Glasgow Counci Soaks the Poor

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THE GORDALS. ALTERAFTTVE FEVELOTMENT STRATIES WAS TO PRESS ANEW SPINT A SOLUTION Your chee /OLD CHAP. ....Haws, THIS DOWN SITUATION TO FRANCE MISS PICKY UNLIZING ME SIR. IT SYSTEM COMING MOST ADVANCED ALONG? AH OVI,:

FIAN NO. 1 FLAN NO2 A' TELMNOLONIY SHE COMES VERRI AVAILABL WELL MONSIEVSA..

TIME... ON THE JOB RIGHT BLA Ben NOW . wo Вел cAL IT.

OTHER AGGRAUATON NO 'NO HOT BATHS DO NOT MATiNG DOEs LEAN DRYING GIOTHES IT PISH oveM MAKINA WARM CARY DOTS NG HOT POOD ОХ ДнК BONsG PUrVNG MYING, SWCANY NOKTE AASMENGUA Stan Crooke reports on a long struggle by tenants in the Gorbals 'GOD bless her, and all who sail in her.' Although there is no record of Queen Elizabeth II actually using these words to open the Hutchesontown housing scheme in the Gorbals (Glasgow) in July 1972, they are certainly the most appropriate words she could have used; so bad was the dampness in the scheme that it rapidly achieved a national notoriety.

The Hutcheson E scheme consisted of two high-rise blocks (24 storeys) and twelve low-rise blocks (7 storeys), with 384 flats in the former and 759 in the latter, housing a total of 2,500 people. The blocks were built between 1969 and 1973, using the TRACOBA system of design and construction.

The TRACOBA system, first used in France in 1959, basically involves building housing blocks from prefabricated kits, like Lego though on a larger scale. The system bas both advantages and disadvantages: advantages for penny-pinching district councils and money-grabbing private contractors, disadvantages are for who enas up living in the flats.

In 1967 the National Building Agency issued a Certificate allowing the British concessionaires of the TRACOBA system the right to use it in Scotland - but not for low-rise blocks. It was in the low-rise blocks that the worst. dampness occurred.

The first tenants moved into the scheme in December 1971. And the first complaints about dampness were made in ... December 1971.

As more tenants moved Youny Sacialists l 1*300 = 5400 19Ho 805.

NOI 0m11!| ....BY THE BEST IN EUROPE.. into the scheme, more complained about dampness. But the complaints were ignored: in 1972 the authorities passed the flats as fit for human habitation, and the remaining blocks were built using exactly the same method.

Seventy per cent of the TRACOBA flats in the Gorbals suffer from dampness.

First there is the unpleasant, musty smell. Then the wallpaper becomes discoloured and begins to peel away. Fungus and mould cover the walls.

The fungus and mould spread to the furniture, carpets and clothing. Some tenants have had to throw out new carpets which had become rotten and stinking after only eight weeks.

Health suffers too. Respiratory diseases →32L THE IDEA POR THe COPERAS • URBAN CONTENT SHUMON.. TAKF GENERATED THis MOMENT. • ASSEMBLED are aggravated by damp-. ness and possibly caused by it, and dampness is a health hazard for asthmatics, sensitive to the fungus spores.

Other features of the TRACOBA flats 'include flooding in the verandahs, inadequate sound-proofing between rooms, lack of drying areas, regularly faulty lifts, lack of playspace, inadequate waste disposal arrangements, etc., etc.

For the tenants in the Gorbals, these conditions are part of a whole way of life: high levels of unemployment, low wages for the few with work, social isolation caused by the large number of high-rise flats, remaining pockets of the old slum tenements, large tracts of derelict land, rat-infested abandoned buildings, lack of child-care facilies made even worse by recent cuts), traffic hazards, 'and corruption in local government.

In the early seventies, continual complaints to the then Glasgow Corporation produced only a visual inspection of some of the flats by a Clerk of Works, and a few tips of insulting advice.

Tenants were told to leave all windows open and turn up all heating - and never mind the massive electricity bills.

Stop

The dampness waB attributed by the Corporashe ld loave the who laves IN YES WHAT IS IT?

