HOUSING ASSOCIATIONS

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The Abbeyfield Society

The Abbeyfield Society provides housing for socially isolated people. In 1953 Richard Carr-Gomm (1922-2008) was travelling back across Europe after having served for two years in Egypt as an officer in the Coldstream Guards.¹ In Italy he chose to travel in the guise of a tramp. He became aware of the loneliness that he felt because of the way in which people he encountered treated him. While passing through Turin he came across the Little House of Providence (Cottolengo), an 8000-person community that had been established by the St Joseph Benedict Cottolengo in 1827. This prompted him to start thinking about how socially isolated people were treated in Britain. A weekend retreat in a monastery in Dorset made him believe that he should do something. His thoughts were finally crystallised by a period he spent as on officer on guard at Buckingham Palace. This gave him the right to invite a guest of his choosing to a meal at St James's Palace. He chose the American evangelist Billy Graham, who in turn invited him to a religious rally that was being held at Harringay Stadium.

In 1955 he left the Army took a bedsitter in Abbeyfield Road, Bermondsey, where his family-owned property, and bought a house (No. 50 Eugenia Road) using his 250 Army gratuity as the deposit. He did this up with the help of volunteers, becoming known as the scrubbing major in the process. Carr-Gomm was a committed Anglican and the house hosted prayer meetings. The experiment in social living proved a success and soon other houses were acquired. The organisation grew and was turned into a charity, taking the name Abbeyfield in 1957 from the road that contained the building were the organisers were meeting.

A structure of having the local Abbeyfield Societies operate autonomously was established. The movement spread rapidly across, its growth aided by the work of Tommy Frankland. Carr-Gomm became concerned about the lack of the spiritual dimension in many of the organisations homes and that many of them seemed to be operating as just boarding houses. By 1963 the charity had 180 properties. The same year, the charity's founder was ousted from the charity's central committee. He continued to address the issue of loneliness by founding first the Carr-Gomm Society (founded 1964) and then the Morpeth Society (founded 1972). In the 1970s he and Abbeyfield were reconciled to one another.

In 2008 Abbeyfield had over 700 properties.

Location: 50 Eugenia Road, SE16 2RU

Website: www.abbeyfield.com

¹. His great-great-uncle was Field Marshal Sir William Carr-Gomm (1784-1875).

Central & Cecil Housing Trust

In 2021 it was reported the Central & Cecil Housing Trust was merging with Aster Group.

Website: www.ccht.org.uk www.aster.co.uk

Clarion Housing Group

The Circle 33 Housing Association was founded the architects David Bernstein (1937-2018) and David Levitt and their wives. Using a grant from Shelter, it mostly converted existing buildings into social housing. In 2016 it merged with Affinity Sutton.

In 2018 Clarion Housing came into being.

Website: www.clarionhg.com

L&Q Group

Nicholas Stacey (1927-2017) served as an officer in the Royal Navy in the Far East during the Second World War. Following its end, he founded himself being required to participate in a station's sports day. As he was hungover at the time, he was not inclined to do so and asked to be put down for whatever event would take the shortest time. This was the sprint. It became apparent that he had a natural talent for the event. He went on to run in the 200m heats at the Helsinki Olympics.

While still a naval officer, Stacey visited Hiroshima two months after the atom bomb had been dropped over the city. The experience set him on a course whereby he was ordained to be an Anglican priest in 1953. He found himself to be aligned to the South Bank Religion that was developed by Mervyn Stockwood, the Bishop of Southwark. In 1960 Stacey was appointed to be the Rector of Woolwich. There, he became concerned about the homelessness that he witnessed. In 1963 he hosted a fund-raising event at Quaglino s. He ended the evening with 64. With this as starting capital he set up the Quadrant Housing Association of which he was the first chief executive. It paid 3500 for No. 2 Wrottesley Road, Woolwich. The first tenant was a Mrs Cobb.

In 1968 stepped down from the parochial ministry. He went on to be the Director of Social Services first for Ealing and then Kent. By the time of his death in 2017 London & Quadrant was managing over 90,000 homes in London. No. 2 was then providing accommodation for young single mothers and their babies.

Website: www.lqgroup.org.uk

Notting Hill Genesis

In 1957 the Conservative government relaxed rent controls. This led to massive overcrowding in districts such as North Kensington, which was exploited by slum landlords such as Peter Rachman.

The Rev Bruce Kenrick became concerned at the social consequences of the poor housing. The Conservative-dominated local council was unwilling to address the issue. Therefore, the Presbyterian clergyman decided to take practical action. He bought a house in Blenheim Crescent in 1962 and the following year founded The Notting Hill Housing Trust. The organisation s first means of raising funds was a stall in Portobello Market. An advertisement that was placed in The Guardian newspaper generated 20,000. Housing professionals were hired. During its first year of operation the Trust bought five houses and rehoused 57 people, in its second year it purchased seventeen properties. Within five years a thousand people had new homes.

