‘SOCIAL housing is our right!’ chanted over three thousand protestors on the March to Defend Council Housing on Saturday.
The march began at Shoreditch Church and made its way to London’s City Hall by Tower Bridge where it met another march of thousands that began at the Aylesbury Estate in South London.
At the beginning of the march there was a rally where Lindsey Garrett, one of the leaders of the New Era Estate struggle spoke about how the residents drove the US asset management company privateers Westbrook out after they tried to hike up the rents by 300 per cent.
Garrett said, ‘It’s great to see so many people here today. It shows the strength of feeling over housing and its shows that when the community comes together, that’s real strength.
‘As you know, we were all facing eviction on the New Era Estate.
‘We took direct action, we set out an objective, we came together as a community and we won!
‘We were in a situation where we had to fight. We are now able to stay in our homes and I hope that that inspires everybody.
‘Now we are continuing the fight on the whole wider issue of homes for all to stop the privateers taking over our communities. We all have to come together and fight this privatisation otherwise we will be forced out of London.’
The march made its way down Liverpool Street, urged along by a Samba band. There were banners from the trade unions NUT, Unison, Unite, and others.
Alex King, who works for a homeless charity called No Second Night Out, told News Line: ‘The main cause of homelessness is a severe lack of council housing. New houses must be built. We need many more council homes.
‘I’m on the march because we have to stop them privatising and demolishing council housing.’
Barry Phillips, a member of Unison, said, ‘Central London has become only for the rich and now that the centre is expanding, they want the residential areas in the ring around the centre cleared out of working class families so that they can build their private housing blocks for millionaires.’