Brixton Prison to make way for luxury housing? [Archive]

IntoStella

07-01-2004, 11:18

Originally posted by Giles
I did not mention race at all in what was intended as a light-hearted comment. Jawohl! Where is pie1 when you need him? ;)

It may have been intended as ''lighthearted" and even "humorous" but it certainly wasn't very funny. :p

As a property developer you are bound to be antipathetic to any kind of development that propagates social good -- ie schools, social housing -- when the land could be sold to richly line the pockets of your own kind and the residents could send their kids off to private schools in west London.

Myself, I prefer convicts to property developers. :p

Having said that, I don't see either how your limp joke was racist.

hatboy

07-01-2004, 11:38

Originally posted by IntoStella
Hmm... Nice big site. Could be perfect for a school, solving that particularly pressing problem. Or -- you know what I'm going to say -- social housing. But what we really need is... more fucking luxury apartments... :mad: :mad:

Agreed. And my two pence on the other thing. Giles' comment came across to me as about the mix of wealth, class and circumstance. He mentions "yuppies", indicating he was talking about money not colour. A light-hearted comment. It didn't occur to me that he mean't the racial mix of the prison or the area. I don't think he did. However, if "Daily Mail Reader" or someone with a track record of being a stinking Tory and potential racist had said that I might wonder.

:)

ViolentPanda

07-01-2004, 11:45

Looks like the Home Office is using the condition of the prison as a spurious reason for closing it down.
I say spurious because the material condition of Holloway and of Brixton are no better and no worse than Wormwood Scrubs, Wandsworth and a double handful of other Victorian prisons in the South-East. What is unarguably different i that Brixton and Holloway have truly foull reputations (and records) for inmate self-harm (including suicide) and for brutality.
Looks like the Home Office is taking the opportunity to
a) make some serious dosh from land sales, and
b) attempting to engineer a change in it's reputation by a bit of social engineering on the inmates.

The social engineering is only going to work if the new prisons are better than the old, both construction and regime-wise. From past experience I don't hold out much hope. :(

As for the actual sale. It doesn't surprise me. When the HM Prisons estate was surveyed in the late 1980s (just after the first property crash), the London prisons (or their sites) were valued in 9 figures, not including suburban prison farm land.
Just a shame that the land will be used for private rather than public benefit.

hatboy

07-01-2004, 11:54

Any new development above 14 flats will have to have a proportion of social housing. Ken Livingston wants to legislate to increase that proportion. Another good reason to vote Ken. :)

SlazengerMoss

07-01-2004, 11:56

Originally posted by Giles
Maybe the prisoners could be offered the chance to buy their own cells under "right-to-buy"?

At least this would help to preserve the social mix of the area, and prevent it becoming another yuppie enclave.

Giles..

Look, none of you are going to change my mind. I think the above statement is out of order. The majority of inmates in Brixton are black and some snide joke about giving inmates the right to buy to preserve the social mix of the area is offensive.
I am amazed other people fail to see the racism, all be it unintentional, in Giles' statment.
Re Brixton, if you want to do something worthwhile. Campaign to keep the prison open. All of the people who go there come back into this very same community. The Governor has opened the doors of the prison to let community organisations in and help inmates make changes in their lives. If Brixton goes they'll build some private jail in Kent to send people from Lambeth to. It is a disaster waiting to happen. Lambeth needs Brixton prison.

lang rabbie

07-01-2004, 11:57

I wonder whether Thames Water's reluctance to say what their plans are for the next door reservoir site may have reflected some earlier approach by the Home Office when they were looking at options for extension/rebuild of Brixton prison.

There's a very strong argument for Lambeth insisting on a single planning brief for the two sites together.

Unfortunately, I suspect that the Home Office's timetable for building a new prison elsewhere won't free up the site in time to allow a new secondary school at the prison site when it's needed.

hatboy

07-01-2004, 12:16

Slaz, you are immediately assuming (your asumption) that Giles was referring to race. How do you know this? He may well have been making a silly joke about people who have been in prison and how he perceives them as opposed to the "yuppies" of this area. He may not even be aware of the racial mix in Brixton prison or other prisons.

On the other hand Slaz, perhaps you are right, but you can't know for sure. And if you've misunderstood, it is you who racialised this thread.

GarfieldLeChat

07-01-2004, 12:23

don't argue with the arse who clearly has race issues in their own poco head...

no doubt citizen smith here thinks that black boards are racist too!!!

:rolleyes:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/cult/ilove/years/1977/images/citizensmith173.jpg

Blagsta

07-01-2004, 12:34

SlazengerMoss

07-01-2004, 12:35

Originally posted by hatboy
Slaz, you are immediately assuming (your asumption) that Giles was referring to race. How do you know this? He may well have been making a silly joke about people who have been in prison and how he perceives them as opposed to the "yuppies" of this area. He may not even be aware of the racial mix in Brixton prison or other prisons.

On the other hand Slaz, perhaps you are right, but you can't know for sure. And if you've misunderstood, it is you who racialised this thread.

Hatboy, perhaps you're right. We'll never know whether Giles' comment was mallicious or not. I found it offensive and I'm white, but I don't want to racialise anything. Perhaps I have been over sensitive but last night I sat through a presentation at the Lambeth CPCG that reviewed the crime stats for the year and put it in the context of the scale of deprivation in Lambeth. It's nothing I did'nt already know, but when you here stat after stat showing this place to be the worst in the country for just about everything from teenage pregnancies to the number of people with mental health problems it grinds you down. Lambeth is f***ked and the Government is doing nothing. Everything it does do, like closing the prison to make way for luxury flats, which is what will happen, is just going to f*** it even more. It's a serious issue, not something to make crap jokes about.

hatboy

07-01-2004, 12:45

I totally agree with all of that. Thanks for not just going "what the fuck do you know" because I do care deeply about such issues.

I agree there are serious fuck-ups going on and I feel in combination they could even lead to further social unrest, even riots again. A big subject and race is definitely a part of it. Extreme division in wealth and opportunity and particularly the total unfairness of market-forces in housing are even more a part of it.

I think your sensitivity was well-intentioned and I know some people don't notice the drip drip low-level racism that many put up with on a daily basis.

We all :cool: now? Good. :)

Brixton Hatter

07-01-2004, 12:51

well I'm certainly not against the closing of the prison - by all accounts it's one of the worst shitholes going, not only in terms of physical conditions but also in how staff treat prisoners, esp. non-white prisoners. One of the problems linked to the prison is hard drug use - which then impacts on the local community when people are released, in terms of crime, mental health issues etc. This alone is a good reason for closing the prison.

It's a shame there's no "joined up government" on this however. The Govt wants to build more homes and more social housing, but all the Home office want is a premium price for the land, which is only going to be achieved by selling to the purveyors of "luxury" hosuing developments. As Hatboy said, a certain proportion may have to be social housing, but we've seen how developers try to get round this. Even if they don't, how many new social homes might be created? 10? 20? That hardly solves Brixton's housing problems.

A new school would be a perfect use of the land - some "luxury" boxes could be constructed on the edge of the site to raise a bit of cash and keep the govt happy. Then Tamara and Talulah's parents could buy the luxury boxes as their second home to ensure they get into the new, "good" Brixton school.
:rolleyes:

ps - I also took Giles' comment as meaning "keep the yuppies out" but perhaps we could try to avoid another massive race argument. Happy New Year to you all and goodwill to all men and women!

lang rabbie

07-01-2004, 12:56

Have just seen the Guardian's version (http://politics.guardian.co.uk/homeaffairs/story/0,11026,1117577,00.html) of the story.

Are Home Office going for selling off the most valuable sites, rather than the prisons in worst condition?

I'm also concerned by the suggestion in the Home Office response to the report that "bigger is better" for prisons. I'd have thought there's a strong argument for smaller local institutions for first time offenders - with a much stronger emphasis on rehabilitation and getting these people off drugs.

From the Patrick Carter .report to the Prime Minister (http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/justice/sentencing/correctional/reducingcrime-changinglives.html) (pp39-40)

Old and unsuitable prisons
There is also the issue of replacing old and unsuitable prisons. Some of theprison stock in England and Wales is extremely old, dating back to the 18th century. However, some of the most unsuitable prisons date from the 1960s and 1970s. There is a case for replacing these unsuitable prisons, although any build programme would need to be justified by a detailed business case. Early work should focus on the women’s estate

Anna Key

07-01-2004, 13:44

Been wondering what these 'luxury apartments' could called.

Heartbreak Close?
Old Lag Towers?
Treadmill Estate?

And perhaps the developement could include a Yuppie style-bar named '23 Hour Lockdown' or 'Category A' or maybe a fake spit and sawdust pub called 'Tin of Snout.'

I'd hate to live on the site of Brixton prison and the yuppies in their 'luxury apartments' would deserve to be severely haunted.

Given the years of concentrated pain suffered by generations of people in that place it should be bulldozed and turned into a garden.

Mr Retro

07-01-2004, 14:04

Originally posted by Anna Key

Given the years of concentrated pain suffered by generations of people in that place it should be bulldozed and turned into a garden.

Thats the most sensible thing said on this thread

SlazengerMoss

07-01-2004, 14:17

don't know how to do links but this is a good report from the Social Exclusion Unit that I believe supports keeping a prison here in Brixton.

http://www.socialexclusionunit.gov.uk/publications/reports/html/Reducing_Re-offending/index.htm

detective-boy

07-01-2004, 15:04

Originally posted by Anna Key
Been wondering what these 'luxury apartments' could called.

Whatever you called 'em they'd be the ultimate gated community!

IntoStella

07-01-2004, 15:19

Originally posted by detective-boy
Whatever you called 'em they'd be the ultimate gated community! :D :D

Lord Dome

07-01-2004, 15:20

Originally posted by SlazengerMoss
report from the Social Exclusion Unit that I believe supports keeping a prison here in Brixton.
It's ironic that Brixton has no branch of London University, no theatre but has a damn great jail.

A jail labelled institutionally racist in October 2000, described by the Director General of the Prisons Service, Martin Nary, as a "pocket of blatant racism."

No higher education. No adequate secondary education (see schools thread). No theatre. But we'll send you to a "blatantly racist" jail just up the road. And the Social Exclusion Unit wants to keep it. Poor old Brixton.

Local jails for local people!

