Victory for Avondale Residents

For at least three years I have been working with the Avondale Residents Association to press their landlord, Hillingdon Homes, to take seriously the safety fears of the residents, worried about crime and anti social behaviour in and around their appartment blocks. Councillor Lynne Allen has taken up the cause of the local residents and battled away on their behalf.

The residents were promised a CCTV system in and around their appartment blocks. These are the only appartment blocks in Hayes without a CCTV security system. The problem came to a head over the last 10 months after a spate of 18 burglaries in the area.

Mr Bernard Fagan, the chair of the residents association, made it clear to Hillingdon Homes and the Police that people had just had enough and demanded action. Working with Councillor Allen and myself the residents signed a petition and we demanded a meeting with the Chief Executive of Hillingdon Homes and the Police.

That meeting took place this morning (Monday 6th October). The Chief Executive and Board members of Hillingdon Homes and the local Hayes Police inspector met us. Local residents and local councillors expressed their anger at the lack of an adequate response from Hillingdon Homes to the feras and worries people had about their safety.

As a result of the strength of feelings expressed by all of us we secured at the meeting a number of important commitments. First, we were promised that work on installing the CCTV system would start in 4 weeks. Second, we were informed that 3 carpenters would be on site to repair properly the doors damaged in the burglaries. Third, we insisted on HIllingodon Homes and the Police giving us a commitment that they would work with us all to develop a community safety strategy for the area to reduce crime and anti social behaviour permanently. We believe that this should include increased police patrols and diversionary activities for local young peope to keep them out of trouble.

The meeting was a victory for our campaign but we will monitor closely the implementation of the promises given today.

After the meeting I interviewed Councillor Lynne Allen, who has played such an important and powerful role in our campaign.

submitted by John on 06 Oct 2008 at 20:46