Harder times for Hackney squatters

squat art

Home is where the art is: squatters’ exhibition sets up in commercial premises

Hackney’s squatters are heeding the Government’s warnings to vacate squats following the scrapping of ‘squatters’ rights’ last September.

However, as the new legislation – which carries sentences of up to six months in jail and maximum fines of £5,000 – only applies to residential premises, squatters are now making commercial properties their main priority.

Tania Rose, a Hackney squatter for over three years, said that in the wake of the first prosecutions “squatters in residential properties when the law was enacted have decided to move on.”

Ms Rose, who is also an activist on behalf of people facing eviction, described relations between squatters and Hackney Council as “all hostile – if you’re in a council property they’re going to serve you with legal proceedings.”

A spokesperson for Hackney Council told the Hackney Citizen it is too early to say whether the new legislation is having any impact but pointed out 1,535 households in the borough were classed as statutorily homeless – ie those with a roof over their heads but who are still threatened with the loss of their current accommodation.

With waiting lists for housing numbering over 12,000 (according to lettings website Hackney Choice), the council plans to tackle the issue of homelessness by providing 2,000 homes over the next decade, as well as offering assistance for owners wanting to bring their empty properties back in to use.

However, the current demand by squatters for commercial spaces brings its own problems, according to Ms Rose.

“It’s getting to the point where we have a squat that’s open to 15 that now has 40, and overcrowding is becoming a health issue. Often the commercial buildings don’t have washing facilities – if you get a flushing toilet you’re lucky and there’s certainly no shower.

“People say ‘Look, they’re just criminals, lawless criminals’, but it’s not about that, it’s about supporting each other and a right to a home.”

Conservative MP for Hove and so-called ‘architect of the squat ban’, Mike Weatherley, said the fact that squatters have moved to commercial properties means people will be “screaming out” for that law to be changed as well.

He replied to Ms Rose’s claims by saying: “I have to give hats off to the squatters, they have an excellent PR machine that spreads all these sort of things that people want to believe but that are completely untrue when you actually test it out.

“If there is suddenly overcrowding in other squats as a result of [the law] then I’d like to know specifics, and I’d also like to know why they are there squatting rather than going through the local council.”

According to figures from the Empty Homes Agency, an independent charity, there are 3,180 empty homes in Hackney with over two thirds of those listed as privately owned with many of them standing vacant for six months or longer.

Among the 14 inner London boroughs, Hackney has the highest rate of empty homes at 3.1 per cent. A Freedom of Information request to Hackney Council in 2010 showed a total of 1,248 empty commercial properties at the time.

However, Mr Weatherley does not see why the number of empty homes should justify squatting, and claims there are many reasons why properties lay idle which squatters “can’t possibly know the reasons for.”

He said: “If something is wrong in a society you don’t just go and break the law and help yourself to it. Before, there was no repercussion for those anarchistic behaviours and now there is some retribution available under law, and most residential people feel this is a good law.”

The Metropolitan Police Service said in a statement that the new legislation “sought to protect the vulnerable, in terms of the harm caused to home owners but also to take full account of the systems that are in place to provide support for the homeless.”

Hackney squatter Adrian ‘Litro’ Serrano, who is helping run the four-day Temporary Autonomous Art exhibition from his commercial squat off Hackney Road, said locals told him the building he currently lives in was empty for 25 years.

He insisted: “We’re not stealing anything. It’s just a place to live because they weren’t using it. These people have a lot of money, a lot of places. What is the purpose of having a place and never using it?”

According to Jenny Simon – also attending the show and herself a squatter for over 10 years – the new law will fail because the “hard-core, hard line squatters who can see a derelict monstrosity like this and see potential in it” will always find ways to circumnavigate legislation.

“It’s dank and it’s dirty, and it’s got rising damp and there’s asbestos in the roof, but ultimately people have been forced into finding places like this,” she said.

The Advisory Service for Squatters (ASS) is a long-established, volunteer-run organisation, based in Whitechapel. Michael Dixon, who works with the group said: “Homelessness is not going to go away and empty properties, particularly in Hackney, continue to be left empty and neglected and so long as those two things are going to happen, squatting is going to happen.”

Mr Dixon described being homeless as not about sleeping rough, but rather “it is about being in a position of losing any place to sleep”.

