Simon Lee, secretary of Hastings Area Southern Housing Tenants’ Association, reflects on the living situation in a local housing association estate.
Anyone who has lived in the Four Courts will know that the most frequently asked question of anyone is ‘how long have you been here’?
When I arrived just over a year ago, I was overwhelmed with gratitude having narrowly escaped homelessness. Now I live high above the streets with breathtaking views across to Beachy Head and the Sussex countryside. It’s quiet up here with just a distant hum of the people and traffic below us. My neighbours are perfectly respectful of this space we call home. We all recognise the imperfections of life here but, more or less, I am happy to be here.
I could rail against the injustices and poor management of Southern Housing, there’s enough of that to fill a book, but something else has been slowly eating into my soul. Something at first almost indiscernible is now starting to crank up the volume. It’s the collective sound of lost hope and disappointment that is seeping through cracks in every layer of life in the Four Courts.
The ‘how long have you lived here’ mantra rings out over the Courts reminding us that this must be endured as some karmic journey where, if we are lucky, and the gods are smiling, we will eventually find some peace. Many here are very happy, with rich and fulfilling memories. They can recall the excitement of moving in, building and sharing a community full of diversity in ages, men and women, ethnicity, ordinary working folk living together.
The tower blocks have become somewhat iconic. In the day they were lauded and praised, marvels of the new architecture. They sat majestic, owning their space, proud and unabashedly modern.
But somehow this panache has been lost. Today they are sad and embarrassed. The dreams that flourished here are gone, confined to the history of failed planning, poor management, lack of foresight, underinvestment. We struggle to see the beauty in these blocks.
How has this happened? Where is the hope and excitement that must have arrived with the new high-rise living? Why have successive administrations failed to stop the steady decline?
Because now, if you mention the Four Courts, it’s the recurring ‘how long have you been here’ that always gets noticed. Instead of the glorification of the groundbreaking design, there is disappointment, distrust, and apathy. Years of systematic neglect has worn away the promise of a better life. Disillusionment and despondency have become pernicious and rife in our community. The dreams that fed the belief in a better, more equitable and socially responsible world have largely evaporated.
My journey to the Four Courts was troubled but I was thankful for the lifeline that was thrown to me by a town I didn’t know. It turned out so much better than I could have imagined. There’s a strong sense of connectedness through these streets that seems to thrive regardless of money, success or status. There’s rebellion in our culture, the bonfire societies, the music, the art, it’s everywhere!
But there is also a tangible sense of decline here, and the Four Courts, like so many similar estates in towns and cities across Britain, are just as much a victim of this drip drip degradation of our lives.
People deserve more, much more. We don’t expect to be rich, after all, we live in a society that systematically neglects our well-being. But surely, at the very least, we deserve our self-respect?
As I walk around the estate with my dog, I see the families on their way to school, the retired, the carers, the postman on his rounds, women and men leaving for work, maintenance contractors, the whole microcosm of the outside world is represented here. Dig a little deeper and you start to uncover a world of poverty, pharma dependency, long-term unemployment, gig economy zero-hours contracts, drug and alcohol dependency. It may not yet be an epidemic but it’s certainly heading in that direction. I can’t help seeing the worry and angst in people’s faces. What happened to those dreams? How did we lose that promise? Why is everything so seemingly dysfunctional?
I don’t enjoy these thoughts. It feels disloyal, like a betrayal. And ultimately, spiritually useless and moribund. So instead, I try to practice joy, kindness, seeing the best in the people I meet.
In the lifts coming down from the top, I enjoy the encounters, the shared greetings, the teasing jokes. I remember one hot sunny day, taking the lift, and the heat was unbearable. Shirts were being abandoned, and, on each floor, another shirtless man joined the group. Only one fully clothed and five men not knowing where to look! Suddenly, we were all laughing at the absurdity! The Four Courts lifts are an endless source of camaraderie with the occasional inappropriate dress code error! Somehow, the lift is a great leveller, we are all equal, we share the same hope and dreams.
