Brixton news, rumours and general chat - September 2017

[friendofdorothy]

It's above the old dept store building above the former PO (which has now been shunted into an annoyingly smaller space nearby).
Squire and Partners talk vibrancy and show off the shiny dome of their new Brixton Department Store home

thought the PO move was temp - is that a permanent new home for the PO then?

 

[editor]

thought the PO move was temp - is that a permanent new home for the PO then?

That's the new permanent, smaller, queue-out-into-the street home. The old PO space was annexed by Squire & Partners for their showcase offices.

 

[editor]

The entire estate was ASBOd and no one told us!

Lambeth & Met Police put an entire Brixton council estate on a 48 hour Closure Notice – without telling them

 

[shakespearegirl]

What park is everyone prohibited from entering? It doesn't make sense!

 

[organicpanda]

The entire estate was ASBOd and no one told us!

Lambeth & Met Police put an entire Brixton council estate on a 48 hour Closure Notice – without telling them

thought there was less braying cunts about than usual, obviously worked

 

[Gramsci]

thanks I wondered about that, but can't be bothered reading whole thread which mostly consists of bickering, couldn't see anything about a dome. Is that the building site where the PO is?

Instead of making comment on your view of the merits of that thread you could have used the search facility to find info on the dome using the link Ed postrd up for you I've just tried it on that thread. It comes up with relevant posts.

 

[Gramsci]

Some do, yes.

) There is a lack of EU workers as well, as many are leaving, upping costs of labour. /QUOTE]
This.

Upping costs on labour isn't necessarily meaning higher wages for the workers. Not from my , admittedly, subjective view from chatting to workers in the building industry. One was telling me how much his firm charges for plumbing jobs. How little a proportion of it he gets.

 

[Gramsci]

The entire estate was ASBOd and no one told us!

Lambeth & Met Police put an entire Brixton council estate on a 48 hour Closure Notice – without telling them

This was Notting Hill Carnival weekend. Clearly the police thought that an estate with a large relatively poor and black population may cause a nuisance and disturbance that weekend.

Funny that the nuisance that residents of central Brixton have been complaining about at meetings ,where police were present, doesn't result in a closure notice. Say in Electric Avenue for example.

There is unpleasant tinge of racial and class profiling in this Closure notice.

 

[madolesance]

The Virgin Mobile Shop appears to of closed on Brixton Road next to the tube. Not going to miss it, but I'm sure the employees will.

 

[Gramsci]

What park is everyone prohibited from entering? It doesn't make sense!

The way I read it is this. If you live in area ,and can prove it to an officer, you are allowed to enter and leave the designated area.

If you don't live in area then police officer can order you to leave.

So ,in theory , police could put officers around the boundary asking people to prove they live on estate.

If say someone from estate went to Carnival and after invited a few friends back the officer could refuse them entry if they didn't reside on estate.

You don't even have to be causing any trouble.

 

[CH1]

This was Notting Hill Carnival weekend. Clearly the police thought that an estate with a large relatively poor and black population may cause a nuisance and disturbance that weekend.
Funny that the nuisance that residents of central Brixton have been complaining about at meetings ,where police were present, doesn't result in a closure notice. Say in Electric Avenue for example.

An old music hall song encapsulates the situation:

It's the same the whole world over
It's the poor what gets the blame
It's the rich what gets the pleasure
Ain't it all a bloomin' shame?

Ironically Pier Paolo Pasolini - well-known left-leaning film director - noted that it is the poor who end up as policemen and the children of the wealthy who regularly violently confronted them (but that was Italy in the 1960s).

 

[lefteri]

That's the new permanent, smaller, queue-out-into-the street home. The old PO space was annexed by Squire & Partners for their showcase offices.

With no post box on the outside of it, let's not forget

 

[Gleena]

Upping costs on labour isn't necessarily meaning higher wages for the workers. Not from my , admittedly, subjective view from chatting to workers in the building industry. One was telling me how much his firm charges for plumbing jobs. How little a proportion of it he gets.

No argument from me.

 

[Gleena]

The entire estate was ASBOd and no one told us!

Lambeth & Met Police put an entire Brixton council estate on a 48 hour Closure Notice – without telling them

I'll see if I can find it but we got a threatening letter from Metropolitan a couple of weeks ago about not having an organised BBQ with food stalls (??) through our letterboxes. Encouraged people to dob in their neighbours, and threatened to have folks leases terminated (no word on what they'd do to private owners). Maybe that is the notice?

 

[CH1]

With no post box on the outside of it, let's not forget

This is supposed to be in process.

I heard on the grapevine that the GPO are currently engaged in restoring the "Wedgwood Benn" pillar box which was formerly outside Iceland. This is to be situated outside the new Ferndale Road Post Office.

 

[Winot]

The way I read it is this. If you live in area ,and can prove it to an officer, you are allowed to enter and leave the designated area.

If you don't live in area then police officer can order you to leave.

So ,in theory , police could put officers around the boundary asking people to prove they live on estate.

If say someone from estate went to Carnival and after invited a few friends back the officer could refuse them entry if they didn't reside on estate.

You don't even have to be causing any trouble.

I'd like to see someone like Liberty challenge this. It seems to be legally very dodgy to me (though not an expert).

