Lambeth Conservatives

Despite numerous warnings from local residents and Conservative councillors, Labour run Lambeth Council failed to take adequate steps to stop squatters occupying a council house in West Norwood valued at £459,000. The property had been empty for over four months while bureaucrats dithered.

The house in a leafy street opposite a church was “decanted” in August 2009 of its former residents and boarded up but nothing happened about the proposed major repairs and just before Christmas squatters moved in with possessions stacked in two vans. They broke in, disabled the security alarm, and reconnected the electricity. Now the council faces determined opposition from the squatters and will have to spend thousands of pounds of tax payers money to evict the illegal occupants.

Lambeth lawyers have reacted quickly but that’s more than you can say for the housing department which is a by-word for incompetence and overspending with its housing revenue account £7 million in the red.

Conservative Group Leader Cllr John Whelan takes up the story.

“It beggars belief that the council ignored so many telephone calls, e-mails, and representations by local councillors,” says Cllr Whelan.

“The truth only emerged at a meeting with Labour MP for Streatham Keith Hill, the chairman of Lambeth Living, where it was stated by the Chief Executive of Lambeth Living a few days before the squatters struck that no decision had been made about proceeding with the repairs.”

In addition, the Council ignored several requests for the front garden of the property to be cleared of dumped rubbish.

Cllr Whelan (see picture) says: “In the end, I went round myself and spent 90 minutes tidying up the garden helped by the waste contractor Veolia who sent a vehicle to take away the garbage. What I’ll never know is why the residents were moved out four months before the repairs were finally authorised. The biggest losers are the two families that lived in the house who will have to wait ages to get back into their homes.”