A March for Homes in London is gaining support fast. The March on 31 January is demanding:
· An end to the demolition of good quality council homes
· Rent control
· Scrapping of the Bedroom Tax and benefit caps
· Secure tenancies for all
· A national programme of council housing investment
· Decent pay and conditions for housing and care workers.
The March is uniting tenants and housing campaigns across London, to demand action to change the Government and Mayoral policies that support soaring rents, redevelopment of estates, rising eviction and homelessness, and loss of security.
Initiated by Defend Council Housing and the London Peoples Assembly, the March already has support from tenant organisations, trade unions and housing campaigns and from some London MPs and London Assembly members. Strong and growing support includes New Era tenants, Focus E15 Mums, Generation Rent, Hackney and Tower Hamlets private renters, BECTU trade unionand the Unite Housing Workers Branch.
Two marches: from Elephant and Castle SE1 and from Shoreditch E1, will meet at Tower Bridge and join the short march co-ordinated by Disabled People Against Cuts, together to protest at London's City Hall. See www.marchforhomes.org and leaflet.
Eileen Short, national Chair of Defend Council Housing (DCH) said:
We are taking to the street to show the united demand for urgent action. Tenants from all tenures, public and private, campaigns and trade unions are determined to organise together to resist evictions.
'The growing housing movement will not swallow hollow promises and more empty luxury housing. The London Mayor and councils must act now to control rents and invest in council housing.
Alastair Stephens, Chair of the South London People's Assembly,
said 'A whole generation of Londoners will never have a home of their own unless there is a radical change in housing policy. With social housing shrinking and astronomical house prices, huge numbers are now trapped in expensive and insecure private rented accommodation. Growing numbers are ending up homeless. Polls show that most people support rent controls, greater regulation of the private rented sector and a return to the mass building of council housing. Only these actions will solve the housing crisis. We will take these demands onto the streets on 31 January.'
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