to think that this has no place in this country

[brizzlemint]

www.theguardian.com/cities/2019/mar/25/too-poor-to-play-children-in-social-housing-blocked-from-communal-playground

At least one multimillion-pound housing development in London is segregating the children of less well-off tenants from those of wealthier homebuyers by blocking them from some communal play areas.

Guardian Cities has discovered that developer Henley Homes has blocked social housing residents from using shared play spaces at its Baylis Old School complex on Lollard Street, south London. The development was required to include a mix of “affordable” and social rental units in order to gain planning permission.

Yes...lets all leave our jobs to be bankers shall we. I chose not to go into banking after my boss made a pass at me when i was a 17 year old on work experience for Deutsche Bank. Maybe i would have been richer . Anyway i digress...some people work hard but cannot afford to live.
Acceptance of gross inequality is passive.

Why on earth do they think they should be entitled to use something they don't pay for?

I would imagine none of the children involved pay for any parks. What with child labour laws being as they are, they tend not to have much in the way of disposable income.

I know you meant the parents. But why the hell should children suffer because their parents aren't wealthy? And social housing in London isn't for the feckless and lazy as I'm sure you're about to imply, it's as much used by people in normal, essential jobs like nursing, or retail work, or the people who empty your bins, none of whom are paid enough to comfortably cover London private rents.

By all means if you want to live in a society where the best nurses have all quit their jobs to become bankers just so their kids can play in the same park as their friends next door, you're going the right way about it.

Its not a public or council run park though. Its a play area attached to certain properties that pay a premium for it. The same way people pay for driveways. Should someone that lives in a flat on a development get to use a driveway of a house there?

I have a work acquaintance who started out her career in nursing, had to leave for health reasons, and is now a very successful award winning business woman. A lot of the skills are very transferable: communication, keeping a cool head under pressure, remembering vast amounts of critical information. Perhaps if they all follow her example London could just do without nurses.

Or we could stop this trend of treating hard working people who happen not to earn very much money as second and third class citizens. Just a thought.

I must admit I would be very aggrieved if I was being charged £100 or whatever it is to maintain the facilities only to find out 20% of the residents got them for free.

There's a really simple solution to this - Guinness Housing Association pay a negotiated rate to the building management company to allow their tenants access. Other housing associations do this, it's not uncommon. They don't need to include gyms or other facilities that are physically inside other blocks, but communal grounds should be accessible to all residents.

It's horrible to think there are children who can't play with their friends in a playground they can see from their window. Imagine being the parent who has to explain to their child why that is? Imagine having to do it several times a day, because toddlers are like that. Imagine how you'd feel when your child stopped asking, because they'd learned the lesson that they're too poor to have nice things?

That will do well for the social housing childrens self esteem won't it. Regardless if they own or rent a childrens playground should NEVER be segregated ffs.

Gym, pool etc that is fair enough.

We wonder why some children grow up resentful/angry at the world so to speak. Yes its only a playground, people can argue its only right only people who pay for it should use it.

This is only their first taste of "you are poor so no entry" in life, its actually very sad.

Good luck explaining to a 5 year old "you cant play in that park because mummy couldn't afford a deposit" every single day.

As adults we understand what we can and cant access due to finances, i just dont think its a lesson they need to learn at such a young age.

Perhaps a reduced service fee could be negotiated for the social housing tenants who want to avail themselves of the facilities.

Why should it be reduced? Private members clubs in Mayfair don't reduce their prices because someone wants to join and doesn't earn silly money. Same principle.

As PP said it’s no different to the many private parks and gardens all over the place.

Am highly amused that some people are naive enough to think only the workshy live I never social housing. Where do you think all the people working full time in jobs like retail live in London. On £18K per year they certainly aren’t buying or renting privately?

It makes me really sad to think of little children looking out of their window seeing neighbours playing but they aren’t allowed in because they are too poor. It’s really shit.
The play area provided for the social tenants looks pretty unwelcoming and sparse almost like they aren’t wanted there...

The purpose behind the Council requiring the developer to include social housing is surely to promote integration.

