Redfern squatters evicted

The search for a new home has begun for a group of young people squatting at a property in Redfern, which they were evicted from on the grounds of trespassing.

After moving into the empty public building around a month ago, their case against the City of Sydney’s attempt to force them out was dismissed in a court hearing last Friday, when the Council ordered the squatters to leave by noon the same day.

“It was unreasonable for them to ask us to leave within two hours because there are a lot of people in this house and we have a lot of stuff with us,” said Thomas Lalevee, one of the squatters.

The 24 year old moved there because he couldn’t afford to pay rent, an experience mirrored by his ten housemates – the majority of whom are university students.

The group filed a court order to prevent the council from physically throwing them out, but the council responded by taking legal action, enabling them to override the claim and do exactly this.

The police granted the squatters a few extra days to move out.

Lawyer William Beattie assisted the residents pro-bono. They were originally expected in court on the 15th of December, but Council pushed an urgent request last Wednesday. He believes the outcome might have been different if they’d had more time.

“The Council managed to get the judge to see them at three pm and I got notice around noon that day…so it was very rushed,” he said.

One reason for the rush was the Council worried about the safety of the building.

“The Redfern building has no electricity or water and does not meet current fire safety standards,” a City of Sydney spokesperson said.

Colin James is a senior lecturer in architecture who argues these safety issues are easy to fix, as has been proven in the past with squatters in Newtown.

“They had the same problem, they City Council said they had a fire problem, but that was sorted out very easily…” Mr James said.

The Council wanted the Redfern building vacated because of their plans to turn it into a temporary housing centre for homeless youth, but William Beattie doubts the legitimacy of these claims.

“There’s some suspicion that the council’s agenda is quite different – it’s masking capital development of a building using public funds and using the face of homelessness to actually eject quite a large sum of public money into capitalisation and development of one of its assets,” Mr Beattie says.

Their team had access to a memo from the Council to the Property Industry Foundation, revealing plans to take the building down a different path, after using it as a youth centre for five years.

A spokesperson maintains the Council has a right to decide what happens to a building in its ownership.

“It’s an ongoing arrangement, the council is leasing the building out to the Property Industry Foundation, who will be sub-leasing it to the Salvation Army,” the spokesperson said.

“We have submitted a proposal and are waiting on official confirmation [from the Council] that it’s been approved,” said Paul Moulds, Director of Oasis in The Salvation Army.

Thomas finds it unfair that the Council has targeted this building for their plans, especially since the squatters have been serving people free coffee and food that has been thrown away by supermarkets.

“It felt quite ironic that the council has plans to build a homeless youth centre, which is in itself a good idea, but to be throwing ten people out to do that, as well as closing down a community space, doesn’t seem like a very sensible way of going about things,” he says

Sue Cripps, CEO of Homelessness NSW, says the most recent census reveals thousands of empty buildings, which the government should use to create safe, affordable housing that tackles the growing crisis in Australia.

“Clearly some of those are people who are overseas, on holiday, whatever, but it is understood that a significant number of those properties are long term vacant assets just sitting there,” Ms Cripps says.

The Council agrees there’s an urgent need for quality cheap housing, but says that illegal squatting is not the solution.

By Melissa Lahoud