 

[lefteri]

This is supposed to be in process.

I heard on the grapevine that the GPO are currently engaged in restoring the "Wedgwood Benn" pillar box which was formerly outside Iceland. This is to be situated outside the new Ferndale Road Post Office.

Good news but with the net result that we would still be down one post box

 

[GarveyLives]

...There is unpleasant tinge of racial and class profiling in this Closure notice.

Funny you should mention that ...

... three weeks earlier ...



... one year ago.​

 

[friendofdorothy]

Instead of making comment on your view of the merits of that thread you could have used the search facility to find info on the dome using the link Ed postrd up for you I've just tried it on that thread. It comes up with relevant posts.

Well that's me told. I was only asking a general question - I'm not doing an essay on it and I don't really care to research to whom the fucking dome belongs.

 

[friendofdorothy]

This is supposed to be in process.

I heard on the grapevine that the GPO are currently engaged in restoring the "Wedgwood Benn" pillar box which was formerly outside Iceland. This is to be situated outside the new Ferndale Road Post Office.

I'm not sure anyone notices the ill placed post box at the end of the market its always so piled up with rubbish. Still there really ought to be a PO box on the high street somewhere.

 

[teuchter]

I'd like to see someone like Liberty challenge this. It seems to be legally very dodgy to me (though not an expert).

Same here. It seems completely dodgy.

 

[Winot]

Looking at the Act cited in the Buzz article it is clearly to do with closing a dodgy premises e.g. a nightclub or bar where the police believe there is going to otherwise be trouble. The section talks about the owner of the premises. This can't have been intended to be applied to a whole estate or area of land - I think the Met are pushing the limits of what was intended to be covered by the law. I'll contact Liberty and see if they are interested in taking this up.

 

[Pickman's model]

I'll see if I can find it but we got a threatening letter from Metropolitan a couple of weeks ago about not having an organised BBQ with food stalls (??) through our letterboxes. Encouraged people to dob in their neighbours, and threatened to have folks leases terminated (no word on what they'd do to private owners). Maybe that is the notice?

Yeh. Welcome to Lambeth, police-style

 

[Gramsci]

Well that's me told. I was only asking a general question - I'm not doing an essay on it and I don't really care to research to whom the fucking dome belongs.

You were also making a comment about that thread. Expressing an opinion. Not just asking a general question.

 

[ash]

Looking at the Act cited in the Buzz article it is clearly to do with closing a dodgy premises e.g. a nightclub or bar where the police believe there is going to otherwise be trouble. The section talks about the owner of the premises. This can't have been intended to be applied to a whole estate or area of land - I think the Met are pushing the limits of what was intended to be covered by the law. I'll contact Liberty and see if they are interested in taking this up.

It can also apply to residential properties a couple of flats in our rd have recently had closure notices applied. Initially to stop people visiting then to remove the residents prior to eviction. From what I can make out these were related to dealing and cookooing.

 

[Gramsci]

Looking at the Act cited in the Buzz article it is clearly to do with closing a dodgy premises e.g. a nightclub or bar where the police believe there is going to otherwise be trouble. The section talks about the owner of the premises. This can't have been intended to be applied to a whole estate or area of land - I think the Met are pushing the limits of what was intended to be covered by the law. I'll contact Liberty and see if they are interested in taking this up.

I agree. Looking it up and a 48 hour closure was meant to be a quick stopgap giving police two days to apply for more permanent closure. It was supposed to be used where serious issues like hard drug dealing may be taking place in a club or house.

In this case the Met were using it to put the residents on whole estate in a kind of lock down. Never intending to make a case to magistrate for long closure. This was never about closing a particular building.

The trouble with legislation like this is that the Met can look at wording of act and use it in ways that might not have been intended.But then that's why whole books are written about the law. Arguing about the wording is what lawyers do. Mets legal advice must have been this creative use of this closure power for 48 hours is just inside the law.

But I agree it's arguable.

 

[Winot]

It can also apply to residential properties a couple of flats in our rd have recently had closure notices applied. Initially to stop people visiting then to remove the residents prior to eviction. From what I can make out these were related to dealing and cookooing.

Yes I think premises=property. Not a whole estate.

 

[ash]

Yes I think premises=property. Not a whole estate.

I agree I can't see how it could have been endorsed or justified on such a grand scale

 

[teuchter]

One property would tend to be under the control of one person or group of people who would have some degree of control over, and responsibility for what goes on within it.

A housing estate has lots of properties, each under the control of different people. Serving this kind of notice puts restrictions on people who have absolutely no control over what goes on elsewhere in the estate, whether or not those goings-ons are real or actually harmful. It's like a kind of collective punishment. And it intrudes on what people do in their own homes. The whole thing seems wrong to me. The amateurish and barely literate Lambeth poster announcing it makes it look like power is being excercised by people who shouldn't be trusted with it.

 

[editor]

As far as I can see, the one pair of notices stuck on the lamppost outside Southwyck House represented the sum total of the requirement by law to ensure that "reasonable efforts have been made to inform the people who live on the premises."

I've spoken to many residents and not one of them had any idea of the 48 hour Closure Notice, and it's been the same story on Facebook where other estate agents have posted.