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Don’t criminalise squatters - build council homes (my experiences)

Sarah Evans Andover
28th October 2011 at 20:49
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As I read my LRC update this morning I didn’t imagine for one minute that the front bench of the Labour Party would be supporting the Tories plan to criminalise squatters next week.(reported in the Guardian)

Perhaps it hit more of a chord because in May 1997 I sat watching Labour come to power from my bedroom in a squat. I can still remember the feeling of hope and happiness that the Tories were gone, or so I thought at the time.

What sort of sick logic is it that sets out to criminalise vulnerable, homeless people, forced to squat because of the failure of successive governments to provide adequate council homes and jobs?

People do not squat out of choice, they do so because the only other option is the street or a sofa.

Over 78 per cent of homeless people who have squatted have contacted their local council for help, but have been turned away because of the shortage of homes and the strict criteria that has made working people turn on each other.

Just like people on benefits, squatters are vilified in the media, but a quick look at the facts exposes the myths. Take a look at some research by Crisis and find out for yourself.

We have five million people in 1.8million households on council waiting lists: homelessness is a national crisis, not something to criminalise. The problem is about to get a whole lot worse when the government brings in Housing Benefit caps next January.

Figures suggest that between 20,000 to 40,000 people will be made homeless because the government is unprepared to cap private rents, compulsorily purchase empty properties or build new council homes which would create lots of jobs too.

The caps to new Housing Benefit claims, brought in a few months ago have already shown us that capping Housing Benefit does not bring down private rents. In fact, according to Private Eye, private rents have continued to rocket, making the private rental market even more unaffordable.

For me the experience of squatting only lasted about eight months, eight months I hope I will never have to repeat. I met some lovely people in the squats of London Lane and Ellingfort Road in London Fields, Hackney, and it was their campaign that brought those houses, left to rot, back into proper use, but squatting is not easy.

When I finished my HND in Silversmithing & Jewellery making I was pretty hard up: I had what I considered then to be a horrific debt, which in 1996 was about £5,000. My debt had built up over two years of a full time course at University even though I’d tried to work as a support worker. I had received the last dregs of a frozen grant and grudgingly took out one of the first student loans.

I look back now and think how lucky I was not to come out of my education with the sort of debt students are expected to shoulder now. I really don’t think that I would have had the confidence to risk putting myself into so much debt as students are expected to now, and consequently I would not have studied.

I went to University when I was 23, maybe 24: it was nearly 20 years ago. I had lived mainly away from home since I was eighteen and pretty much always had a job, so when college finished and my flat-mates all planned to move out of our crumby flat, I wasn’t sure where I was going to live.

I couldn’t keep the flat going because it needed five people to rent it, and besides which the flat was poorly maintained. When we moved in it had no glass in one of the windows, no lock on the front door and the back of the oven was the kitchen wall and fresh air. We only found this out after one flat-mate, who shall remain nameless, spent a good hour cleaning the oven and trying to light it before spotting the kitchen wall - I don’t know if he had tried to clean the wall too.

At least we were not expected to hand over an extortionate amount of money to an estate agent to be placed on their books before we could be shown available properties. And we ensured that we got our deposit back by using it to pay for our last month’s rent. Life is not easy if you have no money and need to rent in the private sector.

Everyone moved out, some back to their home towns, but I wanted to stay in London to find a job doing what I had trained to do: making jewellery, but I couldn’t afford a flat. Then someone I knew asked if I could look after their room in a squat for the summer.

I had never thought of squatting and initially I was not too sure, but my financial circumstances helped me to make up my mind and I moved in with about three taxi-loads of stuff.

I soon got used to the squat’s internal drainage system which rooted rain water that leaked through the roof back outside. In one room the drainage system employed an upside umbrella suspended from the ceiling with guttering for the water to run along.

I got used to all the cats which kept the mice at bay, the mould, the leaning walls and the holes between the floor boards and some of the bricks.

Within a couple of months the room’s owner returned, but I was invited to move into another squat a few doors away, which at the time was a massive relief because I still didn’t have a regular income.

The second house was lived in by two alcoholics - lovely chaps who I remember fondly. They lived upstairs, argued too much, never washed up or cleaned and were prone to sleepwalking and forgetting where the bathroom was: but let’s not revisit that story now.

There were no cats in this house so every time anyone visited the kitchen mice jumped out from the oven, from cupboards, from the sink, from under the table and they even nibbled your chocolate if you left it around – it was pretty horrific and it is a good job I do not mind mice.

The plus side is that if you have mice you don’t have rats.

Winter came along and I woke to ice on the inside of the windows: something I have never seen before and never want to see again. Sadly it is the reality for so many living in fuel poverty, who have to decide between putting food on the table or heating their homes.

It was at that point I borrowed some money to pay for a deposit on a rented house and a friend and I moved in to a two bedroom terrace just off Morning Lane.

We had to claim Housing Benefit and we were signing on, but somehow we managed to convince the landlord to rent the house to us without him knowing we were on benefits.

The house had central heating, cosy carpets and a plentiful supply of hot water. And for a while it felt like luxury and a safe home.

I found myself a job as a goldsmith in the West End with a grand salary of between £60 and £125 per week (this was 1996 and I still didn’t know much about trade unions then). At the time I thought I was lucky, others had paid to work at the company according to my boss. The craft experiences that I gained there was wonderful, even if Health and Safety was regarded as rude words.

Everything was great until we got a letter from a bank addressed to the occupiers, informing us that the house was going to be repossessed because the landlord had defaulted on his mortgage.

To make matters worse the bank were unaware that our landlord was renting the property out.

After speaking to a lawyer we were advised to hold on to the rent, just in case the bank wanted the money from us, meaning that we could end up paying two lots of rent.

On explaining the situation to the landlord he denied all knowledge of any ‘bank problems’ and demanded his rent or else.

Our fear of this man’s ongoing threats made us decide to move out, and I was given the opportunity to move back to the squat, something I did with mixed feelings of relief and dismay.

It was in that squat in May 1997 that I sat up all night watching Labour get elected to power, I think I even shed a tear. I certainly remember the song by D:ream, Things can only get better - from where I was sat I certainly hoped so.

Here we are in 2011 with an even wider gap between the rich and the poor, and even fewer council homes and things have not got a lot better, they’ve got a whole lot worse for the most vulnerable in society, but at least we have one of the most inspirational movements building, that we’ve seen for years: UK Uncut and the recent Occupy movements across the globe.

However, it is a sad fact that under New Labour more council homes were sold off than under Thatcher, but what is unforgivable is the Labour leadership’s apparent complicity in criminalising the homeless, in its support for clause 26 of the Legal Aid and Punishment Bill - let’s hope they change their minds before next week.

Come on Ed, we need you to start standing up for people, things haven’t been this bad since 1930.

I’ve posted my open letter to Ed Miliband here: http://sarahevanslabour.blogspot.com/2011/10/criminalising-most-vulnerable-squatters.html

Tags: council houses (1) | defend welfare (1) | homeless crisis (1) | housing benefit (1) | squatters (1)