Councillor John Lines’ Homeless Village in Birmingham + update

5.11.2008
A protest camp named after Coun­cil­lor John Lines who’s respon­si­ble for the city’s hous­ing, was estab­lished last Thurs­day on derelict land owned by Birm­ing­ham City Coun­cil. Cllr. Lines has denied there is a home­less prob­lem in Birm­ing­ham and also denies there is mon­ey avail­able to build new ‘social hous­ing’. The occu­pied land has been unused for around sev­en years whilst there are over 30,000 peo­ple in the city wait­ing for hous­ing.

Birmingham homeless land squat 1Birmingham homeless land squat 25.11.2008
A protest camp named after Coun­cil­lor John Lines who’s respon­si­ble for the city’s hous­ing, was estab­lished last Thurs­day on derelict land owned by Birm­ing­ham City Coun­cil. Cllr. Lines has denied there is a home­less prob­lem in Birm­ing­ham and also denies there is mon­ey avail­able to build new ‘social hous­ing’. The occu­pied land has been unused for around sev­en years whilst there are over 30,000 peo­ple in the city wait­ing for hous­ing.

The protest is against the Coun­cil hold­ing on to land that could be sold at a ‘friend­ly’ price to Hous­ing asso­ci­a­tions there­by allow­ing Hous­ing Asso­ci­a­tions to draw up to £100m of grants to pro­vide ‘social hous­ing’. “At a cost of £50,000 per unit, the £100m could pro­vide around 2,000 homes” said one of the pro­test­ers. They claim the Council’s approach is spec­u­la­tive — by hold­ing onto unused land and build­ings with a view to sell­ing them off to the high­est com­mer­cial bid­der.

‘The John Lines’ Home­less Vil­lage’ con­sists of tents, a fire, cook­ing facil­i­ties and is locat­ed on the Per­shore Road in Bal­sall Heath. Orig­i­nal­ly the camp was intend­ed to last a week, but now pro­test­ers are try­ing to stay there as long as they can. Up until now the Coun­cil have made no plans to meet or talk with the pro­test­ers. They have been served with a notice to quit by Birm­ing­ham City Coun­cil and are due in court this Fri­day.

A group of around 30 peo­ple from dif­fer­ent parts of the city reg­u­lar­ly sleep over at the camp, some of whom are on wait­ing lists for social hous­ing and some home­less peo­ple have also joined the camp. The pro­test­ers have also attend­ed and dis­rupt­ed a coun­cil meet­ing yes­ter­day where accord­ing to the local press, they threat­ened to occu­py the roof of the home of Coun­cil­lor Lines, and Lines in return has ‘threat­ened to set his dogs on them’.

Pro­test­ers at the camp are keen on meet­ing vis­i­tors who want to express some sol­i­dar­i­ty. They are also in need of food, blan­kets and dona­tions.

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Update:

The coun­cil was grant­ed the evic­tion order at Birm­ing­ham Coun­ty Court on Fri­day to evict the cam­paign­ers who are on land off Per­shore Road in Birm­ing­ham.