Otherwise the Council could simply sell the entirety of the land for private development and use the sale proceeds to build a greater number of social housing elsewhere (on cheaper land). It doesn't do that presumably (at least in part) because there is drive to minimise segregation of the rich and the poor.

Henley throw their hands up and saying its nothing to do with them. And perhaps it isn't. Perhaps the Council should have been empowered and funded to require that Henley should assume the playgrounds would be available to all and require Henley to price and build on that basis and to collaborate with the housing association to ensure they delivered that together.

But Henley would probably then have been less interested in the development as it would probably in their view have been less marketable (and seeing some of the posts on this thread you can see why....the horror of children of social housing tenants getting 'something for free').
And Lambeth were probably desperate.

Interestingly there is a local thread on another platform on this article currently. Over sixty posts and not a single person has argued that its justifiable on the grounds of who pays the service charge. Instead people are lobbying their MPs to ask why Councils are not better empowered and accountable to prevent this happening.

Things in life we dont have to pay for:
Lots of our local parks. Why is this park costing homeowners £100 ( per year/ week?) Is it for maintenance? Is a park really that expensive once it is built? It's just a bit mean isn't it.

Well I vote for all nurses the care-workers retraining for jobs in the City then
I agree although ft nurses can earn a decent salary, especially if working nights. You can also become specialised and earn over £40k. Two ft nurses together would fall into the category of couples who can afootd to buy.

I fully agreed about carers though, they really don't get paid enough, hence a massive crisis in the care sector and high reliance on foreign workers.

It's not like the children from the social houses have no private playground at all, they are still at an advantage to those children whose homes don't come with a playground right next to it and have to use the normal council parks. It's really not that terrible, all children have to learn that they can't always have what they want and people have to tell their children no to things all the time.

I don't understand why some posters are saying that it's understandable that the private houses have access to a swimming pool that the social houses don't, but it's different when it's a playground. It's the same thing, kids like pools as much as they like playgrounds.

A residents only playground is a luxury, and all the children concerned here have that, this isn't something essential like education or healthcare. The social housing only exists because of the private money going in to it, so lower income families (like mine) are still benefitting overall.

It is difficult. I think all kids should be allowed, but maybe they're worried about teens?

Are the teens from the private housing a better class of teenager than the ones in the social housing then?

it's that Britain is now a country run for the Haves, whilst screwing over the Have Nots and leaving them to rot.

No argument there, sadly.

The play area provided for the social tenants looks pretty unwelcoming and sparse

The one on Archbishop's Park doesn't, though; it's only a few minutes' walk up the road and it's paid for through local taxes and open to everyone, just like lots of other public provision

I think I've been misunderstood...

I think resident teens of the social housing and private housing should be allowed and should be given keys, but if one of the residents resort to anti social/criminal behaviour then

Sorry I clicked post by mistake too early....

Then the ones who have done the bad behaviour should have their privilege revoked and keys taken. Kind of the same as a pool or gym would be treated, which would have nothing to do with finances but would make residents accountable for the property.

It's wrong but yet another example of the way Tories want things to happen. Just a bit more blatant than the % for social housing being allowed to be commuted by payment.

It is difficult. I think all kids should be allowed, but maybe they're worried about teens?

Yes, we all worry about the teens because anti-social teenagers can cause an awful lot of hell. But if we as a society do not look after all the children and treat them as important members of society, we are creating an awful lot of anti-social teens.

Where on earth are the low-paid that the higher-paid employ (to do the stuff they can't/won't do) supposed to live?

At least their children have a real chance due to their London location of getting one of them there high-faluting jobs too. They probably won't forget their 'segregation' because they grew up 'poor' either.

I thought London was supposed to be all-encompassing, welcoming and understanding of all - looks like it isn't really like that doesn't it?

And this point will be controversial- it's no secret that social housing suffers from more anti-social and criminal behaviour

a. this tars all tenants with the same brush.
b. and if so you know who suffers most. The OTHER tenants being forced to live with it

I wonder how many on this thread drop their kids off at nurseries staffed by childminders who live in social housing.

Perhaps they should retrain too.