No happy New Year for McLeish family— just eviction

another decision over an important housing question.

For a private property company has bought four acres of land on the bank of the Thames at Battersea and plans to build £30,000 houses there.

Like all ihner London boroughs, Wandsworth has its housing problems. The total number of .. people the housing waiting list is 7,000, of which 2,000 are considered to have a pressing need for a council home.

And published figures show that Wandsworth has at least 20,000 unsatisfactory dwellings in the area.

For 70 years the site next to Battersea Bridge has been used by Philip Mills and Company as a waste paper collection depot.

The site has now been purchased by District and Suburban Properties for building what can only be considered speculative housing.

Noise shield

The 280, homes planned will range trom t14,000 for studio to £30,000 for a sixroom house fronting on to the river.

But that's not all. The middle-class and the rich must be shielded from the noise of lorries crossing the bridge.

The developers have come with squash courts, a health club and sauna bath, shops, a pub and a restaurant.

With all those buildings bétween ' 'residents' and the traffic, the dinner parties should be pleasant occasions.

The whole scheme, therefore, as is perfectly natural from the developer's point of view, is designed with profit in mind.

A planning application has been slapped in. On the council's general plan the area is designated for industrial use because of the heavy concentration of factories.

The property men want a change to residential use, a radical switch.

Opulent

As Labour councillors, the 53 men and women would presumably be opposéd to such opulent developments on their stretch of the Thames.

Wandsworth's housing situation is far from good. And unemployment is increasing around the Battersea area as factories close down.

After all, thousands of council tenants in Wandsworth live in soaring unattractive tower blocks in small areas containing few amenities.

The only policy the council has for the riverbank land is the insistence that any development will allow the construction of walkways along the Thames.

Inis aspect is included 1l he planning application.

The Labour councillors at Wandsworth say they will fight the Tory proposals to double council rents. They must also take a stand on the Thamesside housing bonanza.

The alternative is the continuation of the process by which property tycoons amass pilés and piles. of money through speculation on land and buildings.

Money-spinning

Whole stretches of land are involved, not just in Wandsworth. We've already seen the Hay's Wharf proposals.

On the North side of the river, near London Bridge, there is the money-spinning St Katherine's Dock scheme.

That includes things like a yatching marina, hotels and an exhibition centre-all lucrative projects.

We await with interest the decision of Wandsworth borough council's planning committee over the Battersea schame. THE MCLEISH family, including two children aged one and two, face the threat of eviction from their N London flat early in the New Year.

This will be, the outcome of Clifford McLeish's year-long fight to get much-needed repairs to the bathroom and toilet.

In his fight to have the repairs carried out, Mr McLeish has twice refused to pay his rent to the private landlords. He took this action in an attempt to force the landlord into doing the necessary repairs.

Last week the landlord got a court order to evict the whole family.

The family consists of 53year-old Clifford McLeish, his daughter Zelma and her two children, and another daughter, Desiree.

FLAT

They live in a first floor flat at 53 Manor Road, Hackney while the rest of the building is occupied by six other adults and three children.

The toilet used by the nine adults and five children in the house is in a state of absolute disrepair with the cistern coming off the wall, while the walls themselves are damp and wallpaper is peeling off.

All over the house the effects of damp can be seen. In the bathroom the water tank leaks and . the floor is now covered with old wallpaper which the landlord's repair man left when he came to plaster the walls, the day before taking Mr McLeish to court.

LATE NEWS NEWS DESK 01-720 2000 CIRCULATION 01-622 7029 • Internment in N Ireland may have to go on 'for some time', William Deedes. Tory MP and 'Daily " Telegraph' writer, said yesterday.

Deedes, who recently led an all-party delegation of MPs to inspect internment camps, said on BBC radio: 'I cannot accept that internment in present circumstances can end.' At his first court appearance, Mr McLeish was ordered to pay the rent arrears, which he did in the hope that the repairs might be started. However, when nothing was done, Mr McLeish again withheld the rent.

EXTENSION

This time the landlord applied for and got a court order to evict the family in one week. On Wednesday, December 22, Mr McLeish again went to court and applied for an extension • of the order until December 28.

The McLeish family have lived in their present home for 14, years but they now face being turned out early in the New Year when the bailiff returns from holiday.

I asked Zelma what she felt about a statement from the local Hackney Council that if the family are turned out, she ren into *care five her child- might have to home can be found for them. She was visibly shocked.

RESPONSIBILITY "They're not taking my children away from me, she said. I don't know what's going to happen, but I won't allow them do that. I don't want to go to any halfway house either.

SHOWERS and sunny periods in all E districts will spread W into many central areas by the afternoon.

The showers will be of rain or sleet, but will fall as snow over high ground in the N.

W England and Scotland 'We've lived here for 14 years but in all that time we've only been visited twice to see if any repairs need doing.

'They'll come quick enough if you stop paying your rent, though?

She went on: 'When I had my last child the health visitor used to come around and say that they would try wallpaper