Morning Lane People’s Space is a campaign for our local Hackney community voice to be heard in the development of the 55 Morning Lane Tesco site in Hackney Central. We launched in February 2020.
We are calling for our Council to put people before profit, to design and develop the site to meet the needs of our borough’s residents. Two years ago, Hackney Council committed to co-designing the development with us, but they have failed to start this process and have not even proposed how they plan to do it.
In this manifesto we set out our demands for the site, for the co-design process and for development in Hackney in general. These demands are based on our surveys of thousands of residents, and our discussions outside Tesco, in public meetings and online. In contrast to Council consultations, we use open questions, go to places where people are to collect data, report on collective priorities not just individual responses, and feed back results in a range of ways via leaflets, online communication, and public meetings.
OUR DEMANDS FOR THE TESCO SITE IN HACKNEY CENTRAL
Make the case for change: The big Tesco and car park are well used. We want to see our Council building on the site. But it would be better to leave it as it is than to reduce the size of the supermarket, build tower blocks, and gentrify the area. Hackney Council must make the case for change, through open dialogue and by proposing something that improves our lives.
Any housing built on the site should be a minimum of 50% council homes at social rent: In Hackney, thousands of families live in temporary accommodation and thousands more are forced into the expensive private rental sector. From 2010 to 2022, Hackney Council built just 464 social-rent council homes in the borough. During that same 12 year period, they sold 895 through Right To Buy. This development must prioritise cheap public homes.
Keep a supermarket of the same size as the current Tesco on the site: As well as cheap housing, we need cheap shops, and ones with long opening hours and a big product range.
OUR DEMANDS FOR THE CO-DESIGN PROCESS
Be open and transparent: The previous deals that Hackney Council made are secrets. Even if the Council feel bound by commercial confidentiality, they must speak about what happened and why mistakes were made, and they must be 100% transparent about everything that happens from now on.
Trust Hackney residents and make decisions with us: Repeatedly, residents have shown greater capacity to predict what will work for Hackney than elected councillors and unelected council officers, as is painfully evident in the boarded-up Fashion Hub just down the road from 55 Morning Lane. For co-design to work, Hackney Council must give up power, including decision-making power, and put their resources at the disposal of communities.
Share knowledge: Hackney residents have a vast knowledge to share with our Council. Hackney Council must also share their knowledge with us – on planning policy, financial viability, housing density, the financing and ongoing cost of and returns from public housing, and everything else we need to be full partners in the design process.
OUR DEMANDS FOR PLANNING AND DEVELOPMENT IN HACKNEY BEYOND THE TESCO SITE
Use the findings and methods of our campaign to guide planning policy: Our consultation shows that there are three community priorities for 55 Morning Lane – cheapness, localness and spaciousness. Council officers have told us that they recognise these as concerns across our borough, so they must put these into their planning policies.
Embed co-design within the council’s work: The development on the Tesco site is not the only one that can benefit from the knowledge, skills and wisdom of Hackney residents. The Council should replace their tokenistic and biassed consultations with co-design putting people’s lives at the centre of any changes in our borough. Let’s make 55 Morning Lane a model for a new way of working in Hackney and set an example for other boroughs to emulate.
Have more ambitious policies for building public housing: Between 2005 and 2015, 30,000 council homes across 50 estates in London were part of ‘regeneration’ projects. These projects increased the amount of private housing on the estates by 900% and decreased the amount of council housing by 27%. Hackney Council has to show the political will of councils like Wandsworth that are using borrowing to build 100% council homes on public land. Together we can find alternative methods of financing the homes we need.
morninglanepeoplesspace.org 