(Anna Key posting as Lord Dome - library computers broken)

Hollis

07-01-2004, 15:33

Yeah.. I was wondering what the reaction here would be if Brixton didn't have a prison, and Blunkett announced that one was to be built?

SlazengerMoss

07-01-2004, 16:24

Originally posted by Lord Dome
It's ironic that Brixton has no branch of London University, no theatre but has a damn great jail.

A jail labelled institutionally racist in October 2000, described by the Director General of the Prisons Service, Martin Nary, as a "pocket of blatant racism."

No higher education. No adequate secondary education (see schools thread). No theatre. But we'll send you to a "blatantly racist" jail just up the road. And the Social Exclusion Unit wants to keep it. Poor old Brixton.

Local jails for local people!

(Anna Key posting as Lord Dome - library computers broken)

So you don't think that will all the criticism that has been made of HMP Brixton there might have been some effort to change it?
Or are you just happy to justify your argument with four year old quotes? Even the recent CRE report was actually almost three years out of date. You're right Lambeth needs more schools, better higher educational facilities, but it needs a prison too.
Wait and see, when they open its replacement somewhere in the sticks, the incidents of racism are going to rocket. Then a lot of very angry people are going to come back to Lambeth having gained nothing from some red-neck prison regime and commit further crimes here. Where is your social conscience? You're very vocal on social housing, which I support, but you're a total nimby merchant on this. Please take some time to read the SEU's report.

Anna Key

07-01-2004, 16:30

Sorry but I won't be joining any march to Save Brixton Nick. But you're right about the 4 year old report and I'll read the SEU stuff.

Hollis

07-01-2004, 16:35

Originally posted by SlazengerMoss
Wait and see, when they open its replacement somewhere in the sticks, the incidents of racism are going to rocket. Then a lot of very angry people are going to come back to Lambeth having gained nothing from some red-neck prison regime and commit further crimes here.

Don't you think you're being abit lazy in your stereotyping of the 'sticks' & 'red-necks'?

IntoStella

07-01-2004, 16:50

Originally posted by Hollis
Don't you think you're being abit lazy in your stereotyping of the 'sticks' & 'red-necks'? Haven't you BEEN to Kent?

Hay-ull, ever' tahm ah fergit not ta call ma Momma Sis she done hit me with her banjo. If tha gators don' getcha, tha' Injuns wee-yull.

Just ask hatboy. ;)

hatboy

07-01-2004, 16:52

I thought the "rednecks" worked at Brixton prison, er, in the past.

:)

I dunno whether it matters if they move the jail elsewhere. I mean if you're locked-up do you really care about the neighbourhood beyond the prison walls? And, as Brixton prison's previous record on racism shows, just because the neighbourhood is tolerant doesn't mean prison service employees are (or the opposite).

Not a subject I know alot about really, but like others here I do think it would be scandalous if all the council or government can think to do with that site is flog it to the highest bidder.

By the way, have a look at Brockwell Gate from the air, its huge. What a terrific site for a City Academy or other type of, er, school that could have been.

http://www2.getmapping.com/printpreview.asp?OsEast=531010&OsNorth=175570&vType=&lps=&dsoption=125mm

(You'll have to use the roam button to navigate south from central Brixton. I couldn't work out how to link to the exact view I wanted).

:)

Blagsta

07-01-2004, 20:42

Originally posted by SlazengerMoss
but it needs a prison too.

Why? :confused:

ViolentPanda

07-01-2004, 21:01

Originally posted by SlazengerMoss
Look, none of you are going to change my mind. I think the above statement is out of order. The majority of inmates in Brixton are black and some snide joke about giving inmates the right to buy to preserve the social mix of the area is offensive.
I am amazed other people fail to see the racism, all be it unintentional, in Giles' statment.

The *majority* of inmates in Brixton Prison aren't black, for the very good reason that HM Prison Service tries very hard to "balance" the ethnic composition of prisons, mostly to prevent the sort of ethnic self-segregation common in US prisons.

Re Brixton, if you want to do something worthwhile. Campaign to keep the prison open. All of the people who go there come back into this very same community. The Governor has opened the doors of the prison to let community organisations in and help inmates make changes in their lives. If Brixton goes they'll build some private jail in Kent to send people from Lambeth to. It is a disaster waiting to happen. Lambeth needs Brixton prison.
Seems to me you're labouring under a misconception about the nature of local prisons. A cat B prison such as Brixton, although classed as a "local", will accept convicted and remand prisoners from across the region it resides in and will house inmates from other areas who are either on rotation or who are being tried at London courts.
A Lambeth resident is as likely to be remanded and detained in the Scrubs, Wandsworth or Pentonville as he is in Brixton, and is likely to be dispersed anywhere in the UK prison system once convicted. Incarcerating someone near to thier family would indeed be a great benefit for the families, but current and past Home Secretaries have been more concerned with retribution than with easing the social problems of offender's nearest and dearest.

squidlet

07-01-2004, 22:24

Going back to the luxury flats end of this thread, one of the main problems with situations like HMP Brixton, where potentiallyy redundant public sector land / property becomes available is that current law / regulations mean that most owning public sector bodies - i.e. the Home Office in this case - have to obtain 'best consideration' (that is highest price) when disposing of the land. That means that private developers are automatically advantaged, in that social landlords such as housing associations can't compete in price terms. Hence, you are stuck with trying to squeeze affordable housing developments out of the private sector via the planning system and s. 106 agreements. What is needed is a redefinition (by the Treasury ultimately) of what 'best consideration' is, incorporating community / social factors - such as the development of mixed, sustainable developments rather than gated owner-occupied estates with a few affordable rented homes crowded into one end of the development. Some bodies are starting to make this case.

SlazengerMoss

08-01-2004, 08:16

Originally posted by ViolentPanda
The *majority* of inmates in Brixton Prison aren't black, for the very good reason that HM Prison Service tries very hard to "balance" the ethnic composition of prisons, mostly to prevent the sort of ethnic self-segregation common in US prisons.

Seems to me you're labouring under a misconception about the nature of local prisons. A cat B prison such as Brixton, although classed as a "local", will accept convicted and remand prisoners from across the region it resides in [B]and will house inmates from other areas who are either on rotation or who are being tried at London courts.
A Lambeth resident is as likely to be remanded and detained in the Scrubs, Wandsworth or Pentonville as he is in Brixton, and is likely to be dispersed anywhere in the UK prison system once convicted. Incarcerating someone near to thier family would indeed be a great benefit for the families, but current and past Home Secretaries have been more concerned with retribution than with easing the social problems of offender's nearest and dearest.

The Prison Service tries to "balance the ethnic composition"
Come on, there are more than 400 Jamaican inmates in Wandsworth alone!
Of course some one local could end up somewhere other than Brixton. I know this is the Brixton Forum but I'm not just talking about people from Brixton needing a local prison. I mean that it is needed for Lambeth, Southwark, Wandsworth and so on.
HMP Wandsworth is also on the list for the axe too.
The Goverment has wanted to close these places for a long time and have starved them of cash. Much to the detriment of both the inmates and staff. So after years of cash starvation it then turns round and tells the prison it is failing but nothing more is put on the table to save it. Next thing Blunkett, who is as right-wiing as Howard was, says in so many words it is going to go.
No coincidence of course that the land at both Brixton and Wandsworth is worth a fortune. There are plenty of other Victorian jails in this country, and plenty in a lot worse state that were built in the 60s and 70s, but none of them are going - because surprise, surprise, that land they're on it is worth f*** all in comparison with the greater london jails.
Whether you see the value in a local prisons or not as the case is, you have to accept that the luxury flats they put there aren't going to benefit anyone. They'll just further increase the spiralling gap between rich and poor in the borough which along with drugs has to be one of the biggest crime generators.
Anyone who thinks they're going to build a school/social housing there needs to go for a quiet walk in Brockwell Park and have a word with themselves!

Blagsta

08-01-2004, 09:14

SlazengerMoss - you seem to misuderstand the prison system.

lang rabbie

08-01-2004, 09:15

From "Victorian London" visit to the female convict prison Brixton (http://www.victorianlondon.org/prisons/brixtonprison.htm)

"The means at our command," add the directors, "for improving, if not actually reforming, female convicts in prison, though carefully designed and faithfully executed, will be insufficient in many instances unless some asylum be found to receive them on their discharge from prison. The difficulties in the way of such women, as the majority of these prisoners, returning to respectability are too notorious to require description or enumeration. They beset them in every direction the moment they are discharged, and drive them back to their former evil ways and bad associates, if they be not rescued through the medium of a refuge from whence they may obtain service."

SlazengerMoss

08-01-2004, 10:14

Originally posted by lang rabbie
From "Victorian London" visit to the female convict prison Brixton (http://www.victorianlondon.org/prisons/brixtonprison.htm)

"The means at our command," add the directors, "for improving, if not actually reforming, female convicts in prison, though carefully designed and faithfully executed, will be insufficient in many instances unless some asylum be found to receive them on their discharge from prison. The difficulties in the way of such women, as the majority of these prisoners, returning to respectability are too notorious to require description or enumeration. They beset them in every direction the moment they are discharged, and drive them back to their former evil ways and bad associates, if they be not rescued through the medium of a refuge from whence they may obtain service."

Zip forward a 100 years or so and what is said there still makes sense. People who find themselves in prison are likely to reoffend when they come out into the same difficult circumstances that led them into crime. So you open the prison doors to all of the organisations that can help them prior to and after their release with issues like housing, education, debt, drug problems, mental health problems.
This is exactly what has been done at Brixton in recent years.
This is why I believe it is important that Brixton remains.
Despite what other people have said on this thread, the vast majority of inmates, will end up back on the streets of Lambeth/South London.
If local individuals and groups can go into the prison and help the inmates with there problems they are potentially helping reduce future crime in the borough as well as helping the individual inmates turn their lives around.
Some 150+ different groups/organisations do so at Brixton at the moment.
Tell me that is workable if you ship the inmates off to some new prison in the sticks.
Of course, I make it all sound very simple when in fact it is a rehabilitation is very difficult. But surely now people can understand why we need the prison here?

Anna Key

08-01-2004, 11:58

Originally posted by squidlet
What is needed is a redefinition (by the Treasury ultimately) of what 'best consideration' is, incorporating community / social factors
This strikes me as the crucial point... and goes to the heart of the Blair project.

