Urban75 Home About Offline BrixtonBuzz Contact

Grenfell Tower fire in North Kensington - news and discussion

It is good news, but all they've done is in this one development is done what Livingstone insisted on in every development.
 
Hmm...The CoL buying social housing stock in another borough and letting that borough manage the stock.

What benefit is there for them? Does this mean they can get away with having less SC stock in central London themselves and therefore fewer 'poor' people in their housing/borough? Does this add to/fulfil their own quotas in some way?

IIRC they have quite a bit of social housing stock across many London boroughs - there are certainly some in Lambeth (by Lambeth North tube and along Hercules Road) and Southwark.
 
"I wonder if I torch my fridge , the government will buy me that Cornish farm house with swimming pool, 5 acres of woodland , overlooking the Atlantic ocean, that I have always dreamed of owning. Probably not, I work , pay taxes and am English born and bred."

DM comments FTW :facepalm:
 
It looks from this like the cheapest properties in the development were on offer for over 1.5 million. Can that seriously have been the 'affordable housing' bit? Can't be.
Kensington Row, New Apartments in Kensington - St Edward

Think the affordable housing bits are not being offered through that website. On the map lower down on the page, these are buildings that have no names as yet (ETA: or whose names are not important for the purposes of the website).
 
Last edited:
They weren't built as 'affordable housing ' from what I read, but as social housing. So they would never have been available for sale.
 
"I wonder if I torch my fridge , the government will buy me that Cornish farm house with swimming pool, 5 acres of woodland , overlooking the Atlantic ocean, that I have always dreamed of owning. Probably not, I work , pay taxes and am English born and bred."

DM comments FTW :facepalm:

I hope someone has pointed out that the Government probably would buy him that Cornish farm house with the swimming pool, 5 acres of woodland, overlooking the Atlantic Ocean and quite a bit more besides if the government bore a considerable amount of responsibility for utterly destroying his house, all of his moveable property and incinerating more than eighty of his neighbours.
 
It looks from this like the cheapest properties in the development were on offer for over 1.5 million. Can that seriously have been the 'affordable housing' bit? Can't be.
Kensington Row, New Apartments in Kensington - St Edward

No, the affordable part will have been for rental rather than purchase.

I hope these flats are social rent, not affordable, because a lot of the affordable tenancies where I live charge as the entire benefits cap.

Of course, since these are from the affordable part of the project they're not actually extra housing stock and people already on the housing list will have even less chance of getting a place.

Hmm...The CoL buying social housing stock in another borough and letting that borough manage the stock.

What benefit is there for them? Does this mean they can get away with having less SC stock in central London themselves and therefore fewer 'poor' people in their housing/borough? Does this add to/fulfil their own quotas in some way?

They've been doing it for years because it's a really good way of making money. Nothing more complicated in it than that.
 
They weren't built as 'affordable housing ' from what I read, but as social housing. So they would never have been available for sale.

I don't know, but they are marked as "affordable housing" on the developer's map.

Quite possible, though, that the press people are spinning this as "government splashes out on luxury flats" when the reality is that they have given the developers a bit of extra cash so that a block of housing association flats is ready a bit earlier than it would have been.
 
"I wonder if I torch my fridge , the government will buy me that Cornish farm house with swimming pool, 5 acres of woodland , overlooking the Atlantic ocean, that I have always dreamed of owning. Probably not, I work , pay taxes and am English born and bred."

DM comments FTW :facepalm:
Good god man, don't do it to yourself! Why even read what these sewer rats think?

Meanwhile in the Metro :D I read that Theresa May was swanning around at the Savoy at a £5000 a head Tory party fundraiser.

I hope she was able to raise funds for that fiddle she seems bent on playing.
 
They weren't built as 'affordable housing ' from what I read, but as social housing. So they would never have been available for sale.

Affordable housing includes rental properties. The rents are supposedly 80% of average local rent for that property size, but in reality they're usually 100% or over. Tenancies are five years, not permanent, though generally people who are already social tenants can get a permanent contract.

My flatmate's on the housing list and the affordable rent properties here hardly have any bidders because no-one eligible for social housing can afford them.
 
Re affordable / social I don't know but according to that Guardian article the flats that will be used to house these people were 'affordable housing' which 'have been purchased by the COL and will become part of its social housing stock.'
 
They've been doing it for years because it's a really good way of making money. Nothing more complicated in it than that.

Is there any need to be so dismissive? I asked a couple of questions, if you didn't want to answer them fine but don't condescend to me. Thankfully, others saw them worthy of a more helpful/detailed response.
 
Radical Housing Network
5 mins ·
**** press statement ****

In response to news that the Corporation of London has offered affordable housing to families of Grenfell in a luxury block, Radical Housing Network said:

"We're pleased that the Corporation of London has stepped in to offer laffordable social housing to Grenfell residents – the least that should happen is that existing social tenants are offered alternative social housing after their homes have been burnt to the ground following council and government negligence.

"However, questions remain about housing social tenants in luxury apartment blocks - how 'affordable' will these flats really be? We also abhor the way in which developers of luxury blocks meet 'affordable' housing quotas by designing buildings in which those on low-incomes are kept out of sight and out of mind from the rich.

"It's unclear whether these flats will be available to private renters, homeowners or subtenants of Grenfell Tower. Public authorities have a responsibility to ensure the safety and security of all of those displaced by the Grenfell catastrophe, whatever their status.

"Long term we need public investment in housing. Council housing pays for itself and saves public money - currently, we spend £23 billion every year on housing benefit which goes directly into landlord's pockets.

“We need housing for people not for profit - and public investment in secure, decent, genuinely affordable housing for everyone.”

Notes to Editors

Radical Housing Network is a London-wide network of campaigns fighting housing injustice. For all press statements see radicalhousingnetwork.org.

Grenfell Action Group is a member of the Radical Housing Network.

Press contact

Katya Nasim 07791018631
Harriet Vickers – 07817724556

Radical Housing Network
[email protected]
@radicalhousing
 
To clear up the matter:

Affordable housing is social rented, affordable rented and intermediate housing, provided to eligible households whose needs are not met by the market.

From here Definitions of general housing terms - GOV.UK

Intermediate housing can be for sale, affordable housing is for rent. These were always going to be rental properties. I don't know if the sale to City took place before these events or not but it's such a long process that I suspect it was already in the works. They're not extra housing, in any case.
 
The CoL don't build social housing in the City any more, developers of posh housing pay a levy to mitigate the expectatipn they will have a % of social housing. The levy is generally much smaller than you/I would like it to be. The details of recent examples are hidden in CoL Planning Committee Minutes.

IIRC they have quite a bit of social housing stock across many London boroughs - there are certainly some in Lambeth (by Lambeth North tube and along Hercules Road) and Southwark.

Rutita1 , scifisam was the only person to respond to your question as far as I can see.
you missed these two above then!
 
New York TImes on the disaster.

Opinion | Would a White British Community Have Burned in Grenfell Tower?

Pretty poor stuff I thought.

A terrible article. Disasters like Grenfell (caused by incompetence, penny-pinching and Government indifference to blatantly dangerous situations) did happen to "White British Communities" at Hillsborough, Valley Parade, Aberfan, Ibrox and at least a dozen different coal mines. She would have been better off just writing "poor".
 
Back
Top Bottom