Every city in the developed world faces it, redevelopment, gentrification, this type of procedure may not be "ethnic cleansing", but it is "class cleansing". Each area in the city or town must be made into a profit making entity, capital needs somewhere to gamble. So push out the low earners and bring in the big spenders, it is the foundation of this era of capitalism.
This "class cleansing" can be stopped, but only by community direct action and solidarity. So we raise a fist in solidarity with the residents of Southwark area who have forced the council to "temporarily" suspend its intended "class cleansing"
Southwark Council has been forced to bow to community pressure,
temporarily shelving the redevelopment of Elephant and Castle shopping
centre on a night which saw anti-gentrification protesters storm the
council's offices.
Local residents - many from the area's
Latin American community - and students, marched from the London College
of Communication's (LCC) campus off the Elephant roundabout to the
council offices on Tooley Street. As the march snaked through South
London, protesters chanted demands for social housing - in a borough
with a notoriously poor track record of providing it.
Outside the Council offices, protesters listened to impassioned speeches
before the chant of "let us in" went up. Security gates blocking access
to the foyer sprang open and the crowd rushed in to the foyer of the
council building. Demonstrators had to be held back by security guards
as meetings on the ground floor were evacuated.
As the protest continued inside the council offices, music was played
and the crowd made space for some Latin dancing. The next track on was
Skepta's Shutdown, reflecting the feeling that the planning committee
meeting had been successfully disrupted - although that wasn't the case.
The threatened demolition of the Elephant and Castle shopping centre
in South London has loomed over the space for over a decade. Those
familiar with the area will be all too aware of the destruction of
social housing on the nearby Heygate Estate, where over 1,200 homes have
already been demolished by the local council, as well as the ongoing
destruction of the nearby Aylesbury Estate and many of the other
programs of estate “regeneration” taking place across the area.
Last night, Southwark Council’s planning committee met to discuss the
proposed redevelopment of the shopping centre by Delancey (the
objections to this redevelopment are covered in far more detail here).
The proposals would see the shopping centre and LCC's campus demolished,
to be replaced by a new development resituating the two alongside a new
housing development featuring a staggeringly low 33 “affordable” homes
out of the 979 promised.
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Massive love and respect to all those who came out today to support The
Elephant community's opposition to the social cleansing of the area. The
march up Borough High St was well spirited, noisy and powerful!!
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