God forbid that a public policy issue should not be led by market forces. The ungrateful proles would be demanding free dental care and local Soviets next!

Brixton Hatter

08-01-2004, 12:11

Agree absolutely that the Govt needs to redefine what "best consideration" is. Monetary value isn't the only thing they should look at.

There is also an argument that we're putting too many people in prison anyway - the population has gone from about 55,000 to about 74,000 under the Labour Govt - more community-type sentances would help.

Hatboy wrote:
By the way, have a look at Brockwell Gate from the air, its huge. What a terrific site for a City Academy or other type of, er, school that could have been. Hmm. I wonder what it was before they turned it into luxury flats???!!!!!! :rolleyes:

hatboy

08-01-2004, 12:15

Exactly. Could you all email the mayor about this "best consideration" thing please? Especially in relation to this huge prison site. I just pasted some comments in am email from this thread. Only takes a minute. mayor@london.gov.uk

:)

corporate whore

08-01-2004, 12:31

*flippant*

If the prison closed, it would mean the end of one of the time-honoured Brixton Blags

"'Scuse me mate, sorry to bother you, but I've just been let out of prison and..."

"Yeah? What were you in for?"

"Err, a crime of passion"

"Shit. How long were you inside?"

"Errrrrr, eight years, mate... anyway, I really need to get to Barnsley and was wondering if you could spare me a quid?"

the preceeding exchange was based on a number of actual events

:p

Giles

08-01-2004, 12:35

Originally posted by SlazengerMoss
The Goverment has wanted to close these places for a long time and have starved them of cash. Much to the detriment of both the inmates and staff. So after years of cash starvation it then turns round and tells the prison it is failing but nothing more is put on the table to save it. Next thing Blunkett, who is as right-wiing as Howard was, says in so many words it is going to go.

This is the same ploy used by many government entities when they want to get rid of something. It's been done often with railway lines and stations, and hospitals.

Run it down by starving it of cash, then produce statistics that state that it now provides a crap service, so should be closed.

Giles..

Blagsta

08-01-2004, 12:36

Originally posted by SlazengerMoss
Despite what other people have said on this thread, the vast majority of inmates, will end up back on the streets of Lambeth/South London.

I'm not sure if this is true. I'll find out. But I was under the impression that prisons such as Brixton have a "catchment" area that is not necessarily the local area and that prisoners get moved around the system all the time.

Personally I don't see the problem with demolishing a crumbling Victorian hellhole and building a new facility. I visited Highdown not long ago and its a lot nicer than Brixton.

Brixton Hatter

08-01-2004, 12:39

I have written to the Mayor - but as I think responsibility ultimately rests with the Home Office, I have also written to Blunkett, and Charles Clarke (education, re: a school site) and John Prescott (with responsibility for housing) - let's see how joined up this Govt really is.

David Blunkett: public.enquiries@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk
Charles Clarke: info@dfes.gov.uk
John Prescott: psdpm@odpm.gsi.gov.uk

Anna Key

08-01-2004, 12:51

Email to Livingstone sent. He's usually quite good about replying so will post up anything I get back.

He was born just up the road and cut his political teeth on Lambeth Council so may be keen to see justice done in his old neighbourhood.

William of Walworth

08-01-2004, 13:21

Originally posted by ViolentPanda
Looks like the Home Office is using the condition of the prison as a spurious reason for closing it down.
I say spurious because the material condition of Holloway and of Brixton are no better and no worse than Wormwood Scrubs, Wandsworth and a double handful of other Victorian prisons in the South-East. What is unarguably different i that Brixton and Holloway have truly foull reputations (and records) for inmate self-harm (including suicide) and for brutality.
Looks like the Home Office is taking the opportunity to
a) make some serious dosh from land sales, and
b) attempting to engineer a change in it's reputation by a bit of social engineering on the inmates.

The social engineering is only going to work if the new prisons are better than the old, both construction and regime-wise. From past experience I don't hold out much hope. :(

As for the actual sale. It doesn't surprise me. When the HM Prisons estate was surveyed in the late 1980s (just after the first property crash), the London prisons (or their sites) were valued in 9 figures, not including suburban prison farm land.
Just a shame that the land will be used for private rather than public benefit.

I agree with Violent Panda and others here who are concerned that the site will be used only for luxury housing.

Just a slight correction for VP on one detail though -- they may be keeping the Scrubs open (for now) but according to the Guardian report on this (link further up this thread) they are planning to close Wandsworth too, for pretty similar reasons and purposes as Brixton (shit, underinvested prison/very valuable land).

IntoStella

08-01-2004, 13:29

When these prisons were built, they were on the outskirts of London. Now, as the metropolis has expanded, their locations have become more central, more 'trendy' and more valuable. This process is not going to stop (short of a catastrophe). So if they build new prisons on what are now the outskirts of London, in 20, 30, 40 years' time (and the process is also accelerating exponentially) the 'new' jails will also be squeezed by the escalating value of the land they are on.

What will happen when Bexleyheath is the new Hoxton? :confused: :eek: :D

SlazengerMoss

08-01-2004, 14:08

Originally posted by corporate whore
*flippant*

If the prison closed, it would mean the end of one of the time-honoured Brixton Blags

"'Scuse me mate, sorry to bother you, but I've just been let out of prison and..."

"Yeah? What were you in for?"

"Err, a crime of passion"

"Shit. How long were you inside?"

"Errrrrr, eight years, mate... anyway, I really need to get to Barnsley and was wondering if you could spare me a quid?"

the preceeding exchange was based on a number of actual events

You think that's a blag. I know of cases where people have been released without as much as a bus fare to get to the other side of South London and have ended up robbing someone hours after their release, got nicked and ended up back inside the same day. This is why the help has to come from both inside and outside of the prison walls.

:p

ViolentPanda

08-01-2004, 14:55

Originally posted by SlazengerMoss
The Prison Service tries to "balance the ethnic composition"
Come on, there are more than 400 Jamaican inmates in Wandsworth alone!

And your figures come from where? I ask because I made a quick phone call after reading this, and was told that (excluding remand) about 23% of Wandsworth's population are classed as "black".

Of course some one local could end up somewhere other than Brixton. I know this is the Brixton Forum but I'm not just talking about people from Brixton needing a local prison. I mean that it is needed for Lambeth, Southwark, Wandsworth and so on.

As I said, any idea that a "local" prison is for local people is pretty much unrealistic given the fact that there is no longer any elasticity in where an inmate is sent. Nowadays you go where there is room, and that could as likely mean Doncaster or Brum as Brixton or Wandsworth.

HMP Wandsworth is also on the list for the axe too.

Hardly surprising. Can you guess why? Go on, have a try!

The Goverment has wanted to close these places for a long time and have starved them of cash. Much to the detriment of both the inmates and staff. So after years of cash starvation it then turns round and tells the prison it is failing but nothing more is put on the table to save it. Next thing Blunkett, who is as right-wiing as Howard was, says in so many words it is going to go.

That's not really the whole story though, is it? For example, Wandsworth had a complete refurb between 1991 and 1996, we're talking the wings being gutted in succession, and rebuilt, and although Brixton hasn't had the same level of refurb the reason is more to do with the inability to close off parts of the prison while work is undertaken (because there is nowhere else to hold the inmates) than because there was no cash in the pot.
Don't get me wrong, I'm against the prisons being closed, but your localism argument, at least to me. misses the point.

No coincidence of course that the land at both Brixton and Wandsworth is worth a fortune. There are plenty of other Victorian jails in this country, and plenty in a lot worse state that were built in the 60s and 70s, but none of them are going - because surprise, surprise, that land they're on it is worth f*** all in comparison with the greater london jails.

Which is true if you're talking about Wakefield or Risley, but not if you're talking about Whitemoor or Albany for example.

Whether you see the value in a local prisons or not as the case is, you have to accept that the luxury flats they put there aren't going to benefit anyone. They'll just further increase the spiralling gap between rich and poor in the borough which along with drugs has to be one of the biggest crime generators.
Anyone who thinks they're going to build a school/social housing there needs to go for a quiet walk in Brockwell Park and have a word with themselves!
Agreed. I've seen so many places that are ostensibly owned by "the public" (schools, wasteland, amenities, housing) over the last 20 or so years that it's depressing. That said, lobbying to keep Brixton Prison open on the strength of keeping out luxury housing will be seen by some elements of the press as class envy rather than social solidarity.

Anna Key

08-01-2004, 15:09

Originally posted by ViolentPanda
lobbying to keep Brixton Prison open on the strength of keeping out luxury housing will be seen by some elements of the press as class envy rather than social solidarity.
I say close the bugger, flatten it, and build 100% social housing on the site with a strong equal opportunities lettings policy to secure and maintain a 50-50 white/non-white mix.

And have some sort of garden at the centre of the development as a mark of respect for the generations of pain caused by the jail.

And maybe a monument - like a village war memorial - naming the hundreds (thousands?) of inmates who strung themselves up in their cells? Or got stabbed over a packet of Old Holborn.

There's absolutely no reason, except for local politicial will, why the luxury apartment brigade can't be kept out and a model public housing estate built on the site.

I wonder what the Howard League for Penal Reform think about this? I bet people like John Mortimer have something to say.

pooka

08-01-2004, 15:54

SLP Report (http://icsouthlondon.icnetwork.co.uk/0100news/0400lambeth/content_objectid=13790142_method=full_siteid=50100_headline=-End%2Din%2Dsight%2Dfor%2Dindustrial%2Destate-name_page.html)

Developers want to demolish five industrial units that make up Clapham North Industrial Estate, on Clapham Road, and replace them with a five-storey building of 14 flats and offices.

In front of the estate is a petrol garage also due to be knocked down and replaced by a six-storey building of offices and 14 flats.

And south of the estate, another block of 14 flats is under construction.

Does anyone have a link for the policy re 15 or more requiring a proportion of social housing?

ViolentPanda

08-01-2004, 17:49

Originally posted by Anna Key
I say close the bugger, flatten it, and build 100% social housing on the site with a strong equal opportunities lettings policy to secure and maintain a 50-50 white/non-white mix.

And have some sort of garden at the centre of the development as a mark of respect for the generations of pain caused by the jail.

