Tonight Programme, 8pm, ITV : Govt/housing regeneration stuff. Watch it.

chucknorris

PasturesNew wrote: »

Sealed envelopes.
I'll do a precis, it goes to the highest sealed bidder.
Deadline: 19:50

How about a portion of chicken and king prawn medium curry with special fried rice which I am cooking tonight (my wife can't eat spicy food but I like it so much she doesn't mind having pizza). It's made with madras but only medium spicy because I dilute it with coconut cream (as I like lots of liquid in the curry to mop up with the pashwari nann bread)

nearlynew

I'll have to change what I said in post #20

I don't have to buy the bread now.

PasturesNew

nearlynew wrote: »

I'll pay your grocery bill for the week.

( By the way how much is a large silced loaf and 2 tins of beans)?.

Ah, but I get to choose WHICH week. How about Xmas with the family... that'd cost about £75, but then there's the booze and chocolate bill ... and nibbles etc. I do love the liqueur chocolate barrels you can get from Lidl, they're in pouch bags.... normally I'd get 3 of those, but if you're paying, well... make that 3 boxes... I can stock up.

PasturesNew

chucknorris wrote: »

How about a portion of chicken and king prawn medium curry with special fried rice which I am cooking tonight (my wife can't eat spicy food but I like it so much she doesn't mind having pizza). It's made with madras but only medium spicy because I dilute it with coconut cream (as I like lots of liquid in the curry to mop up with the pashwari nann bread)

Chicken off the bone, no prawns .. hot as you like.
Oh - can you chuck in some bombay spuds too?

chucknorris

PasturesNew wrote: »

Chicken off the bone, no prawns .. hot as you like.
Oh - can you chuck in some bombay spuds too?

Well actually this weekend I am going over to Redhill to the local chinese supermarket as I want to buy some chinese curry which I much prefer to the indian style, so the influence will change from indian to chinese after tonight.

PasturesNew

chucknorris wrote: »

Well actually this weekend I am going over to Redhill to the local chinese supermarket as I want to buy some chinese curry which I much prefer to the indian style, so the influence will change from indian to chinese after tonight.

I've never been in a chinese supermarket. It's on the list of things I would like to do, but I know I'd get information overload and not be able to see the wood for the trees. I really need to be taken to one the first time and have everything explained to me.

It's the speshulness

carolt

PasturesNew wrote: »

I've never been in a chinese supermarket. It's on the list of things I would like to do, but I know I'd get information overload and not be able to see the wood for the trees. I really need to be taken to one the first time and have everything explained to me.

It's the speshulness

Not helped by the fact that all the trees are labelled in Chinese.

PasturesNew

Precis - no whinging it's as hard to read as it would be to watch!

The battle against the bulldozer.
Opening scene was Salford: Evicting people and saying they will remove the door and carry people out of their homes
Cut to random teasers:
"houses set on fire, garages set on fire, you're just waiting for it to be you"
"The Council's boarded up properties and vandals have got in."
"Children had to leave their friends and areas where they were brought up"

Presenter: It is a controversy few have noticed - the destruction of thousands of British homes all in the name of improvement.
Streets like these (red terraces) are part of our national heritage.
Councils want to bulldoze them to regenerate the areas.
People were angry, they wanted to stay and thought their communities were being destoryed.
So now the show is back to see if the people are still angry.

Pathfinder Scheme - to demolish or upgrade vast swathes of property.
59,000 have been refurbished, but 50,000 will be demolished by the end.
It will cost over £2 billion, money the Govt said was vital in run down areas.
They want to see and end to the rows of boarded up houses and have places that people are happy to live in and proud to live in .. a chance for those communities to turn themselves around.
Programme went to see how wisely our money has been spent on the project so far.
Pathfinder is in: North/Midlands, Liverpool, Salford, North East
Bailiff at a door (of Guy Griffiths): "If you refuse to do so then we will remove the door and carry you out if needs be"
Guy Griffiths was the last man - in the end he was forcibly evicted (they showed this).
They were building on a nearby school and sports field
Guy got £36,500 compensation for a 3-bed home, but a 1-bed on the new development would cost him 3x that amount.
"It's not going to buy me a house is it, it's not going to buy me a house in this area"
Council say they have offered him the market value of his home,
On top of that, he was offered an extra grant of £25k, but that still left him short of a similar house.
The sports centre that was going to be built on, along with his house, is still fenced off and not been built on.
New properties have been built in some of the area they were clearing.
23 out of 109 are housing association.
"Only 2 were sold last year, so it's hardly been a raving success"
Cllr John Merry, Salford: "Frustrated about it, this has got to be an improvement on what we had before ... it's going to be better... when we started this build we were at a time when people were demanding houses ... problem obtaining mortgages ... temporarily..."
Approaching 80% of the properties being disposed of and sure that final 20% with help from the Govt schemes.
123/177 are now sold, with another 10 reserved
Council promised to turn it into a hub with medical facilities and a library - neither have been built
Guy lives round the corner from his old house now, but the house he is now in will be demolished soon too.
He wants to move out of the area, but the Council won't give him the help he needds. The Council has the power to give him help to move anywhere in the country, but the Council say he has to stay in Salford to get the money.
He thinks they want to go to the Govt and say "look how many people we've housed and helped to stay here"
Cllr wants him to stay in Salford.

