{"id":712,"date":"2018-01-15T17:28:47","date_gmt":"2018-01-15T17:28:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.edinburghagainstpoverty.org.uk\/?p=712"},"modified":"2018-01-15T20:22:39","modified_gmt":"2018-01-15T20:22:39","slug":"homes-for-everyone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/edinburghagainstpoverty.org.uk\/?p=712","title":{"rendered":"HOMES FOR EVERYONE"},"content":{"rendered":"

Solidarity protest with homeless people<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

End the Horror of SLUM HOMELESS HOSTELS IN EDINBURGH<\/span><\/p>\n

Wednesday 17 January 10am \u2013 11.30am<\/span><\/p>\n

Abbots House 10 Links Place EH6 7EZ<\/span><\/p>\n

Abbots house\u00a0was recently reviewed as\u00a0\u201cabsolutely disgusting\u201d, but its business is flourishing. Its owner is making a fortune from exploiting homeless people placed there by Edinburgh City Council.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Instead of building homes to solve the housing crisis once and for all the Council persists in a mischievous plan funding private profit through public money against public interest. The housing crisis has seen Edinburgh City Council paying out \u00a3120,000 a week to hostels and B&Bs. While the numbers of homeless continue to grow, Edinburgh Council has been using rotten hostels and B&B as temporary accommodation.<\/span><\/p>\n

Whole families are being put in one room. Dirty and dilapidated rooms, filthy mattresses,\u00a0disgusting\u00a0shared\u00a0bathrooms and toilets\u00a0with no locks….. The shocking conditions in Abbots House and Almond House B&B’s were exposed in the Daily Record in August 2017 \u2013 with some of the residents describing them as more similar to prisons than homes – but things are now worse than ever.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

We say to City of Edinburgh Council:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00b7 Stop putting families in homeless bed and breakfasts<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00b7 Take immediate action to drastically improve the appalling conditions in Abbots House and other homeless\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 B&B’s like Almond House<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00b7 Provide more genuine social housing for rent so no-one has to stay in homeless B&B’s<\/span><\/p>\n

GOOD HOMES FOR ALL<\/span><\/p>\n

There are more than enough resources to build good homes for all. But profit is being put before people\u2019s needs. Developers make more money from luxury hotels, shopping centres, and expensive private homes \u2013 the number of council houses in Edinburgh has fallen from 58,000 in the late 1970’s to under 20,000. In the meantime rents in Edinburgh are soaring, with entire neighbourhoods being made unaffordable for working\u00a0class\u00a0people, displaced by\u00a0luxurious hotels and private homes for the few.<\/span><\/p>\n

After years of succumbing to the logic of social cleansing of the city, Edinburgh is seeing a resurgence of direct action against the housing crisis. The group that is most significant in this wave of protest is led by mothers from North Edinburgh\u00a0who\u00a0have been affected by the cuts\u00a0to\u00a0housing benefit. This group \u201cAll About Me\u201d contest the benefits cap as the reason why so many families are getting evicted and finding nowhere else to go. After a summer of protest\u00a0including occupations of Council offices and meetings and the take-over of Tory party offices,\u00a0the group has gained the small victory of the abolition of charges for homeless people taking their possessions out of council storage.<\/span><\/p>\n

This should be considered only the beginning of this campaign to put an end to the system of profit over homelessness\u00a0operated\u00a0by Edinburgh City council and its\u00a0cohorts\u00a0of private profiteers. Together we can confront the housing crisis and fight back against austerity and the cuts, we need to make these brutal policies unworkable.<\/span><\/p>\n

==<\/span><\/p>\n

Abbots House, 10 Links Place, Edinburgh EH6 7EZ (By Leith Links. 12 bus – or 16 to Constitution Street, then walk along Queen Charlotte Street)<\/span><\/p>\n

Family crippled by Tory benefits cap housed in ‘filthy’ B&B<\/a> hotel<\/span><\/p>\n

Campaign demands<\/a> and reports of earlier actions<\/span><\/p>\n

The campaign are fighting for the Scottish Government to grant enough funds to enable Discretionary Housing Payments to fully cover the benefits cap.<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

North Edinburgh Action Group, All About Me, Power to the People group, Edinburgh Coalition Against Poverty. Contact via\u00a0ecap@lists.riseup.net<\/a>
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