'Just because someone was born and raised in Islington does it give them the right to have housing in Islington?'
This question through me slightly it was one of those situations where I felt unease in my gut but have taken a number of weeks to ponder it and unearth the exact reason for my unease.
Islington's house prices are staggering and rents rocket along with them. Overcrowding, poor quality accommodation, isolation and families being moved out of the borough are common problems. There are 1.3 jobs for every resident in Islington yet as a borough we have higher than national average unemployment. It is a borough of huge inequalities.
And the question being asked by someone on the left is loaded in a way that requires the poor to justify themselves. And there is reason for that. It was one incident that got me thinking but it was reflective of a theme. The dominant questions being asked are in the main being asked by the right. But should we be asking them or attempting to answer them at all? When I look at the housing problems in Islington I see a whole load of questions that have been left out of the asking.
Lets stop answering the rights questions with long convoluted arguments that are straining to move the discussion leftwards at glacial pace -lets just ask the left out questions. Like should a small group of people with no long term commitment to an area be aloud to extract profit from its housing market, contribute nothing to the local community and move out leaving a greater number of its local residents in poverty?
Perhaps many of us who like to consider ourselves leftist activists cant confront theses things and ask those questions until we have come to turns with our own hypocrisy. I live in an ex-local that I own.
Perhaps neo-liberalism and capitalism has won out so much that only the fringes and outliers will ever be brave enough to ask questions about private ownership but I hope not. I hope questions about who has the right to own resources and space will become mainstream. Asking the questions doesn't mean we have to offer the answers of the past but it does acknowledge they where good questions to ask.
This question through me slightly it was one of those situations where I felt unease in my gut but have taken a number of weeks to ponder it and unearth the exact reason for my unease.
Islington's house prices are staggering and rents rocket along with them. Overcrowding, poor quality accommodation, isolation and families being moved out of the borough are common problems. There are 1.3 jobs for every resident in Islington yet as a borough we have higher than national average unemployment. It is a borough of huge inequalities.
And the question being asked by someone on the left is loaded in a way that requires the poor to justify themselves. And there is reason for that. It was one incident that got me thinking but it was reflective of a theme. The dominant questions being asked are in the main being asked by the right. But should we be asking them or attempting to answer them at all? When I look at the housing problems in Islington I see a whole load of questions that have been left out of the asking.
Lets stop answering the rights questions with long convoluted arguments that are straining to move the discussion leftwards at glacial pace -lets just ask the left out questions. Like should a small group of people with no long term commitment to an area be aloud to extract profit from its housing market, contribute nothing to the local community and move out leaving a greater number of its local residents in poverty?
Perhaps many of us who like to consider ourselves leftist activists cant confront theses things and ask those questions until we have come to turns with our own hypocrisy. I live in an ex-local that I own.
Perhaps neo-liberalism and capitalism has won out so much that only the fringes and outliers will ever be brave enough to ask questions about private ownership but I hope not. I hope questions about who has the right to own resources and space will become mainstream. Asking the questions doesn't mean we have to offer the answers of the past but it does acknowledge they where good questions to ask.
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