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We're back at Hackney council! - where council officers are insisting that an 8 year old disabled boy and his family leave their council home of 20 years and move to temporary housing in about a fortnight. 

The boy can't cope with change, but tough luck for him, I guess. The council insists the family moves in that short time, whether the boy can adjust quickly or not. (Spoiler - he can't. He's autistic and very much relies on his routines).

The London Renters' Union will hold a protest today (Monday 9 November):

3:30pm - 6pm (come along any time during those hours)

Hackney Town Hall

Mare Street

E8 1EA

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Does Hackney council's persecution of this disabled and autistic child and his family go on and on or what. 

This Friday - 18 September - Hackney council will make ANOTHER attempt to force 8 year old Kayden and his family out of their council home and into temporary housing. 

Charity, the boy's mother, has been told that she must agree by Friday to leave the family's council home of 20 years and move into temporary housing - even though the council could let them stay.  

Charity is just too depressed and lost to make a decision about moving, let alone pack up a whole house for a move. 

Also, it feels like just about every medical and eduction specialist in Hackney has told the council that eviction from his council home will have a terrible effect on the boy's mental and emotional health. 

I started reporting on this story in February when the council first sent bailiffs via the court to evict the family. It's a mere tenancy problem which could easily be solved, but here we all still are. 

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Oh dear. 

We return to Hackney council - and the council's ongoing attempts to evict a disabled and autistic 8 year old boy and his family from their council home. 

As regular listeners will know, the council wants to evict the family and put them into temporary housing - even though the boy's medical supporters and teachers say the move will have a terrible effect on him. 

I was at a meeting about 10 days ago with the boy's teachers and a paediatric doctor. 

A council social worker at the meeting suggested that the move to temporary housing could be a good chance to see if the boy could cope with moving - because families in temporary housing are moved again and again and again. 

Kill me. Seriously.

Meanwhile, the ruling Green party is at war with its own staff. 

The Greens are apparently getting an external legal adviser in to see if the council's housing officers have behaved as they should have when dealing with this family.

Spoiler alert: they haven't. 

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My source says Yes. 

The council says nothing.

A whistleblower tells me that Newham council has a new policy and a team to forcefully moving homeless people in temporary housing into even worse temporary housing because it is cheaper. 

Families get very little notice. A council officer calls them on a burner phone and says the family has to move to the cheaper and crappier place immediately, or they'll have no housing at all. . 

My sources tell me that in the recent heatwave, one family was evicted onto the street - on a boiling hot red alert day. Councils are supposed to get people inside on those days, not push them out. 

Families I've spoken to say that the "housing" they're pushed into is filthy, has no hot water, is filled with mice and mouldy. Great 

I've asked and asked and asked the council for comment on all of this but it's all very quiet over there. Perhaps this will inspire them.  

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In series 4 of the podcast, I covered Charity's story - which was that then-Labour Hackney council was trying to evict Charity and her disabled and autistic 8 year old boy with bailiffs. 

The issue: Charity does not have a tenancy for the council home she's lived in for more than 18 years. She didn't realise her sister in law should have assigned the tenancy to Charity when the sister in law left. 

The Greens took the family's side when Labour tried to evict them before the May local elections. They even turned up to defend the family when bailiffs were due to evict them in February. 

Now, the Greens are in power - and eviction by bailiffs is planned for next week. 

Plus ça change, my friends. 

Let me say this. Elected councillors need to learn to stand up to housing officers. That's the problem. 

You get staff who've been there for years who know the law and who use every trick in the book to crush poor families as in this case. 

Then you get novice councillors elected who do not know how to play the game. 

They need to learn and fast. 

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We return to East Devon!  - where Mr T, our disabled ex-services man, continues to live in non-adapted temporary housing. 

He has to crawl to the bathroom and sleeps on a mat because there is no room for his wheelchair. Great stuff. 

East Devon council is supposed to be fixing his main home, which is a council place with such bad damp and mould that Mr T's wheelchair fell through the floorboards. 

East Devon has not been fast to respond to these issues, but we will most certainly keep on. 

And what is our great Labour government doing while disabled people continue to live like this? They're handbagging over the leadership of their moribund party. A fantastic sense of priority there. 

Don't start me. 

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This episode is a wee rant on the reasons why people upload their personal, medical and financial information into AI - people who are desperate for answers to serious housing and money problems.

Three reasons people do this: 

1) Councils and the DWP - the organisations that are meant to help people in need with housing and money - simply do not help. 

They turn homeless people away and deny people benefit money. You might as well talk to a bot. 

2) People have given up hope that their private data will be kept secure. So - might as well load it into AI. 

Councils and the DWP lose people's personal, medical and financial information all the time. Data security is a luxury that you're not getting anyway.

3) AI is polite and even enthusiastic to and about you. 

Chatgpt and google AI might steal your info, say you can get a council house when you absolutely can't and sell your data on to sociopathic private companies, but they will be incredibly friendly to you while they're at it. 

Makes a refreshing change from being treated like shite by your council and jobcentre.

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So much for disability adaptations.

In this episode, I talk with Mr T, who has been in a wheelchair since a serious traffic accident. 

East Devon is his council. His council home had very bad leaks, mould and flooding. The floorboards were so rotten that his wheelchair went through them. Great stuff from the council there.  

Anyway, the council put him in a non-adapted temporary flat where he can't turn his wheelchair around. 

Upshot is that Mr T has to drag himself down the hall to the loo which he sometimes misses. He also sleeps on the floor, because getting into his wheelchair at night for a trip to the bathroom is too hard. 

I can't tell you how pleased I am that Labour has decided to blow the rest of the year on various meaningless leadership contests, rather than sort out serious council issues like this. 

Hope they rot etc.

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In this episode, I talk to renowned benefits journalist Chaminda Jayanetti. 

We talk about this Labour government's attempt to make cuts to the personal independence payment disability support benefit last year.

In particular, we talk about the fact that the government didn't realise who the cuts would hit. 

Government happily imagined that the people affected would be people with mental health and autism conditions - you know, the so-called snowflakes that politics loves to hate. 

Actually, it was people with conditions like inflammatory arthritis and serious heart compromise who were in the firing line. 

On the back of that circus, minister for social security and disability Stephen Timms is conducting a nationwide consultation on the future of PIP as we speak. Wonder if he'll come up with anything sensible. 

We also talk about the mediafying and gentrification of mental health. Media luvvie-chat about mental health doesn't really reflect the reality of the sort of mental health problems you need to claim PIP. 

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Today, we hear from Homerton Hospital paediatric doctor Hannah Caller.

Hannah goes through the reasons why she made a safeguarding referral about the threat that Hackney council poses to an 8 year old disabled and autistic boy who Hackney council is trying to evict from his council home with his family.

And what was the first thing that the council's social services team did when they received the referral? 

They closed it down. 

Safeguarding referrals are important. Doctors and other professionals make them when they feel that a child is at serious risk. 

In this case, the boy is at serious risk of harm from the housing department at his own council. The council's social services department has a legal duty to investigate these referrals. Can't imagine why.

I've been covering the boy's story in the last few episodes. 

More soon.  

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