London Housing & Health meeting (in-person)

Medact’s EJ Housing & Health Group is organising to improve policies for better access to secure and sustainable housing. This includes working alongside local groups to support local campaigns, as well as demanding policy change on a national level for better support for social housing, community-owned housing stock and protections for renters.

Last month, Medact members joined tenants from across the country with the Healthy Homes Coalition at a lively protest outside the so-called Affordable Housing Awards in Old Trafford on Friday 17 November – a grotesque, self-congratulatory awards ceremony for landlords whose neglect is putting tenants’ health at risk. 

Over the past few weeks Medact members in the London Housing and Health Group have been supporting a group of tenants in east London that reported suffering from health problems as a result of their housing conditions. After a session facilitated by the local tenants association and Medact, tenants decided to come together to campaign against their landlord to force them to carry out the necessary disrepairs. It has been a pleasure working with Fatima, one of the tenants, and Channel 4 to tell their story and how they are fighting back.

Meet other Medact members and health workers interested in our Housing & Health work, hear about our ongoing campaign and organising work and find out about how to get involved!

The meeting will be followed by a social in Dalston. Come join us!

[Registration has now closed]

You will be hearing from the members involved in our Housing and Health campaign, get updates on our local organising work in Harrow, news on our work with the Homes for Us coalition, and help us develop our next steps and identify other potential campaigns in London. 

You don’t have to be a regular member of the EJ&H group or a health worker to get involved, everyone is welcome!If you’re unable to attend any of the meetings but keen to get involved or develop a local campaign you can contact Jordi: [email protected]

Background

The housing system in the UK is broken. Currently, 1.6 million households are on social housing waiting lists and millions more are struggling to meet unaffordable rents in the private sector.  One in five dwellings in England fail to meet decent standards for living, with disregard for basic health and safety measures all too common. Housing is not equitably distributed in the UK: poorer households, ethnic minority groups, the elderly and adults with disabilities are all more likely to live in low-quality, unsafe, insecure housing. Despite all of this, social and private rents are growing faster than the cost of living. Social housing stock is dwindling, yet there are around five times more empty homes in the country than households in need of housing.

As part of the health community, we see and care for the symptoms of an unjust economic system. We are united in struggle with friends and colleagues within and beyond the NHS in organising to end housing-related health inequalities. You can read more in our booklet The Public Health Case for Secure Housing