Squatting becomes illegal in England and Wales with LASPO legislation
- Thread starter peacepete
- Start date
DaveCinzano
WATCH OUT, GEORGE, HE'S GOT A SCREWDRIVER!
What do you expect from a photographer?
Housing association I understand
sim667
All aboard the 303 bus.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/sep/11/squatters-reopen-friern-barnet-library
I didnt know if this deserved a thread of its own, but since LASPO passed squatters have moved into a commercial property. Infact a library in barnet, and theyve re-opened it to the public.
The council seem to have been quite accomodating.
I didnt know if this deserved a thread of its own, but since LASPO passed squatters have moved into a commercial property. Infact a library in barnet, and theyve re-opened it to the public.
The council seem to have been quite accomodating.
SpookyFrank
A cheap source of teeth for aquarium gravel
Local councils are often OK with projects like that tbh, I can think of a couple of squatted social projects that have either had the green light from councils (though not any funding or support) or at least tacit acceptance.
This sort of thing can be great fun too, but the fact remains that a building you're using as a public resource often makes a pretty lousy home. It's not sustainable for people to work for nothing running a project like this if they don't have stable homes of their own. Squatting is a culture and an ethos, a big part of it has always been to enable people to go off and do creative and constructive things elsewhere without having to worry about making their rent. I worry that this sort of project will not be the next phase of squatting in the UK but rather its last hurrah.
This sort of thing can be great fun too, but the fact remains that a building you're using as a public resource often makes a pretty lousy home. It's not sustainable for people to work for nothing running a project like this if they don't have stable homes of their own. Squatting is a culture and an ethos, a big part of it has always been to enable people to go off and do creative and constructive things elsewhere without having to worry about making their rent. I worry that this sort of project will not be the next phase of squatting in the UK but rather its last hurrah.
wemakeyousoundb
hopefully not gimboid
The fact that a fair amount of these creative and constructive things people did quite often was part of some sort of protests had obviously no bearing on the government plans.
SpookyFrank
A cheap source of teeth for aquarium gravel
The grapevine tells me a squat full of known political types was evicted in Brighton at twenty minutes past midnight on September the 1st. By contrast, I know of several squats in my area who haven't heard a peep from the piggies since the law changed. The people who live there are careful to separate their political activities and their home lives, coincidentally...
I think the way the police enforce this will have a lot to do with politics and activism, but the main motives for the change in the law were money and earning brownie points among the landed gentry, in that order.
When people ask me why I have no faith in parliamentary democracy, I've got more than 30 years of examples similar to the above clusterfuck, spanning my adult life, with which to illustrate my lack of faith.
People still believe in our system of goverment because they've to a lesser or greater extent, been indoctrinated (educationally, culturally, socially) to believe it's the only game in town besides dictatorship.
It's dead easy when there are no working or lasting examples of an alternative besides...dictatorship.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
There's no alternative to parliamentary democracy beside dictatorship? Really?
What I said was that it's easy to convince people that there's no alternative when there are no working examples, or lasting examples, of a different way of doing things other than dictatorship. Maybe you know different. If so, let's hear it. Working examples, that is, not theory or supposition.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
In my original post I specifically mention parliamentary democracy in the UK, so either your reply is in response to that, or you're talking shite.
If we take the former as being the case, then you're saying that the only functional alternative to parliamentary democracy is dictatorship. What I'm saying is that democracy doesn't begin and end with parliamentary democracy (you know, the actual system that supposedly allows us as "the governed" to have a say?), and that there are other forms of democracy that might work better, no need for dictatorship.
You're doing exactly what I asked you not to, and giving an abstract answer, which is nothing to do with the point I'm making. So here it is again: it is easy to convince people that the only alternative to parliamentary democracy is dictatorship when the only alternative to parliamentary democracy existing in the real world is...dictatorship. (This is not my opinion but fact.)
So are you going to give us any examples of these 'other forms of democracy'? Lasting, functioning examples?
SpookyFrank
A cheap source of teeth for aquarium gravel
The lack of lasting or working examples of such systems is a result of the dictators and the demagogues doing everything in their power to crush them before they can gain a foothold. This way stupid people will continue to parrot the idea that there are no other options so that it seems that the current state of affairs is simply the natural order of things.
If you want an example, go straight back to the subject of this thread. Here we have (or had) a subculture which rejected the notions of profit and property in favour of an organic, inclusive way of living based around stuff that would otherwise have gone to waste in accordance with the capitalist system. Even this flawed, small-scale and largely ignored example of independence and creativity as alternatives to obediance and servitude apparently had to be destroyed before it could spread. The timing is not accidental either, soon many thousands will be driven from their homes by poverty and the slow death of the welfare state. The scene was set for squatting to become endemic in the way it was after world war 2. This could not be allowed because it would have threatened capitalism's hold on the public imagination.
So, the only logical thing to do is to destroy what we have now and then create an alternative. Our masters will never let us do it the other way round.
Again, nothing to do with what I've said. In general, people aren't interested in theories of what might be, or in what might have been if only, but whether an alternative exists in practice. That's why it's easy to convince everybody that the only alternative to parliamentary democracy is dictatorship. Around the world these seem to be the only functioning and lasting systems.