Then, there’s the gaggle of friends that gather around the foyer. They are there most days, in almost all weather, chatting, arguing about their team’s performance on the pitch, chasing an escaped dog, helping carry shopping bags, bantering with the taxi driver.
And beyond the Courts where the wild daffodils bloom, and wild garlic scents the woodlands, across the stream with the plaque commemorating a lost soul, the torrent that gushes along through the weirs, even the abandoned shopping trolleys have a certain charm and familiarity!
And back in the flats themselves, beyond the closed doors, a man aligns his telescope to better view the early evening sky searching for a glimpse of Saturn, mothers reading the hungry caterpillar for the nth time, the tired men and women settling down for their favorite tv show.
It may not be picture perfect, but it is home, and home is where we want to be. Safe, warm, protected.
And then the news comes unexpectedly and unforeseen. Like a bolt from beyond. ‘Four Courts to be demolished’ reads the headline. There’s shock and fear. These are our homes? How can they decide this for us? With no consultation, no hint this was being planned? No-one spoke to me about it? Don’t I get a say?
As I write this, I can feel my anger rising. It’s not that I desperately fear the future, although that is a real concern with the chronic shortage of suitable housing, it’s the casual way we are expected to accept it. As if it’s a normal occurrence to lose your home. There’s a primitive and fundamental need for home and security and we’ve just been told nonchalantly that we don’t qualify for that level of respect or honour. How is anyone supposed to react to such monumental disregard of our humanity?
Some welcome the news, some less so. Now the news is out, the inevitability of this day seems preordained. The wasted attempts to shore up buildings when the cladding came crashing down, the constant battle against the bed bugs that plague the courts, the windows that can’t be closed, the malfunctioning intercoms and lifeline services, lifts that always seem to be breaking…
For me, as a recent new tenant, with far less attachment to the Four Courts, there is part of me that also welcomes the news. I can see the efficacy in the minds of Southern Housing and clearly there are those who will embrace the changes to come.
But still, the questions follow, how and where will we be living, will our friends be nearby, will our new homes be quiet, warm, big enough, well maintained? What will happen to our community? Will anyone mourn our loss? And will we be happy wherever we end up?
These are the questions that will really matter in the fullness of time. When you lose an icon, so much more is lost. Let’s hope the spirit of these sixties’ icons – that time, that style, that hope – remains embedded in the Four Courts. They have an honoured place in our shared history, and we owe a debt of gratitude to all those who have passed this way before and those who will build their new futures here.
The first time I read this it roused my curiousity:
“When I arrived just over a year ago, I was overwhelmed with gratitude having narrowly escaped homelessness.”
“My journey to the Four Courts was troubled but I was thankful for the lifeline that was thrown to me by a town I didn’t know.”
Housing crisis – what crisis? A bloke apparently imminently homeless, apparently never lived in the borough, nor links to the borough, allocated a home at Bevin Court? It’s the statutory duty of whichever local authority he came from.
With hindsight, comments anyone?
Hey Tony,
As he says, he didn’t become homeless.
Housing associations can and do move tenants between towns and properties. In this case Southern Housing is the association responsible, and that doesn’t have anything to do with the local authority.
It also seems common for housing associations to prioritise existing residents over potential new residents, for example with the demolition of Four Courts – all those residents will get priority for rehousing over people who’ve been on the waiting list, living in temporary accommodation.
You say “what housing crisis?”. Well, in Hastings and Rother I believe there’s currently over 3,000 people homeless and on the waiting list for a home, and that number seems to be rising rather than falling. The problem isn’t that there aren’t enough houses – the problem is that they’re too expensive, or left sitting empty and off the market. Meanwhile social housing is being destroyed or repriced at higher rent rates. I’d call that a housing crisis, personally, though I’m aware there are plenty of people in Hastings who don’t care about thousands of people being left without a home.
– Merlin