Hackney Gazette letters 1999

“Class crusaders have called on tenants to fight off a yuppie invasion of Shoreditch and South Hackney. The Hackney Independent Working Class Association fears that Hackney residents will be run out of the area and replaced by yuppies and City business folk. “there is nothing wrong with new homes, shops and bars, but we should have new homes for our community and shops and bars that charge prices we can afford and that employ local people stated IWCA spokesman Peter Sutton.”
Half page article on the IWCA, Gazette 2 September 1999

“Two residential homes for the elderly have been demolished to make way for new developments and libraries all over the Borough have been closed down. I don’t know about regenerating Hackney. Degenerating Hackney seems more appropriate.”
Not just in Shoreditch. Stamford Hill resident Milli Bierman , Gazette 16 September 1999

“Who do you think the new homes will be for? Overcrowded families on Wenlock Barn? Local young people who need a place of their own? The answer is that it will be more high-priced flats for City workers – while our young people are forced to move out of the area. Is this the new deal Shoreditch was promised?”
Shoreditch tenant, John Beverley Gazette, 14 October 1999

New Deal supporter Winnie Ames “says that Shoreditch tenants will be able to vote on all options for their homes under the New Deal. Presumably this includes the option to remain with Hackney Council and have it fulfil its obligations to carry out much-needed repairs. Or is this not what the New Deal is all about?”
Haggerston tenant, Carl Taylor asks the right question of the New Deal, Gazette 21 October 1999

“The town hall square development sums up the priorities of Hackney Council. Councillors from all four political parties will be able to stroll around the piazza, go inside the town hall and vote to sell off more of our estates and then relax again in the late-night café/bars. Over their cappuccinos, they can swap stories about town hall gossip as easily as most of them swap political parties – all safely under the gaze of CCTV cameras. It’s a shame life is not as easy for the rest of us, who live in the houses, use the schools and depend on the services that they are supposed to be running.”
Colin Robinson, Gazette 18 November 1999 on the £50 million Town Hall Square development.

“That [Lib Dem] Councillor Bentley should defend any project spending on regenerating the Town Hall Square when the council is not only cutting services, but also charging the elderly and sick for “community care”, illustrates the vast distance there is between the priorities of the council and the priorities of the people of Hackney.”
Myrna Shaw of the Hackney Pensioners’ Convention, Gazette 25 November 1999

“Kevin Sugrue. Head of gentrification agency Renaisi thinks that “sons and daughters policy providing affordable housing to stop young working class people from moving out” is an option that he would consider. This is surprising, since his New Labour bosses have stated that we are all middle class now.”
Terry Jeffery, Gazette 30 December 1999