Sweets Way residential,social housing Occupation change.org petition network it #olsx

The residents of Sweets Way, an estate in London, have been fighting to keep their homes for the last few weeks. All but 10 of the 160 families have been evicted so far but the residents are standing their ground -- they started a petition which has over 50,000 signatures and have occupied the empty flats to stop them from being demolished.  Annington have now gone to the courts to remove the residents. They have been summoned before Barnet County Court next Monday. The residents need as many signatures as possible before then -- they need to demonstrate to the courts that public support is on their side. Will you sign and help them save their homes?

Annington, Barnet Homes: Stop the demolition of the Sweets Way estate, stop the evictions of current residents and offer decanted residents the right to return to their former homes at truly affordable rents. Sweets Way Resists  London, United Kingdom Sign the petition Sweets Way Estate used to be a tight-nit community in Barnet, London, with families and children who played and went to school together. Now Sweets Way is the site of protest, where these same families are pleading with the council not to push them from their homes. We are Sweets Way Resists, a group of residents and ex-residents of the Sweets Way estate who are being evicted so that the estate can be redeveloped and turned into flats for the wealthy. Before December there were 160 homes on the estate, all but 10 families have now been evicted and rehoused mostly out of the borough -- some even out of London. Most of these are families with children who have had their lives uprooted and moved away from their community, their friends and their schools. The property is being developed by the company Annington -- one of the largest property developers in the UK. In December, Barnet Council approved Annington’s application to redevelop Sweets Way - meaning pushing out all current residents and replacing the existing homes with up to 288 new ones. Almost all of these new homes will be for the wealthy. And meanwhile the families of Sweets Way have been forced into homes that are too small, too far from schools (meaning some of the children have had to miss school) and none have been told where or how they will be housed long term. But we don’t want to be rehoused -- we want our homes back. According to Annington’s plans, the ten families left on the estate will be removed by the end of this month.  We won’t let that happen -- we’re standing our ground, occupying the empty flats and will stand together until Richard Cornelius, Leader of Barnet Council and Annington meet our demands. Barnet Homes has repeatedly told us that there are no appropriate homes for us in the borough, but they are wrong -- we are living in them! Our homes are well-built and perfectly habitable and the estate offers green spaces and gardens for our kids to play and the community to come together. Annington’s so-called ‘regeneration’ of our estate benefits private developers at the expense of our community. We demand: 1. No demolition of the homes on Sweets Way estate 2. Repopulation of empty homes, with right to return for all decanted residents 3. Immediate stop to all eviction proceedings against residents If Annington can’t provide homes at Sweets Way that we can afford, we demand that they sell the estate to Barnet Council at a cost the council can afford. Sign the petition