Kenrick recruited John Coward (d.2014), who previously had been a deputy housing manager at Richmond Council. In 1965 Coward became the Trust's leader. A report on housing, that was authored by Sir Milner Holland, turned public opinion strongly in favour of organisations such as the Trust. However, the organisation's board was unwilling to allow it to become a national body. Therefore, in 1966 Kenrick founded Shelter as a separate entity from the Trust. In 1967 the government introduced legislation that furnished finance for housing associations. That year a survey revealed that Notting Hill had twice the population density of the rest of the Borough of Kensington.

The bipartisan Housing Act of 1974 furnished public funding for housing associations to build affordable housing, something that many local councils no longer had the flexibility to do. Coward helped shape the measure. Massive growth in the community housing sector followed.

In 2014 the Trust owned 25,000 houses.

Location: 115 Blenheim Crescent, W11 2EQ (blue, red)

Website: www.nhg.org.uk

Octavia Housing

F.D. Maurice (1805-1872) was the Preacher at Lincoln's Inn. Octavia Hill went to hear him preach.

Ruskin employed Hill to copy works of art.

In the 1850s involved in the campaign to allow married women to have property rights.

Hill argued that you could not separate the lives of the poor from their homes. She believed in refurbishing existing homes rather than relocating people to purpose-built homes in other districts.

With Ruskin's financial backing Hill developed Paradise Place - known as Little Hell - in Marylebone as housing for the poor. He charged her 5% interest. Not because he wanted the money. It was so that further finance could be raised.

In 1872 she was offered a position as the government inspector for workhouse pauper children. Had she taken it up she would have become the first woman civil servant. She passed it on to someone else.

She and Ruskin fell out with one another after he printed something that criticised her. Subsequently, she raised a large sum of money to buy Swiss Cottage Fields (now Fitzjohn Avenue). The vendors changed the terms so that the sale could not be completed. In 1877 she had a major breakdown.

A Royal Commission on Housing was established. Gladstone wanted her to sit on it, if she had done so she would have been the first person to sit on such a body. The Home Secretary was opposed to her doing so.

Hill secured Parliament Fields and Highgate Woods.

The politics of social reform was changing by the 1880s. Strains in Socialism and advanced Liberalism were developing new ideas. She was no longer cutting-edge.

Swiss Cottage Fields made her appreciate that she both needed to work with others and establish a new way for doing so. In the National Trust she created a body with power to buy rather than seeking to raise money for individual properties. Through Ruskin she met Canon Rawnsley.

Did not believe that women should have the vote. Other women reformers shared this view.

Served on the Poor Law Royal Commission. By then her stance was quite rigid.

Location: 1a Garbutt Place, W1U 4DS. Hill's home.

Emily House 202-208 Kensal Road, W10 5BN (blue, pink)

Website: www.octaviahousing.org.uk

Origin Housing

The St Pancras House Improvement Society was founded in 1924.

The St Pancras Housing Association was founded by Irene Barclay. She had been the first woman to qualify as a chartered surveyor. (Her nephew Sir Peter Barclay (1926-2014), a City of London solicitor, chaired the Joseph Rowntree Foundation Inquiry Into Income & Wealth (1995).)

Website: www.originhousing.org.uk

The Peabody Trust

George Peabody was an American-born financier, who chose to spend most of his working life in London. During the American Civil War Peabody helped to switch Britain's support from the Confederacy to the Union. He was involved in the laying of the first transatlantic cable. He was the first American to become a freeman of the City of London.

In the mid-19^thC London experienced an acute housing crisis. At the time, housing was not viewed as being one of the responsibilities of local government. In 1862 Peabody gave 150,000 to provide housing for London's poor. Two years later the first Peabody buildings were erected at the Shoreditch end of Commercial Street. The tenements had been designed by Henry Ashley Darbishire.

Peabody is commemorated by both a stone in Westminster Abbey and a statue by the Royal Exchange. He died at No. 80 Eaton Square. At William Gladstone s insistence, his corpse was interred temporarily in the Abbey. Subsequently, it was carried back to the United States by a British battleship.

In 2008 50,000 people were living in 12,000 Peabody flats on 72 sites.

Location: Wild Street Estate, WC2B 4AW

80 Eaton Square, SW1W 9AP

Royal Exchange Avenue, EC3V 3LT. A 1869 sculpture of Peabody.

Website: www.peabody.org.uk

Soho Housing Association

Soho Housing Association was founded in the early 1970s by a group of Soho residents. In 1977 the organisation made its first purchase, a row of listed houses on Great Pulteney Street, together with the site on which John Braidwood House stands. With time, it purchased properties in parts of Inner London.

In 2023 the Association owned almost 800 homes and 37 commercial premises. Its largest individual property was Sandringham Flats on Charing Cross Road.

Location: Charing Cross Road, WC2H 0BJ (blue, white)

18 Hanway Street, W1T 1UF (purple, blue)

Website: www.sohoha.org.uk

David Backhouse 2024