From the
Hackney Gazette:
ANGRY tenants protested outside the town hall this week over sell-off plans which could see estates being built on and council homes demolished.
Jeers and boos greeted, Hackney's deputy mayor, Cllr Jamie Carswell, after the council's Cabinet gave the go-ahead on Monday to the plans to transform the borough's estates as part of a £6.8 million investment programme.
For the past nine months, Hackney Council has consulted tenants over controversial plans to sell off land on their estates to a housing association landlord.
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From
I Intend to Escape...
You would have thought Hackney Council and Virgin would have agreed clear working processes to ensure any mechanical faults could be quickly repaired, and tenants would get the service they are paying for. Not so. Two working days notice is required before Hackney will provide Virgin with a key to the roof (that's two days you are paying for a service you cannot use, on top of the week before the engineer can come round)
This time a new twist was added. Virgin informed me I had to request the key from the Council, and they would then pick it up from Hackney on the day of the repair. When I visited by Neighbourhood Office, I was simply told there was no access allowed to the roof of the building, for anyone, due to "problems caused by pirate radio stations operating from roofs".
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From the
Schnews.
There’s a gold rush afoot in east London, and we’re not invited. Also left in the cold is Sicilian café-owner Tony Platia who, together with other locals in the borough of Hackney, has recently re-occupied Francesca’s Café, his business of 30 years, after being booted out last summer. It was one of many premises sold from under tenants’ feet as the Council scrambled to dispose of their property over the last few years.
Now the shop front has turned frontline, barricaded in the battle to halt an ongoing stampede of investors and speculators, trailing a stench of corruption in their wake that would make Robert Mugabe blush. Tony had right of first refusal and tried to buy his place – but his cheques somehow kept getting lost in the post before they reached the Council. You, too, could get a slice of the real estate pie – if you don’t mind furnishing the right officials with a few back-handers.
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