The Communist Party has attacked the demolition of working-class homes and former council estates.
“Rather than renovating houses that are structurally sound, developers are making huge profits destroying structurally sound properties and building new, over-priced ones for sale and let”, Lorraine Douglas told the Communist Party’s Political Committee on Tuesday evening (17 September 2024).
The Convenor of the Party’s Housing Commission attacked council and social landlords in London and elsewhere who have facilitated this approach instead of repairs, renovation and campaigning for more funds to increase the housing stock.
“According to Shelter and other estimates, almost half a million people of every age are without a home and living in temporary accommodation, with thousands of others sleeping rough”, Comrade Douglas noted.
She called on the left – including the Communist Party – and the trade unions to give a higher profile to Britain’s housing crisis, campaigning in local communities against demolition and redevelopment as a cure-all, and urging more funds for investment in local authority housing in Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ October Budget.
As news came in of the lethal detonation of thousands of people’s pagers in Lebanon, Syria and Iran, killing or injuring hundreds of civilians, the CP Political Committee condemned yet another atrocity in Israel’s genocidal destruction of Gaza.
Britain’s Communists called for a mass turnout to march on the Labour Party conference in Liverpool this coming Saturday, 21 September. The Palestine Solidarity Campaign and other groups are demanding that the British government cease all arms exports to the Israeli armed forces illegally occupying Gaza and the West Bank.
The CP Political Committee also urged a full house in the Bolivar Hall, central London, on 28 September to celebrate 75 years of the People’s Republic of China organised by Friends of Socialist China and the Communist Party, and supported by the Morning Star, the Indian Workers Association (GB), the Young Communist League and the Bangladeshi Workers Council.
END.