Some people have questioned the way they did it
Prof Anne Power - "blunt tool to fix the problem. It slows down the progress of projects that would have happened if it weren't for Pathfinder and it accelerates people selling up, shops shutting."
20 miles away, Darwin, Blackburn
For 16 years 13 Sunnybank Street was Pauline Molden's home. She moved out as it was to be demolished. She was given compensation and now lives round the corner from her old one.
She is now financially in a far worse position than she was, mortgage has doubled. Bills are higher. She is a lot worse off.
She has the mortgage for another 23 years, it was 9 years previously.
Children are suffering, house is too cold and they can't afford to have the heating on or remedy the situation. Children had to leave their friends.
Council said there was low demand for the old houses and nobody wanted them
Since moving into their new house, they have had damage to the house and to the car, children get harrassed when they go out.
The Authorities have pointed out that under Pathfinder, more are set to be refubished than demolished.
Strategy is to refurbish where it is: "Feasible and produce the best outcome for the community"
It would make better sense if they concentrated on improvement rather than demolition
Liverpool, 20,000 houses in Pathfinder
Council said they were "unsuitable for replacement".
The Welsh Streets are 450 houses due to be knocked down, includng the one Ringo Starr grew up in.
Four years ago, the programme sent in designer Julia Kendall and builder Jim Foley to renovate it, make it fit to live in.
They did it - 19th dentury house with 21st century spec. Refurbishment cost £24k - less than the demolition cost and a lot less than building a new one.
Back in 2005 Carmen Mubery, in her late 70s had been living in the street since she was 18 and had to move out after a fall.
She had written to try to plead to keep their house, they wrote, she tried to speak at the council meeting, but she didn't know you had to put your name down to ask a question.
She is now in a sheltered housing bungalow as she had a fall.
She has photos of her old house up on the wall. Her old house stril hasn't been demolished. She had to get rid of all her furniture in the move.
Govt says 70% of residents were in favour of demolition. Four years ago the presenter had no problem finding people that wanted out.
"It's gone, the area's gone down so much in the past 15-20 years, before that it was OK to live here."
"I like the house as a family home, but I'd like something better"
Mary Huxham has new accommodation, she's in a new house. She's very proud of her new place. "It is so much better, no damp, no walls falling down around me and it's peaceful"
Presenter asked her "How does it compare to where you were before? It had a community feel"
MH said: "The community is stil here, we're all neighbours from the same streets, we stipulated that we wanted the neighbourhood kept together"
Presenter asked MH: "Heritage types say we must preserve this, it's our heritage, 200 years time do you think they'll be saying this?"
Mary: "I don't see why not, they are built to last."
Featherstone wakefield
One estate got a Pathfinder grant to improve it, but the Council decided to demolish them instead of doing them up.
Gurnhead Estate has just been left to rot, it's a disaster.
Resident said: "cars set on fire, garages set on fire, sheds set on fire, you just wait for it to be you. The latest sport is to set one house on fire, then when the fire brigade come, set another on fire."
The Council described this place as a slum, but the view over open fields from the road is incredible. People that lived here all their lives can't afford the new houses.
The estate has a nickname: Beirut of the North
Roy Bickerton , Mayor
"People were breaking in to rip everything out like the copper"
Presenter: "Resident says it's run down because the Council haven't done enough to keep it going, but because the Council don't want to keep it that way it's gone down"
Andy Wallhead, Wakefield Council: "conditions on that estate have always been poor"
Prsenter: "People say they had nice houses and a lovely community, are you taking responsibility for that?"
Andy: "We take responsibility for the state that we are moving it forward. Some have been upgraded, we expect all our people to be able to live in first class housing"
Presenter: "You don't have to live there"
Andy: "Of course I have sympathy with them ... and I do want to help them"
Prsenter: "Thing that really gets to people is it's a beautiful area and you're kind of engineering a situation where they're got rid of because they're not very rich and in come the middle class who can afford to buy the new houses they are building."
Andy: The developer is willing to talk to people so they can stay on the estate
Adrian lives on the estate and fears he will receive only a fraction of the money the developers will make from it and he'll have to go into the Shared Ownership scheme to afford a new one
With new houses costing at least £150k each, his plot will take three, so they're making £450k from his house/garden.
He has a little girl, he has a house he owns completely, he's trapped. He will accept enough money to go and buy himself a new semi detached house, £120k
His house is on Girnhill Lane
There is a lot of misinformation flying around,
Man at the council said: Of 174 residents, there are only 9 left, we are paying typicaly £110-115k, on top of which we are paying a number of allowances that takes it up to £130-140k
Adrian said it's news to him and he's allowing the Council to value his home

Pathfinder is a 15 year project, just 7 years in, transitional problems
Vast majority of those have benefitted, that's little help for those that have suffered

PasturesNew

Real precis: Pathfinder, it's !!!!!!.

treliac

There you are none of you needed to watch it at all. A better job has been done on the board.

Bl***y h*ll Pastures. How d'you do it.