SpookyFrank
A cheap source of teeth for aquarium gravel
I'm really hungry but my dinner does not yet exist in practice so I guess that's me fucked
I'm really hungry but my dinner does not yet exist in practice so I guess that's me fucked
I notice VP couldn't answer my point either.
SpookyFrank
A cheap source of teeth for aquarium gravel
I've already answered it once. And when you say functioning systems, you fail to note that most of these systems don't function at all if you consider a 'functioning' society to be one which provides the best possible quality of life for its citizens. Our democratic government is deliberately reducing the quality of life of the majority of the population, I wouldn't call that a functioning system. And we still have it a lot better than people who live in dictatorships, so you saying that these are the only two functioning systems grates more than a little.
The state of affairs as I see it is that there is no functioning and stable form of society that has yet been created and we should take the crappy state of the world as we find it and use that as motivation to help create a stable and functioning society, not to simply declare the task impossible and resign ourselves to a selection of different ways to get fucked over.
The extant systems of government don't really count as 'stable' either, especially not dictatorships which often rely on a cult of personality and thus fail to outlive one particular dictator.
What I meant by a functioning system was one that actually keeps things running on a day-to-day level. Whether it functions in the sense that you mean seems to be neither here nor there in the eyes of the majority who have no desire to change it. And a major reason for this may well be that the only functioning alternative they see around the world is, as I said, dictatorship. Most people are not interested in political theory or thinking beautiful thoughts about what might be, for good or ill.
tommers
Fuck it, it's fine.
marty21
One on one? You're crazy.
Disgraceful that a Housing Association property has been empty for a year, the only reasons for this would be - they are selling the building and haven't decanted all the tenants yet, major works are needed and they haven't got the funds to carry them out. They shouldn't normally be empty for that long.
wemakeyousoundb
hopefully not gimboid
L&Q say that they found about the squatter when they took a prospective tenant to show him the flat and started proceedings then, the police acted of their own accord on this one.
Anyone squatting in residential properties should arrange something with friends who rent so they can have an address to give to the police in case of arrest to avoid becoming criminalised, this is starting to look pretty bad :/
Brainaddict
slight system overdrive
There's a really important thing someone pointed out to me the other day in the text of the act:
Note 3(b). They made the definition of 'residential building' as broad as they possibly could and it possibly includes places that have since been adapted into other things. As I understand it there is concern that a building that was once a house at any time but is now, say, an office or entertainment venue, is illegal to squat. Which would cover a lot of places in central London. I don't know if we have to wait for court cases to see how this will be applied in reality or whether the government might issue advice on it to clarify.
Note 3(b). They made the definition of 'residential building' as broad as they possibly could and it possibly includes places that have since been adapted into other things. As I understand it there is concern that a building that was once a house at any time but is now, say, an office or entertainment venue, is illegal to squat. Which would cover a lot of places in central London. I don't know if we have to wait for court cases to see how this will be applied in reality or whether the government might issue advice on it to clarify.
Papawunwun
New Member
Such a lot of outrage and hand wringing on here about squatting becoming a crime down there in Englandshire.
Its been Illegal here in Scotland since 1865, and I see no evidence that we are any the worse off because of it.
Its been Illegal here in Scotland since 1865, and I see no evidence that we are any the worse off because of it.
nino_savatte
No pasaran!
No? Really, Papa Smurf? As for evidence, I suspect you have the utmost contempt for such things. Like this fella.
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100182267/imagine-theres-no-shale-gas/
Papawunwun
New Member
I have no idea what you are banging on about.
nino_savatte
No pasaran!
You seem pretty clueless full stop, fella. Why should now be any different? Hmmmmm?
Papawunwun
New Member
You know comes a time when being polite with some people just gets you nowhere.Ask a simple question, and you just get more bullshit, best really to spell it out I suppose. The reason I said I had no idea what you were banging on about with your link to the telegraph was simply because it bore no relevance to what I had posted.
It droned on about Shale gas and Yoko bloody Ono, a self publicising, moralising and boring pain in the arse, ever since she turned up and married john whatshisname, her late dear departed. who was also a moralising bloody bore. Now it seems this moralising boring could be genetic, as her son now seems to think that its his turn to tell us all whats good for us.
So you see china its because I can see no connection whatsoever to the post I made regarding the fact that Squatting has been illegal up here in Scotland since 1865, and the shite you provided a link to in answer to that bit of info.
Oh and whilst we are having this we chat I am sorry that I missspelled your name earlier....I can imagine how that might have pricked your ego a bit, and you were quite right to draw my attention to it, it is of course important.
nino_savatte
No pasaran!
You're being wilfully thick. You said "Its been Illegal here in Scotland since 1865, and I see no evidence that we are any the worse off because of it".
And I told you that you had contempt for evidence.
You are a returning poster and I claim my £5
And I told you that you had contempt for evidence.
You are a returning poster and I claim my £5
Papawunwun
New Member
Christ on a bicycle.
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