I agree with you totally. The amount of decently-sized "housing units" you could get on a site that size runs into the hundreds, whereas a "luxury private development" will probably be much lower density.

And maybe a monument - like a village war memorial - naming the hundreds (thousands?) of inmates who strung themselves up in their cells? Or got stabbed over a packet of Old Holborn.

And to those executed there.

There's absolutely no reason, except for local politicial will, why the luxury apartment brigade can't be kept out and a model public housing estate built on the site.
I wonder what the Howard League for Penal Reform think about this? I bet people like John Mortimer have something to say.
If the closed prisons are replaced by so-called "modern" jails they probably won't say much at all, unless, like a certain private nick in Herts, the cells are so small they actually contravene legal statutes (the good thing being that private nicks can be prosecuted due to not enjoying "crown immunty").

Can't see the current council even considering building social housing, even though if the prison closes it will actually damage some parts of the local economy which a large building programme could help offset. :(

Anna Key

09-01-2004, 09:16

Originally posted by ViolentPanda
And to those executed there.
I wonder what the historic Brixton Prison death toll is? Once you add them all up:

- state killings (hangings)
- inmate suicides
- inmate on inmate killings
- killings of inmates by jailers

The answer, I suspect, is we'll never know. It's the sort of bottom-up history which never gets written. After all, those being killed are not royalty or statesmen or generals or pop stars.

It's probably reasonable to describe Brixton Prison, in historic terms, as a death camp. So the idea of not demolishing it is absurd. And the idea of selling a death camp to property developers to make a profit via a snobby housing project is obscene.

hatboy

09-01-2004, 10:11

Some of you know quite a bit about this don't you? How come? :)

lang rabbie

09-01-2004, 10:18

Originally posted by Anna Key
It's probably reasonable to describe Brixton Prison, in historic terms, as a death camp. So the idea of not demolishing it is absurd.

I would beg to differ.

Once you start describing places like Brixton Prison as death camps, you lose the ability to accurately distinguish it from Auschwitz-Birkenau, Chelmno, Sobibor, Treblinka, Belzec - names that are already unfamiliar to many Britons, not to mention the locations of more recent genocide in Rwanda.

The preservation of deathcamps (or just their sites) remains a bitterly divisive issue - but IMO what is clear is that demolition is always the preferred option for those who calloborated with the forces of oppression and wish to have all tangible evidence removed.

NB: Has there been a gallows at Brixton Prison since the days of the Surrey House of Correction 1840s - (official) hangings were surely at Wandsworth?

IntoStella

09-01-2004, 10:20

Originally posted by lang rabbie
Once you start describing places like Brixton Prison as death camps, you lose the ability to accurately distinguish it from Auschwitz-Birkenau, Chelmno, Sobibor, Treblinka, Belzec Only if you aren't very bright, surely? :confused: :confused:

Anna Key

09-01-2004, 10:23

Originally posted by lang rabbie
I would beg to differ.
What would you call it then? A Serious Illness Camp? A Not Very Nice Place Camp?

IntoStella

09-01-2004, 10:26

A Death-but-they-were-crims-so-they-deserved-it-camp? :confused:

SlazengerMoss

09-01-2004, 10:32

I would also beg to differ. A death camp! You've lost it.
What absolute f***king rubbish.

lang rabbie

09-01-2004, 10:35

death camp = a concentration camp where prisoners are likely to die or be killed.

concentration camp = a penal camp where political prisoners or prisoners of war are confined (usually under harsh conditions)

Whatever your views on the status of IRA and other Republican prisoners held in Brixton during the 20th century, it cannot be said that the British state managed that.

Brixton Prison was inhumane and for most of the 1980s the psychiatric wing was what a former Governor calls a "modern bedlam" (http://home.wanadoo.nl/hittjo/engels/reports/Coyle.htm), but to call it a death camp is just intellectual laziness.

BTW - I was aghast that the first site I googled to get their definition generated an absolutely dumb advertising side bar: "Buy and sell death camp on eBay":mad:

Anna Key

09-01-2004, 10:35

Originally posted by SlazengerMoss
I would also beg to differ. A death camp! You've lost it.
What absolute f***king rubbish.
I love rational argument. :p

What's the total historic killing spree at Brixton Prison then? Any idea? You haven't have you?

They're forgotten victims. Just like a death camp.

fanta

09-01-2004, 10:40

Brixton prison has a most lamentable record in violence, racism, torture and prisoner deaths.

No one disputes that, even the authorities.

But to deliberately compare it favourably to a place designed for mechanised industrial murder on an immense scale like Auschwitz is risible, and a little dishonest too from someone who knows the real difference like you Anna Key!

(edited for spelling)

Giles

09-01-2004, 10:40

I find this comparison of prisons with death camps etc worrying.

While there are some laws that I disagree with, most people end up in prison for:

hurting people

or

robbing other people's stuff

Things which are always wrong.

Do people really feel that prisons for criminals are so unjust as to be considered the same as actual death camps, whether in Germany or Rwanda etc?

Because I don't.

Giles..

Anna Key

09-01-2004, 10:46

Oh dear. I am in trouble. I'd simply like to know the scale of the historic killing spree at Brixton Nick.

So estate agents, when flogging the luxury housing constructed on the site, can inform buyers of neighbours past. Fair enough?

IntoStella

09-01-2004, 10:49

Originally posted by lang rabbie
but to call it a death camp just intellectual laziness. On the contrary, it's intellectually limited to insist that all statements in a debate must be absolutely literal. So presumably you would argue that Pinochet, for example, wasn't a mass murderer because he didn't personally dispatch the victims of his regime?

There's an important issue here about innocence/guilt/what punishmment people are perceived as deserving.

If the suffering caused to prisoners (and even death) is far out of proportion to the crime they are supposed to have committed -- and especially if they are suffering from a mental illness, as has been the case with so many prisoners at Brixton -- then that is clearly an atrocity.

Unfortunately, many people only care about ''victims'' whom they percieve as being free from any blame.

BTW - I was aghast that the first site I googled to get their definition generated an absolutely dumb advertising side bar: "Buy and sell death camp on eBay":mad: That is appalling. :eek: I suggest you get a screen grab and send it to Private Eye.

IntoStella

09-01-2004, 10:51

Originally posted by Anna Key
Oh dear. I am in trouble. You've upset fanta and a property developer. I'd say you were doing pretty well. ;)

IntoStella

09-01-2004, 10:52

<oops, wrong button>

fanta

09-01-2004, 10:53

Originally posted by Anna Key
Oh dear. I am in trouble. I'd simply like to know the scale of the historic killing spree at Brixton Nick.

4 million?

5 million?

6 million?

Who knows, Anna, who knows, huh!?

Ol Nick

09-01-2004, 10:53

Originally posted by Anna Key
Oh dear. I am in trouble. I'd simply like to know the scale of the historic killing spree at Brixton Nick.

So estate agents, when flogging the luxury housing constructed on the site, can inform buyers of neighbours past. Fair enough? I think this argument could be defused, and the desired effect retained, by ensuring that a couple of pages of the estate agent's brochure for the luxury flats-sorry-apartments are devoted to an angry dicsussion as to whether or not Brixton Prison can or should be referred to as a "death camp".

And I'm sorry, I don't know the scale of the historic killing spree at Brixton.

Anna Key

09-01-2004, 10:55

Originally posted by lang rabbie
death camp = a concentration camp where prisoners are likely to die or be killed.
That's an interesting definition. I've met both ex-prisoners and POA officials who've said that sometimes a new prisoner arrives who they know they will not survive. And they don't.

Pretty similar eh?

IntoStella

09-01-2004, 10:58

Anna Key -- we are more liberal than the liberals. Shome mishtake shurely? :confused: :confused: ;)

fanta

09-01-2004, 11:05

Evil Plan Exposed

Inmates in Brixton Prison learn to their chagrin
http://www.auschwitz-muzeum.oswiecim.pl/images/300px/wyzwolenie.jpg
that their cells are to become luxury flats.

(Published in association with the Dave Spart Alternative Voice)

Anna Key

09-01-2004, 11:07

Originally posted by IntoStella
You've upset fanta and a property developer. I'd say you were doing pretty well. ;)
I'd forgoten Giles is a property developer. And fanta's always upset.
Originally posted by Giles
Do people really feel that prisons for criminals are so unjust as to be considered the same as actual death camps...?
Yes. If that's what historically happens there, as seems to be the case with Brixton Prison.

But no one knows the figures. And (some) become hysterical when a polite enquiry's made.

lang rabbie

09-01-2004, 11:12

Any redevelopment of Brixton Prison is an extreme example of the tensions caused by redevelopment of a wide range of supposedly "redundant" public buildings - barracks, hospitals, schools. Is it more important to preserve the architectural "heritage" or to meet community objectives through future public use of the site?

I have to admit that the prospect of the former Governor's House being preserved in splendid isolation, no doubt with some tastefully Clapham floristy window boxes and with "offers in excess of £1million", in the midst of a new development of apartments makes even a heritage freak like me uneasy. I think it must be reserved for community use.

From EH Images of England listed buildings database:

JEBB AVENUE SW2 (south side)
5023 Octagonal central office
TQ 3074 22/485 building at HM Prison

[Listed Grade II]

2. Circa 1820 small 2-storey octagonal building in dull red brick. Low-pitched slated roof with rebuilt central octagonal chimney. On north face a square clock tower with low pyramidal roof and bracketed eaves. Later stock brick buttreses at alternate angles. Sash windows with glazing bars in stucco-lined reveals under segmental arches of bricks on end. This was the former governor's house from whose windows could be seen prisoners working the treadmills which were first used in Brixton prison. The treadmill buildings have been replaced by a one-storey pentice all around the building. Included mainly for historical interest.

hatboy

09-01-2004, 11:14

Originally posted by fanta
Brixton prison has a most lamentable record in violence, racism, torture and prisoner deaths.

No one disputes that, even the authorities.

But to deliberately compare it favourably to a place designed for mechanised industrial murder on an immense scale like Auschwitz is risible, and a little dishonest too from someone who knows the real difference like you Anna Key!

(edited for spelling)

I agree with this (tho not with everything fanta says, or anybody). But AK shut up. You're making yourself look hysterical and uninformed.