He said squatters were not “just some homogenous group” and although many were squatting as a last resort, there were also many people squatting as a way of life that didn’t involve the ‘rent treadmill’.

Former squatter and Hackney street artist, Stik, said living in squats alongside people who were creating artistically was how he became an artist himself. Speaking about the legislation, he said: “I don’t know any residential squats in Hackney anymore as a result – it’s literally just killed a whole scene.”

Mike Nicholas, who works with the Thames Reach homeless charity, said there were issues regarding refuse and sanitation in squats, as well dangers to do with fires and discarded syringes.

He said: “We don’t want people who are squatting to be criminalised, we want to find some form of housing solution for them. But we also recognise the need to close these squats down because often they’re in dangerous premises, and they present a threat not just to the people living there but they can also cause problems for the local communities.

“Squatting tends to be either romanticised or demonised but often what we find is quite different from the way it’s being portrayed.”

Some names have been changed.

4 Comments

  1. Kerryanna on Tuesday 20 November 2012 at 16:20

    Why do people think they have a right to live somewhere for nothing? I have to pay rent, bills etc why shouldn’t they?



  2. skeptik on Saturday 24 November 2012 at 21:28

    Why do people think they have the right to leave buildings empty and derelict, or charge extortionate profiteering rents, when there are tens of thousands homeless?

    We all have a right to somewhere affordable to live..



  3. zetty on Sunday 25 November 2012 at 18:29

    Exactly.

    Land is a limited resource, and anyone born today is already at disadvantage, unless their parents own a piece. Think of how people acquired the land in the first place, from the very beginning — they claimed it by squatting. They made it a home.

    What’s happening now is in a city like London you must pay extortionate rents for a shithole and that still leads you nowhere cause as soon as you stop paying you’re on street. It’s not just about fact that some people are naturally not business minded, it’s more about the fact that some people own more than they can inhabit / more than they can ever rent out or make any other business use for, while the others are basically paying for it (by the way of inflated rents).. Not everyone is happy with it, and not everyone wants to spend their best, formative years focused on building a narrowly specified career which would pay for a home. Most would be happy to pay reasonable rents though.

    BTW I don’t squat. It’s a tough business, and a lifestyle. Can’t afford it, so I pay. Unfortunately.



  4. Scott on Monday 26 January 2015 at 08:22

    There seems to be a huge war going on between, in B & W, people who pay taxes and people who don’t and I really can’t understand the basic principle here. If you are paying money to a body of government, which you never see and doesn’t really care about your concerns (unless they are affecting a lot of people around you) why pay that tax and why stand there and look down your nose at people like myself(who only pay tax on stuff from shops (tabacco etc.) How am I inferior to anyone based on how much money they chose to spend? My mother said something profound when I was a wee un, Everybody, pottentially, is a paycheck away from losing the roof over their head and being made homeless. I believe in a karma-like system and if you are gonna kick us when we are down then u definately risk your own livelyhood too. It is hard work, living off of nothing. I dog sit to earn a wee bit of dosh but it really is only enough to get some dog food,decent tabacco and other neccessities every so often (once a month or so.) I do not collect dole money, and I am entitled being a brit n all. I have had jobs and i have lost jobs. When I did work I contributed to (what was called) the NHS stamp. I steer clear of hospitals and similar places so I do feel good that money is going to the right places.

    Squatters get a terrible reputation, i think. I am quite impressed with this article and the way it stays neutral on this matter. There are a few things that every squatter does and then a lot of things different crews and individuals do.
    basically we pretty much know EVERYBODY who was or is involved in squatting and if we don’t our mates do. My point here is that there may be 60 squats in London but when we are getting evicted we stand by each others side and explore more of this huge city together, as a community. News travels a lot faster within our world than the evening Standard. We all know (or know someone) who knows where it’s happening, from protests and workshops to the infamous parties or to clubs where our fellow Djays play or gigs. the party crew offers the public to see the majority of these amazing buildings that have been closed. Some people squat to live and others live to squat, some are partygoers and others just trying to move on from a hellish ordeal that may have caused our own homelessness.
    in conclusion please do not judge ANYBODY based on how they are, not by ur belief of what they are. If anybody is my neighbour while i am squatting and need a hand with anything I will be more than happy to help. My neighbour is also part of my community. sorry for typos, too early for me yet



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