hands, with land and housing prices rocketing over recent decades as a result of speculative inflation. In 1995 the total value of land in the UK was around £1 trillion, that figure is now more than £5 trillion.

BEYOND TUITION FEES #11 – MUCH TO LEARN, MORE TO DO

Posted on July 12, 2018 by Norwich Radical in Student and tagged activism, adult education, associate tutors, Beyond Tuition Fees, campaigning, capitalism, co-operatives, Community, consumerism, corbyn, crisis, exploitation, featured, food, Free Education, government, higher education, housing, international students, labour party, learning, market, marketing, marketisation, neoliberalism, NUS, postgraduate, profit, resistance, strategy, student activism, student debt, students' unions, tuition fees, uk, unions, universities, university management, university staff, utopia.

By Bradley Allsop and Rowan Gavin

It is a time of extraordinary potential for change in UK Higher Education. Labour’s promise to end tuition fees has defied the critics and united many behind Corbyn’s political project. In this series, the Norwich Radical and Bright Green have brought together perspectives from across the sector to explore the possibilities of post-fees HE. In the final instalment, the series editors summarise the visions for the next chapter of UK HE that the series has laid out.

There is more energy, debate and innovation on the left now than there has been for decades. Capitalism’s multiple crises, and the inability of its defenders to respond to them, are beginning to translate into tangible political opportunity. This series sought to capture the essence of some of this historical moment and direct it towards thinking about what we want our university campuses to look like, beyond the staple progressive policy of scrapping tuition fees. A project in unashamedly utopian thinking, it recognised the very real possibility that free tuition might be a reality in the near future, and sought to explore how this requires the left to think practically about what comes after and where our energy should be focused next.

A CO-OPERATIVE FUTURE FOR STUDENTS – BEYOND TUITION FEES #9

Posted on May 30, 2018 by Norwich Radical in Student and tagged BDS, Beyond Tuition Fees, Birmingham, Birmingham Student Housing Co-op, block grants, Brighton, co-operatives, Co-ops UK, coalition, corbyn, cost of living, democracy, economics, Edinburgh, Edinburgh Student Housing Co-op, ethical procurement, exploitation, featured, food, food co-ops, free range, free trade, Glasgow, Glasgow Student Housing Co-op, grassroots, housing, Labour, landlords, local food, maintenance grants, nestle boycott, norwich, Norwich Association for the Co-operative Housing of Students, nursing bursaries, NUS, NUSSL, organic, private renting, profit, property, Sheffield, Sheffield Student Housing Co-op, student accommodation, student activism, Student Co-operative Homes, student debt, student housing coops, student loans, students, Students for Co-operation, students' unions, SU reform, Tories, tuition fees.

By Robyn Banks

It is a time of extraordinary potential for change in UK Higher Education. Labour’s promise to end tuition fees has defied the critics and united many behind Corbyn’s political project. But what will the implications for universities be if this comes to pass? And what can we do to leverage this progress? In this series, the Norwich Radical and Bright Green are bringing together perspectives from across the sector to explore these questions.

Up and down the UK, from Edinburgh to Brighton, students are building alternatives to existing, exploitative housing and food practices. How? By creating co-operatives! These alternative ways of organising are expanding and flourishing at a rate never seen before, as students look to take their lives into their own hands, in defiance of the rising cost of living and exploitative landlords and businesses. The founding of Student Co-operative Homes, a launch pad organisation for potential student housing co-ops across the UK founded by the grassroots network Students for Co-operation and supported by national co-op federation Co-Ops UK, demonstrates the growing support for these independent, democratic projects.

REVIEW – A PARTY WITH SOCIALISTS IN IT, BY SIMON HANNAH

Posted on May 6, 2018 by Norwich Radical in Arts, Inter|national and tagged a party with socialists in it, Aneurin Bevan, antisemitism, Attlee, book, Callaghan, corbyn, Fabians, featured, Gaitskell, Haringey Development Vehicle, history, housing, ILP, Labour, left, Left Book Club, MacDonald, new labour, pluto press, politics, radical, review, SDF, Simon Hannah, socialism, Tony Benn, Wilson.

by Justin Reynolds

It was too beautiful to last. The fragile truce established between Labour’s dueling factions after the party’s unexpectedly strong 2017 general election performance disintegrated just in time for this year’s local election campaign.

Despite everything, Labour still made gains, indicating that its simple anti-austerity message continues to have the capacity to cut through the interference generated by chronic internal feuding. But the result was hardly good enough to foster a new outbreak of peace.Continue Reading

housing

THE HOLIDAY HOME PARADOX: WE LOVE CORNWALL BUT FEEL COMPELLED TO DESTROY IT

by Sarah Edgcumbe

TAKING WHAT’S OURS: ACORN NORWICH’S FIGHT FOR TENANTS’ RIGHTS

By Sean Meleady

RIGHT TO THE CITY: AN ANGLIA SQUARE FOR PEOPLE, NOT PROFIT

ACORN NORWICH – THE UNION TAKING ON DODGY LANDLORDS

BEYOND TUITION FEES #11 – MUCH TO LEARN, MORE TO DO

A CO-OPERATIVE FUTURE FOR STUDENTS – BEYOND TUITION FEES #9

REVIEW – A PARTY WITH SOCIALISTS IN IT, BY SIMON HANNAH

Support the Radical

Subscribe

by Sarah Edgcumbe

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

by Kasper Hassett

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

by Kasper Hassett

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Support the Radical

Subscribe