Happy holidays from Ladywood Unite + 2025 next steps

Ladywood Unite  – 2024 reflections and plans for 2025

Thank you

A heartfelt thank you to everyone who supported Ladywood Unite this year. We deeply appreciate every door you knocked on, email you sent, complaint you submitted, protest you joined, petition you signed, meeting you attended, blog you contributed, survey you took, press interview you gave, article you wrote, donation to our crowdfunder, and conversation you had with friends, colleagues, and neighbours. Your efforts have made a real difference.

Save the date

Join us on 15 February 2025 from 4-6pm at Ladywood Methodist Church to celebrate a fresh start to the year and shape the future of our community. We want to be sure that everyone has an equal opportunity to be involved in decision-making, in contrast to our perception of the council. Therefore, we will:

• Elect community members living in the regeneration zone to key roles in the Committee, including Chair, Vice Chair, Secretary, Press Officer, and other positions.
• Invite speakers with experience in similar regenerations.
• Enjoy free drinks, snacks, and art activities for children.

We need volunteers to join the Committee and represent the interests of businesses, council tenants, leaseholders, freeholders, renters, those in social housing, school buildings, and more. If you’re interested, email us at ladywoodunite@gmail.com. The expected commitment is approximately one hour a month, either in person or online.

Photo competition

What do you love about Ladywood? What do you value that you don’t want to lose as a result of the demolition? Send your portrait photos to ladywoodunite@gmail.com by 9am on 6 January 2024.

Key issues

The residents’ charter still lacks a crucial guarantee: that everyone who wishes to remain in Ladywood will be able to do so. We are also concerned that people will have to move multiple times, into unsuitable properties, and experience cost increases, drawing from experiences in similar regeneration projects. Much work remains to ensure the council delivers on its promise to improve the quality of life for everyone within the regeneration zone. Our concerns are grounded in the real-life experiences of people like us experiencing other regenerations, including those conducted by Berkeley Group. Here are some outcomes from Berkeley Group’s ongoing 20-year regeneration in Woodberry Down, London: 

“Everyone thought they would have new council homes on the estate. Everyone was told they would only have to move once. None of the new homes will be council homes… Even tenants rehoused in Phase 1 are getting into debt because of higher bills. And some people have had to move three or four times.” London Tenants Federation, 2017

“This is what disturbs me the most… We’re going through this long regeneration. How do we end up with fewer social homes than there were at the start despite being much denser? And the number of homes have increased 2.5 times. This is the main worry.” Geoff Bell, 2024

“42 per cent of the homes for private sale in the scheme have gone to overseas buyers, with a predicted net loss by the Town Hall of just over 300 social rented homes.” Hackney Citizen, 2019

“The building work was so loud you couldn’t sleep… They started at 7AM and wouldn’t stop drilling until the end of the day.” When Hackney Council tried to purchase her flat through a compulsory purchase order, Mordechai took the decision to send her mum, who has schizophrenia, back to Israel. “The stress, the noise, the sale – it was too much for her.” Liat Mordechai, 2020

We have tried to present credible alternative proposals to the council that avoid demolition and the above problems but the council has refused to seriously consider them. Every email we send is currently substantively unanswered or routed through an ineffective complaints process. Our legal strategy now involves working with Leigh Day, lawyers against injustice, to develop a specific challenge.

Onwards

Even if you can’t join us on Feb 15th, we hope you will continue to stand with us in 2025. Together, we can campaign against the demolition of good-quality and newly built homes, churches, schools, and businesses, while advocating for the creation of social and truly affordable housing, community spaces, and green areas. With the developer agreement still unsigned, there remains significant opportunity to influence outcomes for everyone within the regeneration zone, and we will be stronger by working together to hold the council and developer to account at all stages of the regeneration process.