Anna Key

09-01-2004, 11:15

Originally posted by fanta
Evil Plan Exposed

Inmates in Brixton Prison learn to their chagrin
http://www.auschwitz-muzeum.oswiecim.pl/images/300px/wyzwolenie.jpg
that their cells are to become luxury flats.

(Published in association with the Dave Spart Alternative Voice)
Go on fanta. Sink a bit lower. Maybe publish a picture of dead bodies being bulldozed into mass graves?

Anna Key

09-01-2004, 11:18

Originally posted by hatboy
But AK shut up.
Jawohl!

fanta

09-01-2004, 11:19

Originally posted by Anna Key
I'd forgoten Giles is a property developer. And fanta's always upset.

Yes. If that's what historically happens there, as seems to be the case with Brixton Prison.

But no one knows the figures. And (some) become hysterical when a polite enquiry's made.

I'm not hysterical or angry or upset (it is Friday after all) just a tad amused by it all.

Originally, you were not making a mere 'polite enquiry' like you're trying to represent now.

Rather, you were deliberately comparing a rotten crumbling cramped Victorian prison in Brixton with a 'Death Camp'. A 'Death Camp' is the vast majority of people would associate with gas chambers, cattle trucks and mass murder.

You realise now that this was a fatuous thing to do as does everyone else (despite your lovely cheerleader stella gallantly leaping to your defence ;) Bless) hence your silly wriggling about a 'polite enquiry'!

Give over! Discussing how many people have died in Brixton prison is more owrthwhile and interesting than this Dave Spart sillyness!

lang rabbie

09-01-2004, 11:20

fanta

I'm not sure frivolous use of that image is in the best of possible taste and terribly helpful to my argument.

SlazengerMoss

09-01-2004, 11:21

Originally posted by Anna Key
Go on fanta. Sink a bit lower. Maybe publish a picture of dead bodies being bulldozed into mass graves?

I think you'll find it was you who sank the lowest. I think Fanta is merely pointing that out very well.

fanta

09-01-2004, 11:22

Originally posted by Anna Key
Go on fanta. Sink a bit lower. Maybe publish a picture of dead bodies being bulldozed into mass graves?

Bwahahahahahahahaha!

You sanctimonious old fart!

It was YOU who compared Brixton Nick to a DEATH CAMP!

And then you get upset when I do the same with a photograph?

Bwahahahahahahahahahaha!

Hypocrite!

fanta

09-01-2004, 11:23

Originally posted by lang rabbie
fanta

I'm not sure frivolous use of that image is in the best of possible taste and terribly helpful to my argument.

Accepted and sorry!

I was just taking Anna Key's stupid comparison to it's logical conclusion!

Anna Key

09-01-2004, 11:24

I think I was reasonably polite...
Originally posted by Anna Key
I wonder what the historic Brixton Prison death toll is? Once you add them all up:

- state killings (hangings)
- inmate suicides
- inmate on inmate killings
- killings of inmates by jailers

The answer, I suspect, is we'll never know. It's the sort of bottom-up history which never gets written. After all, those being killed are not royalty or statesmen or generals or pop stars.

It's probably reasonable to describe Brixton Prison, in historic terms, as a death camp. So the idea of not demolishing it is absurd. And the idea of selling a death camp to property developers to make a profit via a snobby housing project is obscene.
Inducing some hysteria and some abuse. But that's OK. No harm done. :D

Anna Key

09-01-2004, 11:25

Originally posted by fanta
Bwahahahahahahahaha!
Oh dear. I've upset fanta again.

hatboy

09-01-2004, 11:33

AK - I also think you've sunk the lowest on this. I think calling Brixton Prison a death camp (even considering the racism and deaths that have occured there) is very inappropriate and actually insulting to relatives of inmates who have lost their lives there.

I'm sure you don't want that do you? You are being Daily Mailish with your exaggeration. And perversly by being so inaccurate you actually trivialise what's happened in Brixton Prison.

fanta

09-01-2004, 11:36

Let us all forget it and just move on!

Anna, several years ago I walked round the remains of Auschwitz where one is still confronted with the physical evidence of the crimes that took place there. Upsetting isn't the word.

I just don't think you would have made that flippant comparison if you had walked round it.

That's all.

Anna Key

09-01-2004, 11:54

Originally posted by hatboy
I think calling Brixton Prison a death camp (even considering the racism and deaths that have occured there) is very inappropriate and actually insulting to relatives of inmates who have lost their lives there.
You'll find I chose my words more carefully than that (see four posts up). But hey, as fanta suggests, let's move on. :p

calum

09-01-2004, 12:15

but should brixton prison be closed down and an alternative rebuilt eslewhere, irrespective of future use of the site?

fanta

09-01-2004, 12:24

I'd rather there wasn't any prison round here to be honest. But if there is to be one it should be modern and big enough so that prisoners (ie those who have been convicted and not on remand) are treated humanely, with respect and the chance to re-train/get educated. Three to a cell for 20 plus hours a week and slopping out should be a thinhg of the past.

ViolentPanda

09-01-2004, 12:49

Originally posted by lang rabbie
Any redevelopment of Brixton Prison is an extreme example of the tensions caused by redevelopment of a wide range of supposedly "redundant" public buildings - barracks, hospitals, schools. Is it more important to preserve the architectural "heritage" or to meet community objectives through future public use of the site?

I have to admit that the prospect of the former Governor's House being preserved in splendid isolation, no doubt with some tastefully Clapham floristy window boxes and with "offers in excess of £1million", in the midst of a new development of apartments makes even a heritage freak like me uneasy. I think it must be reserved for community use.

From EH Images of England listed buildings database:

JEBB AVENUE SW2 (south side)
5023 Octagonal central office
TQ 3074 22/485 building at HM Prison

[Listed Grade II]

2. Circa 1820 small 2-storey octagonal building in dull red brick. Low-pitched slated roof with rebuilt central octagonal chimney. On north face a square clock tower with low pyramidal roof and bracketed eaves. Later stock brick buttreses at alternate angles. Sash windows with glazing bars in stucco-lined reveals under segmental arches of bricks on end. This was the former governor's house from whose windows could be seen prisoners working the treadmills which were first used in Brixton prison. The treadmill buildings have been replaced by a one-storey pentice all around the building. Included mainly for historical interest.

Last time I was in that particular part of Brixton Prison (10 yrs ago) the only part of the rest of the nick that matched it for decrepitude was the shower block. :eek: :eek:
They may, just possibly be hoping that it falls down once unused for a little while.

ViolentPanda

09-01-2004, 13:01

Originally posted by lang rabbie

NB: Has there been a gallows at Brixton Prison since the days of the Surrey House of Correction 1840s - (official) hangings were surely at Wandsworth?

As far as I know, Brixton had a gallows for about 30 yrs starting from the turn of the century, at which time the process wa "rationalised" (what a wonderful word for such a thing, eh? :rolleyes: ) and only one or two prisons per region retained them. Most of the "big name" executions took place at specific prisons such as Wandsworth as a matter of policy, partly because it supposedly imbued those prisons with a notoriety which (ha ha) would discourage offenders from recidivism.

I have to admit to being truly nauseated when I saw a (circa 1955) map of the prison graveyard at Wandsworth, and realsied the extent to which execution was used, and then further nauseated when I was informed that the map listed only those who currently occupied the plots.:eek:

IntoStella

09-01-2004, 13:31

Originally posted by ViolentPanda
I have to admit to being truly nauseated when I saw a (circa 1955) map of the prison graveyard at Wandsworth, and realsied the extent to which execution was used, and then further nauseated when I was informed that the map listed only those who currently occupied the plots.:eek: Which, albeit inadvertently, goes a good way to supporting AK's argument.

I don't see why the families of dead prisoners would be insulted by such an analogy. Their loved ones were the victims of atrocities, after all. Why would they want that to be covered up?

Again it comes down to ideas about morality, guilt and punishment. A crime against a criminal is seen as less than a crime against the ''innocent". A crime against a mentally ill person -- especially a mentally ill convict (even though the conviction itself is almost certainly the result of mental illness) -- is seen as less than a crime against a ''sane'' person.

ViolentPanda

09-01-2004, 14:11

Originally posted by IntoStella
Which, albeit inadvertently, goes a good way to supporting AK's argument.

I don't see why the families of dead prisoners would be insulted by such an analogy. Their loved ones were the victims of atrocities, after all. Why would they want that to be covered up?

I agree. places such as that are true testaments to state violence, given that not only was the "murderer" hung, but so was the "traitor", the "pervert", and (in woefully too many cases) the thief.
As a rather gruesome aside to the words "cover up", the cemetery at Wandsworth was tarmac'd over (for use as an exercise yard) , so the families of the condemned have had an extra indignity piled on them. :(

Again it comes down to ideas about morality, guilt and punishment. A crime against a criminal is seen as less than a crime against the ''innocent". A crime against a mentally ill person -- especially a mentally ill convict (even though the conviction itself is almost certainly the result of mental illness) -- is seen as less than a crime against a ''sane'' person.
It may be seen as lesser, but state violence is violence as much as if it were perpetrated by an individual, and gradiations of acceptability (whether judicial or personal) are social constructs (as indeed is the law) aimed at giving respectability to what is supposedly a "democratic" legal system, but is in fact only the imposition of the ideas of a socio-cultural elite on those they wish to control.
I'm always cynically amused when members of "the elite" (MPs, Aristos, "the great and good") express outrage when they are subjected to the law with the same force as "the ordinary person" (which occurs too rarely anyway). Definitely "do as I say, not as I do"!

Your point about crimes against the mentally unwell is well made. It should be (IMO) that crimes against the mentally unwell should be given exactly the same weight as all others, maybe even prosecuted more vigourously. If we have no other "duty", surely we have a one to secure the best we can for those unable to do it for themselves?

Anna Key

09-01-2004, 14:24

Just so my argument is clear - and not wishing to overexcite poor old fanta or provoke verbal abuse from SlazengerMoss - I claimed that in historic terms Brixton Prison might reasonably be described as a death camp, given the high numbers of killings over many years.

I then listed the some of the various death-categories historically enacted at the Prison - state killings, suicides, etc, etc.

It would be a very different argument to claim that Brixton Prison is now, today, at this moment, a death camp of the type in fanta's photograph. Clearly it isn't.

