Developers have offered homeowners financial support to buy elsewhere, but many do not want to leave the properties they’ve called home for decades
The few residents still living in an iconic brutalist estate in South East London marked for redevelopment have called developers “pure evil” for trying to displace them. Developer Peabody has said it is trying to keep the “strong community” of South Thamesmead together by offering residents financial support to buy new homes in the area.
Plans to demolish the Lesnes Estate in Thamesmead and replace it with 1,950 new homes were approved by Bexley Council in 2022. Since plans to redevelop the 1960s estate—made famous for featuring in the 1971 film A Clockwork Orange—were approved, most of its residents have found accommodation elsewhere.
Residents and campaigners who remain on the estate appealed to the former Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government Angela Rayner to call in the planning application and overturn its approval. However, officials on behalf of the housing ministry declined to call in the application last month.
It is thought that there are still between 80 and 100 households living in Lesnes which is made up of nearly 600 properties. A handful of these are currently in negotiations with Peabody about moving, but several families are refusing to leave the estate that now feels like a ghost town, full of dilapidated and boarded up homes.
Those that remain are unwilling to uproot themselves from the estate they call home and from the properties they purchased several years ago. Rose Asenguah has lived in her house for 18 years. “It’s been home to me,” she said. “I love it. I feel comfortable and happy here.”
During the nearly two decades she has lived in Lesnes with her husband Matthew, she has watched their three children grow up and be part of a vibrant and friendly community on the estate that is slowly crumbling. She recently turned 69 and she fears that she won’t be able to secure a mortgage at her age if she has to vacate her home.
‘You can’t just come into people’s homes and say you want them’
Rose said she will go “to the ends of the earth” to remain at her house, even threatening to bring her case before the United Nations and the European Court of Human Rights. She said: “I don’t think that Bexley and Peabody have a right to sell my house, to sell the land without my permission. That’s tantamount to stealing, to trespassing. This is England. You can’t just come into people’s homes and say you want them.
“They want to be making money for themselves, making us poorer and less healthy to die so that they can reign over our property and our land. I’m not going to have it. This is pure evil.”
In response to the criticism of Bexley Council, a council spokesperson said: “The council acknowledges the depth of feeling expressed by longstanding residents however the regeneration is being delivered by Peabody and is not directly managed by the council.”
Matthew added: “I don’t have any contract with Peabody. For my property, a freehold property, I don’t have to beg Peabody for anything. We have to go to court to sort it out. It’s as simple as that.”
Rose has also been critical of Rayner and the current Labour government for not helping them overturn Bexley’s decision to approve the application. She said: “The government is part and parcel of this, aiding and abetting crime. This to me is criminal. If the people that should protect us now shoot us, now turn their guns, now oppress us, now put their knees on our neck, where do we go to?”
She viewed the new properties springing up all across Thamesmead as “investment properties” being sold “at the expense of hardworking Londoners” and she, alongside her fellow Lesnes residents, felt as if there is still life to be lived in all the vacant properties across the estate.
Jeffrey Woodward has lived on the Lesnes Estate for 40 years and he shared this view, believing that all the vacant properties could be used to house people on the social housing register.
When 79-year-old Jeffrey first moved to Lesnes he was renting his home, but in 2004 he and his wife decided to purchase the property from the council. They did this when Jeffrey received a lump sum from his employers after the factory he worked in was shut down.
‘I bought this house not for profit or gain. I bought it for life’
There are currently eight people living in the Woodward household. Jeffrey, his wife, their three children and three grandchildren. When he first heard about Peabody’s plans to move them out, he was not pleased as he feared that neither him nor his children would be able to secure a mortgage and find a new home.
He said: “I bought this house not for profit or gain. I bought it for life. Peabody suddenly comes and says we’re going to take it off and we’re going to give you money or we can offer you a place.”
Jeffrey doesn’t want to take up Peabody’s offer for a new home because he feels as if he will be beholden to them for the rest of his life, whereas he currently owns his own home and the land on which it stands. He also feels that the new homes offered “aren’t fit for purpose” for him and his family as there are too many of them to fit into one home.
Jeffrey said: “I am extremely angry, and I’m more angry because I’m not getting any word back from them [Peabody]. My anger seems to grow because there’s nothing happening for us people who are not in a position to accept a new house.”
When asked what he and his family were planning to do, Jeffrey said: “I don’t know. I’ve got nothing. I’ve got no options to consider.
“It doesn’t have to happen. You don’t have to make me homeless. You don’t have to take what I’ve paid money for. In this life not everything stands still. You will always have changes, but some consideration should be given to people like us.”
Developer offering ‘strong package of financial support’
Peabody has said that they have given Lesnes residents this due consideration, offering them financial support to buy another home nearby or elsewhere before Lesnes Estate is demolished.
A Peabody spokesperson said: “The South Thamesmead community is strong, and we want to keep it that way. While Lesnes Estate residents will need to move from their current home, there’s no need for them to leave South Thamesmead, unless they want to.
“We have provided resident homeowners with different options to move to a home close by. Each option is backed up by a strong package of financial support. Resident homeowners have the chance either to buy a 1960s home like theirs on the neighbouring estate, a new home in the brand-new development, or another home in Thamesmead – or elsewhere – if that’s what they choose.”
Peabody is offering Lesnes residents the market value of their home plus 10 per cent as compensation. The developer is also willing to bridge potential price gaps between current and new homes by contributing up to half of the equity.
The spokesperson continued: “For example, someone selling their home on the Lesnes Estate for £275,000 could potentially buy a brand-new home for £600,000. They will still own 100% of the home. We don’t charge any interest or fee for our share, and we only get the share back when the home is sold.
“If resident homeowners prefer to buy another home in Thamesmead – or elsewhere – then we can provide them with an equity share of up to 35%. The same terms apply.”
Peabody also thinks the redevelopment of Lesnes will benefit the entire Thamesmead community as the 596 homes demolished will make way for 1,950 new ones, a near 230 per cent increase in available housing. The developer also thinks that many in Thamesmead back their plans to regenerate the area.
A ballot carried out in 2020 by Peabody stated that 70.2 per cent of residents on the Lesnes Estate wanted it to be included in the housing association’s wider plans for South Thamesmead, with 65.4 per cent of residents taking part in the ballot.
The spokesperson added: “The regeneration of the Lesnes Estate aims to benefit the whole community – economically, environmentally and socially. It was supported by the majority of local people. Most residents have already moved home, and we will continue to buy back homes from those who remain, compensate them, and help them find another suitable home close by or somewhere else if they want.”
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