USING THE LATEST IDEAS.... AM SUPFOSE YOU WANT US TO CHANGE IT THEN?' WITH LOVING CARE OSTRACIS CONCELEE l. Kropot IT 3. TennsteR ir To 175 ALL A SKY ITS ALON E NONESENU AVOTHER DEME QUESTION OF seritlinl re 4. THREATEN co6 MAN SON ACTON LFESTYLE...

To prevent growth of fungus on furniture, it was suggested that furnishings should be moved 18 inches away from the walls (effectively halving the usable room space).

Following in the traditions of Victorian capitalists who said that poverty was due to workers' fecklessneas, the corporation tried to blame the dampness on the tenants.

But the tenants started to organise.

In May 1975 Hutcheson Terests rosociation and ENC S000 1/ X00 Me AMIEN O M&SCANRET 750 UVANDA stel •FOR MA BEST MEN ARE "LE SYSTEME, TRAUDA YOU !!!

IF A FEW SIMPLE RULES ARE FOLLOWED.

THErE IS NO REASON FOR THERE TO BE DAMPNESS OR ANY SITUATION y ge g WET COMES UMSAELSTS The campaign committee wrote to the District Council demanding a remedy of the dampness problem in line with the 1897 Public Health Act; and on getting no response, began preparing for legal action against the Council.

Attempts were made to get legal aid for eleven tenants who would act as a test case, but aid was refused.

Some tenants had gone on a rent strike in protest at the dampness, and in set i Jan 102 Taine + burgh). As soon as the hearing opened, the district Council's solicitor announced that the Council was not pursuing the case. The same happened with further cases, and soon over 130 tenants were on rent-strike. At the same timen shown plate un the courts ran aground. A vague promise by the Council to do 'everything practicable' against the dampness was, in legal terms, an adequate defence for the council under the 1897 Act.

So the campaign continued. On November 28, 1976, 500 people attended a campaign meeting itself, 150 attended an overspill meeting in the same building, and many others had to be refused entry due to lack of space.

The meeting was covered by the national media, and there could no longer be any doubt about the GÄDC's mandate from the Gorbals population. The District Council backed down slightly and promised in December 1976 to reINO LONERANA NO BAUL Grants * THAN 37008 house tenants living in damp housing, and not to re-let damp flats once they became vacant.

But promises are one thing, action quite another.

In the first six months of 1977 only 35 families were rehoused. It took a lot more campaigning - including a 1,000 strong rally on May Day 1977 - to get over 100 re-housed in the second half of 1977.

GADC activists felt, justifiably, that they bad made more than their fair share of sacrifices and that tine ox oxbers to 1978 De GADE inctes Tere maximum compensation and as rapid re-housing as possible. Since 1978 the GADC has continued its struggle against the District Council, though on a lower level of militancy since its mass base has been eroded by rehousing. The bulk of its work has been about negotiations with the District Council over the level of compensation and details of re-housing.

Re-housing has, in manner of speaking, finally been sorted out. Only nine flats are still occupied in Hutchesontown E. Eight of those nine have already signed agreements to move into a new house. The ninth is waiting for repairs to her new house to be concluded before signing the agreement.

But the issue of compensation and repayment of rent arrears remains even now - 10½ years after the first complaint about dampness, and seven years after the first tenant going on rent strike - still far from settled.

And now, after the mammoth struggle against REce CAN'T JUsE Minh READ SON?

NO DOGS JERKPOT MEGRASS bras вот слоса BlOKRR dampness, the area is faced by the threat of the District Council selling off the property to private contractors. Did the people of the Gorbals fight against inadequate council housing for ten years in order that it might be replaced by inadequate private housing? Or wasn't the aim all along, and still is today, for decent council housing in place of council's purpose-built slums in Hutchesontown E?

The GADC used a variety of methods of struggle & the same time, i refused to fall into the trap of relying exclusively on one form of action - even a militant one like a rent-strike - and thes giving the council an easy run since * can focus 00 that one

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Socialist Organiser no. 99 September 9 1982 Page 11 YOU MUST REALISE OF COURSE THAT YOUR CASE IS BY NO MEANS UNIQUE.... WE ARE NOW BUNDING DAMP HOUSES ALl OVER GIrEGOW

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DESIGNED COUNKK HOUSES POINTS TABLE

1976 tbe Council began taking scene of thers to