If anyone wants to conflate the two arguments: fine. Just don't pretend I'm doing the conflating. :p

hatboy

09-01-2004, 16:14

Now you've explained that AK I'm more with you. I thought (sorry if I missed reading something) that you were saying "death camp" about the prison now, which would be sensationalist and not really any help to anyone dead or alive.

IS - Like your post about the unfairness of how the same crime, when committed against different types of people or by the state is given a different status of seriousness in general perception. Sadly true I reckon too.

Anna Key

09-01-2004, 16:54

No probs HB. :p
My personal favourite from this thread is:-
Originally posted by SlazengerMoss
I would also beg to differ. A death camp! You've lost it.
What absolute f***king rubbish.
The thought process behind such a post must be something like this:-

1. Misunderstand a few words of simple text
2. Construct a straw man
3. Verbally abuse the straw man
4. Verbally abuse the poster to whom the straw man is attributed.

It's great stuff. :D

lang rabbie

09-01-2004, 16:55

Originally posted by Anna Key
Just so my argument is clear - and not wishing to overexcite poor old fanta or provoke verbal abuse from SlazengerMoss - I claimed that in historic terms Brixton Prison might reasonably be described as a death camp, given the high numbers of killings over many years.

Sorry, Anna, but I read and absorbed the words in historic terms before I begged to differ, because I think that there are important real distinctions to be made between genocide, the folly of state-sanctioned execution, and other prisoner deaths whether through suicide, prisoner brutality or warder brutality.

Those distinctions are important, because the way that we (liberals, democratic socialists, constitutional conservatives) try to influence those in positions of power to prevent recurrences are different (albeit inter-related) in each scenario

[End of sermon]

squidlet

09-01-2004, 20:12

This thread may have gone so far down one route that it's not possible to bring it back to the 'luxury housing' bit. But I'll try. I've done a bit more digging into the 'best consideration' thing (that is, the requirement of govt. depts to get the highest price for redundant public sector assets, therefore meaning that a private sector developer would acquire the prison site if it was disposed of). There are ways around it for local authority owned assets. They can build in a cash discount against the market price, and through planning legislation, make sure (or at least make it more likely) that the site can be sold to a body that will develop it with a social purpose - so that means for example redundant schools or council buildings can be redeveloped by vol orgs / housing associations for something useful - affordable housing, community facilities etc. BUT this doesn't apply to 'public' assets help by other govt Depts/quangos - Health Trusts, MOD, Home Office (prisons) for example. These rules are set by the Treasury in their 'Green Book'
There are two things happening at the moment that could change this: there is a Planning Bill going through Parliament, where there may be an opportunity to highlight this issue and at least put up some form of publicity; and coming up in the summer is Gordon Brown's Spending Review (which will coincide with the the Budget). Input into this (along the lines of you get better sustainability / value for money by fixing the rules to promote social development) could also influence changes to 'best consideration'. If anyone's interested in more info on all this / pursuing this on another thread elsewhere, I'll set pne up (tho haven't quite worked out how to do this yet.)

Anna Key

10-01-2004, 08:34

Originally posted by lang rabbie
Sorry, Anna, but I read and absorbed the words in historic terms before I begged to differ, because I think that there are important real distinctions to be made between genocide, the folly of state-sanctioned execution, and other prisoner deaths whether through suicide, prisoner brutality or warder brutality.

Those distinctions are important, because the way that we (liberals, democratic socialists, constitutional conservatives) try to influence those in positions of power to prevent recurrences are different (albeit inter-related) in each scenario

[End of sermon]
I agree with that. But also think words like "death camp" and "atrocity" if used carefully (as I and others have on this thread) help the process described in your second paragraph, if only to puncture the complacency of people like fanta (and make him huff and puff in an amusing fashion).

Reading the heartbreaking descriptions (above) of the Wandsworth prison graveyard, packed to the gunwales and sealed in tarmac (sounding suspiciously like Lubyanka) I stand by what I wrote. It is an historic atrocity and words like "death camp" carefully deployed, are accurate, powerful and useful.

Oh and I strongly support the right of fanta and SlazengerMoss to make cyber-tits of themsleves. What was it Voltaire said?

"I don't agree with a word fanta and SlazengerMoss say, but will die for their right to say it!"

[End of wholly accurate historical quotation]

Anna Key

10-01-2004, 08:49

Originally posted by squidlet
BUT this doesn't apply to 'public' assets help by other govt Depts/quangos - Health Trusts, MOD, Home Office (prisons) for example.
I take this to mean that moves to prevent the Yuppies colonising the Brixton Prison site would need to be 100% political? That there'd be no help from the courts?
If anyone's interested in more info on all this / pursuing this on another thread elsewhere, I'll set pne up (tho haven't quite worked out how to do this yet.)
I am. :p

fanta

11-01-2004, 08:48

Fanta: Let us all forget it and just move on!

Anna Key: But hey, as fanta suggests, let's move on.

Then...

Anna Key: Oh and I strongly support the right of fanta and SlazengerMoss to make cyber-tits of themsleves.

Hmmm, ok. Good Heavens, I had no idea such a sensitive nerve was touched!

'I...also think words like "death camp" and "atrocity" if used carefully (as I and others have on this thread) help the process described in your second paragraph, if only to puncture the complacency of people like fanta.'

LOL :)

But of course, you didn't use then carefully did you? Yes, you're using them carefully now after your flippant clumsiness was pointed out. It is patently clear what you were trying to do. Namely trying to subtly evoke the horrible imagery - cattle trucks, gas chambers and mass murder etc - of a DEATH CAMP to describe Brixton Prison.

Of course, it wasn't subtle it was silly and dishonest. That was pointed out to you and so you had to back-peddle a la Kilroy-Silk extraodinaire and qualify what you had said. And so you should too though it is better not to have to in the first place, huh?

But you're a great twister of words Anna.

(By the way, you're not Nicholas van Hoogstraten's defence barrister in real life are you Anna?)

:)

Now back to the topic? Where I stand on Brixton Prison, I said this: 'I'd rather there wasn't any prison round here to be honest. But if there is to be one it should be modern and big enough so that prisoners (ie those who have been convicted and not on remand) are treated humanely, with respect and the chance to re-train/get educated. Three to a cell for 20 plus hours a week and slopping out should be a thing of the past.'

Now I don't care if you do not like or disagree with that, and call me a cyber-tit if you want (What an intellectual body-blow. Phew!) it is what I believe.

Perhaps you have an even better idea?

ViolentPanda

11-01-2004, 12:30

Originally posted by fanta

Now back to the topic? Where I stand on Brixton Prison, I said this: 'I'd rather there wasn't any prison round here to be honest. But if there is to be one it should be modern and big enough so that prisoners (ie those who have been convicted and not on remand) are treated humanely, with respect and the chance to re-train/get educated. Three to a cell for 20 plus hours a week and slopping out should be a thing of the past.'

A few small (but perhaps salient) points;
Surely you mean 20+ hours a day rather than "20 plus hours a week"?
Slopping out still occurs in only about 25% of prisons.
The big problem with the proposals around Brixton and wandsworth prisons is that the deals seem to be based on a "new for old" idea, where developers will build new prisons (quite possibly nice new roomy ones) and be granted the sites of the old prisons in exchange. What hasn't been explained is whether this "swap" includes the Prison Service quarters around both prisons, and in the case of Wandsworth, the swathe of land between Heathfield Road and Trinity Road (part of which is, IIRC, currently leased by "Neal's Nursery". If these deals DO include those elements then the private developers will be being given an extremely valuable publicly-owned resource at less than a bargain basement price.
Do you think that would be fair, even if the replacement prisons were of high build quality and appointed with "state of the art" fixtures and fittings?

lang rabbie

11-01-2004, 15:09

Originally posted by squidlet
I've done a bit more digging into the 'best consideration' thing (that is, the requirement of govt. depts to get the highest price for redundant public sector assets, therefore meaning that a private sector developer would acquire the prison site if it was disposed of).

"Best consideration" is not a term used by central government for itself. It the test set by central Government in successive Local Government Acts for local authority disposals. Local authorities can make disposals at up to £2million below market price, without specific central government permission if it meets wider objectives. This doesn't help in this case, but Urbanites may be interested in applicability to some of Lambeth's other proposed disposals ODPM planning circular (http://www.odpm.gov.uk/stellent/groups/odpm_planning/documents/page/odpm_plan_023358.hcsp)

Originally posted by squidlet
These rules are set by the Treasury in their 'Green Book' The Green Book (http://greenbook.treasury.gov.uk/) is all about investment appraisal and evaluation - basically how Departments put together a business case.
Treasury rules on asset disposals by Whitehall Departments are set out in the riveting read that is Government Accounting (http://www.government-accounting.gov.uk/current/frames.htm) (see section 24.4 and Annex 24.1) and they are pretty restrictive.

The main thing to be aware of is that the market value will depend on what a developer could get planning consent for.
As I have posted earlier, that's down to what the local planning authority has set down for the area. The clear implication is that Lambeth's politicians and planners need to get their fingers out, either with the aim of including the prison site in its new UDP as a "Major Development Opportunity" with site specific policies, or to put together a separate planning brief.

Any such plan will have greater weight, should the developers appeal against a cap on housing for sale, if Lambeth can show that their own proposals for the site have widespread local support.

On an assumption that any development would be predominantly residential, on a site of this size, Lambeth's current UDP standards would require a substantial element of social housing (25%), and the draft UDP would require more (40%+?). I suspect that the size of the site/number of residential units proposed is such that the mayor will interevene. If the Mayor Livingstone is still in post by that time, he is likely to demand 50%.

From a paper on planning obligations (http://www.lambeth.gov.uk/intradoc/groups/public/documents/report/023456.pdf) going to a Lambeth scrutiny meeting next week.

"The government has recently issued its proposals for revision of the planning obligations system in the context of the current planning bill. The proposals include the idea of an optional planning charge. Officers will be raising concerns that there should be no ability for a developer to choose to pay a charge instead of negotiating related mitigation/on-site measures (such as on-site affordable housing). Land is scarce and there is no guarantee that monies so collected could be spent; clawback provisions in legal agreements would result in their being
returned to the developer at some later date. In any event, setting such charges would be onerous, uncertain and lengthy even if tied in with new development plan regime."

newbie

11-01-2004, 18:39

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by Anna Key
I say close the bugger, flatten it, and build 100% social housing on the site with a strong equal opportunities lettings policy to secure and maintain a 50-50 white/non-white mix.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Won't work. The recent trend for building housing on every square foot of the borough has left a major deficit in all sorts of resources. It's not only school places but everything from doctors and dentists to parking and seats on the bus. Piling a few thousand extra people into that site without additional resource provision is exactly the sort of plan I'd expect to see from Lambeth but not on here.

