{"id":973,"date":"2015-10-01T15:58:51","date_gmt":"2015-10-01T14:58:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ounews.co\/?p=973"},"modified":"2015-10-01T15:58:51","modified_gmt":"2015-10-01T14:58:51","slug":"london-housing-protests-echo-glasgow-rent-strikes-of-100-years-ago","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/news\/arts-social-sciences\/society-politics\/london-housing-protests-echo-glasgow-rent-strikes-of-100-years-ago\/","title":{"rendered":"London housing protests echo Glasgow rent strikes of 100 years ago"},"content":{"rendered":"

Anger over government housing policy is undoubtedly one of the running themes of the 2010s. Most recently we have seen anti-gentrification protests<\/a> in east London over people being pushed out due to huge increases in private rent costs and a lack of social housing, which made headlines for targeting the hipster Cereal Killer Cafe in Brick Lane.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n

Before the storm: cereal owners<\/span>
\nMatt Crossick\/PA Wire<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

This is an era of severe shortages in social housing, aggravated by Tory plans to extend<\/a> the right to buy scheme to housing associations. We have seen staggering increases<\/a> in the costs of private renting, dwindling owner occupation<\/a> and of course the bedroom tax<\/a>. The London protests were a reaction to the effective social cleansing of working-class residents by Tory\/Lib Dem coaliton policy. Local tenants’ organisations and protest groups have also been formed to co-ordinate discontent. Meanwhile, Corbyn\u2019s Labour is proposing<\/a> the biggest social-housing programme since the 1970s.<\/p>\n

This is all exactly 100 years after the Glasgow rent strikes of 1915, another period that lacked affordable and decent rental accommodation and squeezed those who could least afford it. World War I saw numerous rent strikes in different towns and cities around the UK including Leeds, Sheffield and Wolverhampton<\/a> in 1913-14, but the Glasgow protests were the ones that transformed the country and ultimately brought forth state policies for working-class housing.<\/p>\n

Glasgow at war<\/h2>\n

It is vital to appreciate the context of Clydeside at that time. Glasgow was an industrial powerhouse, the \u201csecond city of the Empire\u201d<\/a>. It was an important producer of the armaments of war \u2013 and of soldiers for the front line. The city had grown enormously<\/a> during its Victorian heyday, and this continued in the early 20th century as the huge needs of the war industries boosted migration to the city.<\/p>\n

By the mid-1910s, the city was suffering from acute overcrowding problems. In early 1915 private landlords took advantage to announce that rents would increase by up to 25%. They had a virtual monopoly over working-class housing, which put them in a powerful position, and they would not have expected much opposition at a time when so many men were away fighting in France.<\/p>\n

Yet the Glasgow Women\u2019s Housing Association, established before 1914 to fight for better housing conditions, soon galvanised growing discontent over the increases by calling for a city-wide rent strike (and note the parallels to the current London protests, in which women have been<\/a> heavily involved). Early support from the areas closest to the shipyards, such as Govan and Partick, where tens of thousands were crammed into poorly maintained tenements, soon spread across much of the city.<\/p>\n