A protest march in London's fashionable Shoreditch area turned nasty when the windows of a Marsh & Parsons estate agency branch were broken over the weekend.
The anti-gentrification march began as a street party in protest against unaffordable housing; similar protests have been held in others parts of London in recent months.
The office windows were broken and a controversial breakfast restaurant called Cereal Killer - where a bowl of cornflakes reportedly costs £3.20p - was attacked. A shop window mannequin from another store was set alight.
The event was organised by a group called 'F*** Protest'.
A statement on the group’s website reads: “We don’t want luxury flats that no one can afford, we want genuinely affordable housing. We don’t want pop-up gin bars or brioche buns – we want community...London is our home and worth defending against this onslaught of dog-eat-dog economics. Working class people are being forced out of our homes but we won’t go out without a fight.”
Meanwhile in Leighton Buzzard a branch of Connells appears to have been targeted by a protester whose grainy image was caught on CCTV.
Serveral windows were damaged on the office early on the morning of August 10 - police have now asked for information from anyone who saw the alleged incident at Connells' Cumbria House office at 6am that day.
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There are polarised viewpoints here and the one which has been in the ascendancy for several years now, clearly, is not working as it should. Isn't it time to consider alternatives?
Yep. Whilst I don't condone the violence or unrest caused, there are a lot of people who are very upset about the continuing gentrification (at a very rapid rate) of much of London and the social cleansing this is causing. People on low and even middle incomes can no longer afford to live in the capital, dominated as it is by rich investors from Russia, the Middle East, Africa and the US.
The hipster duo with the terrible sounding cereal cafe - seriously, who goes to a cafe for cereal? - do seem to have been scapegoated in all this and there is no excuse for attacking their property, despite the understandable anger.
Still, as you say, this anger needs to be dealt with. Because it is not just going to magically disappear.
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