Unrealistic demands won't help. The site should, IMO be considered within the context of the needs of the borough for additional social provision.

I don't pretend to what the priorities really are, but I'll need a lot of convincing to believe that huge housing estates are an answer to anything. Large numbers of flats may plug a shortterm problem now, but in the future the whole estate will be the focus of social problems, like most of the other big estates have been or are.

I'd like to see a mixture of housing (yes, social, but possibly not all one landlord), employment, community and so on. Mixed areas are what make cities work, not slab development.

Gramsci

11-01-2004, 19:19

Interesting thread and thanks Rabbie for the info on Section 106 agreements.

Their are two themes on this thread;

1)The role of prisons.

2)Sales of public assets to private developers instead of keeping land for social use(school/affordable housing).

I will take up theme one-The role of prisons.Their are two views on this thread.One that (ideally) a prison should remain in Brixton and should be a modern reforming institution(Slazenger Moss) that deals with the problems that are laid out by the Social Exclusion Unit.The second put forward most forcibly by Anna that prisons are for the social control of the poor("underclass","socially excluded") in a Capitalist society.

Looking at the work of Michel Foucault(author of Discipline and Punish)prisons are an integral part of modern society.In an earlier age criminal activity was part and parcel of society.It was later in the18th/19thc that the category of the delinquent member of society in need of "reform" was invented.

The modern prison was built as a"technique of surveillance"(see Lang Rabbies link on Brixton prison and picture).

Prisons are not unique in this.The factory,barracks and school
were developed at the same time .Prison was part of the "Disciplined" society-which we still live in.

According to Foucault prisons are;

"a recruitment centre for the army of crime.That is what it achieves.For 200 years people have been saying "Prisons are failing all they do is produce new criminals"I would say on the other hand "They are a success,since that is what has been asked of them."

The role of the prison is to create an "underclass"that can be controlled and classified.The liberal reformist view of prisons ,which was present from the start-a "medico-juridicial remedy",was always a subterfuge.Foucault argues of the "humanitarian reform" of prisons,

"What we have to denounce is not so much the "human" side of life in prison but rather their social function-that is to serve as an instrument that creates a criminal milieu that the ruling classes can control."

Gramsci

11-01-2004, 19:22

Link to Foucault interview:

http://www.literarystudy.net/droit_foucault.htm

ViolentPanda

11-01-2004, 19:46

Originally posted by Gramsci
Interesting thread and thanks Rabbie for the info on Section 106 agreements.

Their are two themes on this thread;

1)The role of prisons.

2)Sales of public assets to private developers instead of keeping land for social use(school/affordable housing).

I will take up theme one-The role of prisons.Their are two views on this thread.One that (ideally) a prison should remain in Brixton and should be a modern reforming institution(Slazenger Moss) that deals with the problems that are laid out by the Social Exclusion Unit.The second put forward most forcibly by Anna that prisons are for the social control of the poor("underclass","socially excluded") in a Capitalist society.
Looking at the work of Michel Foucault(author of Discipline and Punish)prisons are an integral part of modern society.In an earlier age criminal activity was part and parcel of society.It was later in the18th/19thc that the category of the delinquent member of society in need of "reform" was invented.
The modern prison was built as a"technique of surveillance"(see Lang Rabbies link on Brixton prison and picture).

Snipped the rest of your peroration on Foucault :D

Seems to me (and Foucault too IIRC!) that the two purposes (reform/rehabilitation and social control) converge in the fact that prisons attempt, through the media of incarceration and social isolation, to "educate" the inmate in the practice of self-governance, to in effect habituate the inmate to the practice of self-surveillance and self-control, directly reinforcing a set of behaviours that are supposed to be inculcated in us as we learn to socialise beyond our immediate familial environment.

lang rabbie

11-01-2004, 20:40

http://supervision.orcon.net.nz/frames/graph/bars/panthumbs/pans1.gif

Gramsci wins the Lang Rabbie Sweepstake for first mention of Foucault's Discipline and Punish in a thread on prisons.;)

fanta

12-01-2004, 07:53

Originally posted by ViolentPanda
A few small (but perhaps salient) points;
Surely you mean 20+ hours a day rather than "20 plus hours a week"?
Slopping out still occurs in only about 25% of prisons.
The big problem with the proposals around Brixton and wandsworth prisons is that the deals seem to be based on a "new for old" idea, where developers will build new prisons (quite possibly nice new roomy ones) and be granted the sites of the old prisons in exchange. What hasn't been explained is whether this "swap" includes the Prison Service quarters around both prisons, and in the case of Wandsworth, the swathe of land between Heathfield Road and Trinity Road (part of which is, IIRC, currently leased by "Neal's Nursery". If these deals DO include those elements then the private developers will be being given an extremely valuable publicly-owned resource at less than a bargain basement price.
Do you think that would be fair, even if the replacement prisons were of high build quality and appointed with "state of the art" fixtures and fittings?

Yes, sorry of course I meant 20+ hours a day not a week!

If the proposals are as you describe then no, I do not think that is fair and I don't think most people would either.

I actually agree with this: 'I say close the bugger, flatten it, and build 100% social housing on the site with a strong equal opportunities lettings policy to secure and maintain a 50-50 white/non-white mix.'

However, there isn't any chance of that happening sadly, and quite a good chance of what you describe happening instead.

The thing is, how else could it be financed so that extremely valuable publicly-owned resources were saved from falling into the hands of private property developers? The answer is greater taxation obviously. I've no problem with that, and wouldn't mind contributing more, but - let us be realistic about this - I suspect most people wouldn't.

This isn't a defence of these unfair proposals, just the gloomy reality as I see it.

detective-boy

12-01-2004, 08:57

Originally posted by Gramsci
According to Foucault prisons are;

"a recruitment centre for the army of crime.That is what it achieves.For 200 years people have been saying "Prisons are failing all they do is produce new criminals"I would say on the other hand "They are a success,since that is what has been asked of them."

The role of the prison is to create an "underclass"that can be controlled and classified.The liberal reformist view of prisons ,which was present from the start-a "medico-juridicial remedy",was always a subterfuge.Foucault argues of the "humanitarian reform" of prisons,

"What we have to denounce is not so much the "human" side of life in prison but rather their social function-that is to serve as an instrument that creates a criminal milieu that the ruling classes can control."

So far as I can see, there are two views of prison: (a) a means of reforming those labelled as criminals and (b) a means of keeping those criminals away from the rest of the population for a while.

These days the two views seem to be mutually exclusive but they are not. If you are genuinely reforming somebody for 2 years in prison they are also off the streets for that 2 years. That said, it doesn't work the other way round - 2 years off the streets doesn't have any effect on reform if the necessary effort is not put in.

In my experience the prison service has way too little focus on reform - to all intents and purposes it just acts as a type (b) approach. Worse still, with no genuine reform effort the prisoners tend to fill the time with criminality classes so a lot of them come out worse!

Whether it works or not? If you think it should reform - no way. If you think it should just take criminals out of circulation for a while - sure does.

hatboy

12-01-2004, 10:49

Newbie sad:

"I'd like to see a mixture of housing (yes, social, but possibly not all one landlord), employment, community and so on. Mixed areas are what make cities work, not slab development."

He is right. I think streets of houses with owner occupation, HA, council and private renters works. We do need a bigger proportion of social housing but not "slab development" estates.

Do you all know about the little group of flats opposite the Two Woodcocks - alot of ex-homeless people were housed there without sufficient support and they were then exploited by guys taking over their flats to sell crack. Result, some tenants couldn't get out of this situation, gave up their homes and ended up back on the street. If the flats had more mix of people perhaps the ex-homeless tenants would have been less isolated and vulnerable.

One negative aspect of "mix up" tho. I conclude myself from all I've seen that the posher middle-class, upper-middle class if you like, rarely want to mix anyway.

Again, see the Tim Butler article on gentrification on the thread about "that trendy place".

lang rabbie

12-01-2004, 12:32

It would be fascinating to see the current social breakdown of Dumbarton Road and adjacent streets. A decade ago, it was a mix of longstanding tenant, bedsits and public sector professionals living in "genteel poverty" who rubbed along reasonably well.

I see from some googling that the maisonettes are now selling at £200,000 plus and rentals are c.£210 a week - all these deals are through Clapham and Balham estate agents.

And I'm sure I saw some tawdry bit of property journalism last year describing the area as something Village

Will the newer locals throw up their hands in horror at the prospect of social housing backing on to them, and demand the retention of the prison wall as a piece of local heritage?

Anna Key

12-01-2004, 12:46

Originally posted by lang rabbie
And I'm sure I saw some tawdry bit of property journalism last year describing the area as something Village
Dumb Village?

ViolentPanda

12-01-2004, 13:02

Originally posted by detective-boy
So far as I can see, there are two views of prison: (a) a means of reforming those labelled as criminals and (b) a means of keeping those criminals away from the rest of the population for a while.

These days the two views seem to be mutually exclusive but they are not. If you are genuinely reforming somebody for 2 years in prison they are also off the streets for that 2 years. That said, it doesn't work the other way round - 2 years off the streets doesn't have any effect on reform if the necessary effort is not put in.
In my experience the prison service has way too little focus on reform - to all intents and purposes it just acts as a type (b) approach. Worse still, with no genuine reform effort the prisoners tend to fill the time with criminality classes so a lot of them come out worse!

A major bugbear with me is that more often than not it is the Prison Service itself which is blamed for the lack of reformative/rehabilitative programmes within prisons, when the reality is that most (though not all) failings are due to political interference from politicians in the way prisons are run, and the politicisation/commercialisation of the upper ranks of the civil service to such an extent that political interference is accepted rather than rebuffed.
In my time at the Home Office I saw many good rehabilitation projects torpedoed because they didn't fit with the ethos of the Ministerial incumbents. As it was, the current Tory leader vetoed the refurbishment of several provincial Victorian prisons because of his belief that a lack of personal plumbing was a good thing for inmates (obviously never having bothered to check the figures for gastro-enteric infections or for inmate-inmate or inmate-staff assaults in which slop pots were used).
As for the continual staff shrinkage that prisons have suffered in ALL depts, I won't bother to go into that, but it also has a powerful effect "on the ground".

Whether it works or not? If you think it should reform - no way. If you think it should just take criminals out of circulation for a while - sure does.
And of course what the system should really be doing is both.

SlazengerMoss

12-01-2004, 14:27

Originally posted by ViolentPanda
A major bugbear with me is that more often than not it is the Prison Service itself which is blamed for the lack of reformative/rehabilitative programmes within prisons, when the reality is that most (though not all) failings are due to political interference from politicians in the way prisons are run, and the politicisation/commercialisation of the upper ranks of the civil service to such an extent that political interference is accepted rather than rebuffed.
In my time at the Home Office I saw many good rehabilitation projects torpedoed because they didn't fit with the ethos of the Ministerial incumbents. As it was, the current Tory leader vetoed the refurbishment of several provincial Victorian prisons because of his belief that a lack of personal plumbing was a good thing for inmates (obviously never having bothered to check the figures for gastro-enteric infections or for inmate-inmate or inmate-staff assaults in which slop pots were used).
As for the continual staff shrinkage that prisons have suffered in ALL depts, I won't bother to go into that, but it also has a powerful effect "on the ground".
[B]
And of course what the system should really be doing is both.

Exactly what has/is happening at Brixton and no doubt elsewhere due to the clueless, quick fix, populist policies of this government.

squidlet

12-01-2004, 20:33

Newbie sad:

"I'd like to see a mixture of housing (yes, social, but possibly not all one landlord), employment, community and so on. Mixed areas are what make cities work, not slab development."

Absolutely right. And I'd add that there should also be some low cost home ownership (like shared ownership) and intermediate market rented (for medium-waged) as part of the social mix. Monotenure is bad, be it slab estates where local authorities have decided to concentrate their responsibilities to homeless families and 'vulnerable' single people, or owner-occupied, gated, dormitory ghettos.

Picking up the planning obligations point from Lang Rabbie, one of the danger points in the Planning Bill currently around is that it gives developers the chance to settle for a cash payment rather than what we currently call S.106 land / housing provision. This is incredibly dangerous in high value / high demand areas (yes, I mean places like Brixton).The temptation for local authorities will be to use the cash for a) something other than affordable / low cost housing or b) to develop affordable housing where land is cheap - and that means increasing polarisation between gentrified areas and elsewhere.

Final point on 'best consideration' - to clarify, the Local Gvt Act stuff (the £2M discount - which isn't a lot) only applies to land / assets that the council controls - so things like prisons, NHS property, MOD land [the worst offender] are completely outside this. Treasury rules apply. I will have a rant about Gordon Brown's hypocrisy re ending child poverty etc at some later stage

newbie

12-01-2004, 20:37

Will the newer locals throw up their hands in horror at the prospect of social housing backing on to them, and demand the retention of the prison wall as a piece of local heritage?

those'll be the ones who've never noticed Clapham Park Estate...

:)

I largely agree with Hatboy that the mix of 'owner occupation, HA, council and private renters ' works, and works well, though I think there also needs to be workshops, small factories, lockups, shops and community provision (school, health centre, library, that sort of thing). But it's pretty clear that there is currently a lack of social housing in the area, and that the dread gentrification has taken over from regeneration. That's why I'm in favour of housing on the the site being social: council, HA and sheltered. Preferably with a mix of different l/ls so that some diversity is maintained with, for my taste, an architectural mixture of maisonettes, large and small terraced houses with backyards, small blocks of flats and so on.

In any case unless government policy changes, right to buy will erode the purely social nature of the housing relatively quickly (unless newbuild can be ringfenced?).

I can dream, can't I?

Meanwhile in the real world, the only money available will be for gated communities of exective homes. :eek:

newbie

12-01-2004, 20:43

squidlet mentioned intermediate market rented (for medium-waged) which is fair enough but IME council estates have a fair few flats rented out... that maybe wasn't what the council intended, and it's way outside the Rent Acts, but the effect on social mix is much the same.

(for the avoidance of doubt, I'm not suggesting that's a good thing, just saying that that market sector will siort itself out).

Anna Key

13-01-2004, 09:48

Originally posted by fanta
Blah blah flippant clumsiness blah blah silly and dishonest blah blah back-peddle blah blah twister of words blah blah Nicholas van Hoogstraten
Funny man!

I wrote, and stand by 100% (and your rich fanta(sy) life allows me to post it again):
I claimed that in historic terms Brixton Prison might reasonably be described as a death camp given the high number of killings over many years.
Provoking tremendous huffing and puffing from you and Comrade Moss.

Which is fine. Huff and puff away. It's amusing to watch and I strongly support your right - and that of Comrade Moss - to make tits of yourselves on a public bulletin board.

Any more fanta(sies) you want to 'share?' Go on. Make an idiot of yourself again.

fanta

13-01-2004, 11:37

Originally posted by Anna 'Dave Spart' Key
But hey, as fanta suggests, let's move on. :p

Yes of course.

Ahem, :)

IntoStella

13-01-2004, 11:51

Originally posted by farta
Yes of course.

Ahem, :) Bless! He's finally figured out that you can be ''humorous and lighthearted'' with people's quoted usernames. Shame he couldn't think of something original, though. Poor old Farta.

fanta

13-01-2004, 12:00

Originally posted by STALE IN LOT
Bless! He's finally figured out that you can be ''humorous and lighthearted'' with people's quoted usernames. Shame he couldn't think of something original, though. Poor old Farta.

Thanks!

I love you guys!

:)

hatboy

13-01-2004, 12:07

The last few posts are boring, insular and petty. Take it to PMs please. It makes this forum look like a private club for petty sniping.

Sorry, but we not going down the road of Albert cliques or any other clique.

Thankyou. :)

IntoStella

13-01-2004, 12:08

Please, it's A LENTIL SOT
(http://www.wordsmith.org/anagram/index.html)

Not A SILENT LOT, for sure,

Or most damningly, TALENT IS LO. ;)

IntoStella

13-01-2004, 12:10

Originally posted by hatboy
This is boring, insular and petty. Take it to PMs please. It makes this forum look like a private club for petty sniping.

Sorry, but we not going down the road of Albert cliques or any other clique.

Thankyou. :) Oh please! NO HUMOUR IN THE BRIXTON FORUM! VE MUST BE FUN UNT LIGHTHEARTED!! JAWOHL!!:eek:

hatboy

13-01-2004, 12:13

Just watch the "private club" thing, OK? Neither Mike nor me want that in here. Thanks.

:)

(Gentle reminder from moderator, not up for debate)

IntoStella

13-01-2004, 12:31

Originally posted by hatboy
Just watch the "private club" thing, OK? Neither Mike nor me want that in here. Thanks.

:)

(Gentle reminder from moderator, not up for debate) Oh leave off. What private club do you think both me and fanta are in, pray tell? That Groucho Marx quote about not wanting to be in a club that would have him comes to mind. Imagine a club that would have both me and Fanta!! :D

You've completely overreacted to a minor and largely self-deprecating bit of kidding about and are now trying to back up your SoH failure with some decree, apparently handed down by Mike, which no one is allowed to discuss. I have lost count of the number of complaints I have heard from people about heavy handed and over-controlling moderation in this forum. Take it easy!

If you want people to respect your authoritaaay, then believe, me, a lighter touch would go a long way. :)

fanta

13-01-2004, 12:52

Okay okay - I love you too hatboy.

:)

PS 'Private Club'?

Don't get it?

hatboy

13-01-2004, 12:56

This is my lighter touch IS. :)

I've taken my chill pill, I suggest you neck a couple yourself. xx

IntoStella

15-01-2004, 09:31

This is my lighter touch IS. :)

I've taken my chill pill, I suggest you neck a couple yourself. xx

OK, one last anagram reference. I don't want to derail this terrific thread, but if you type HATBOY into the Internet anagram server (http://www.wordsmith.org/anagram/index.html), the first entry to come up is A BOTHY, meaning 'A small house or cottage'. ;) :D ;) :D

hatboy

15-01-2004, 10:29

LOL. Mm. :)

Seriously tho, just to finish off what we were saying before the downtime:

"I have lost count of the number of complaints I have heard from people about heavy handed and over-controlling moderation in this forum."

IS - I am taking a calmer approach, but I'm always going to have to use my judgement. You will have to accept my moderating style in here until either Mike or me get bored with me doing it. Mike and I don't agree on everything, but he is happy with the way I do things here. "The number of complaints I (meaning yourself) have heard" is irrelevant. You're not moderating this forum.

You also need to think about how short-tempered you are too. The number of complaints I have heard about your, etc..... you know the score.

:)

Streathamite

15-01-2004, 10:45

OK, one last anagram reference. I don't want to derail this terrific thread, but if you type HATBOY into the Internet anagram server (http://www.wordsmith.org/anagram/index.html), the first entry to come up is A BOTHY, meaning 'A small house or cottage'. ;) :D ;) :D
a bothy is a kind of derelict cottage, housing both shepherd and a sheep
IS=Still On Tea. a likely story

Mr Retro

15-01-2004, 11:18

"You're not moderating this forum."
"Do not post on this thread again ... deleted without further explanation from me"
etc
etc

"I've taken my chill pill"

Maybe you could take an anti-jobsworth pill along with the chill pill?

Streathamite

15-01-2004, 11:20

What would you call it then? A Serious Illness Camp? A Not Very Nice Place Camp?
No, I would call it "an awful, barbaric and unimaginably violent place run by crim 'barons' and corrupt brutal screws, but which-nevertheless had a different purpose than Auschwitz's central mission of mechanised genocide". and yes, you were OTT there with 'death camp', for all you usually talk a deal of sense
as for its' replacement-as mixed a development as possible! HA, council, rented, workplaces, shops, owner-occupied-and leisure/ents. And the governors manse? simple - community/educational/cultural facility.
The problem is that neither the cash exists (for all the LDs flogging off all but the lav stopcocks) or the attention that would be needed to ensure a genuine, diverse social mix