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Locks and bars are no answer
• THE discussion in the New Journal of gardens on Camden housing estates has done some good (Gardener demands new rules be pruned back, May 25).
The rules are being redrafted. However it never rains but it pours! Attached to a lamppost outside Hinchinbrook House on the Mortimer Estate is a notice from the council that reads: “Erecting of a 2.2 metre metal fence on the north elevation around garden and installation of a door entry system.”
Put in plain English that means a horrific six-foot fence around the garden and locked and barred general entrance to the house. The present attractive 53-year-old open access will be replaced by what looks like a prison compound.
Why? From time to time half a dozen teenagers descend on our staircase and sit there smoking and talking – that’s all. But they can be extremely rude to anyone who questions their presence.
It is an all too familiar story. But they are not a security problem – they are a human problem – and the answer cannot be locks and bars.
But it is not the young who are being penalised – it is the eight tenants of Hinchinbrook House. This is a test of the accountability of the new Camden Council. An arbitrary decision has been taken by one official in the Town Hall who is apparently not answerable to anybody!
Can we have two clear decisions?
(1) To scrub the new ‘security’ scheme proposed for Hinchinbrook House.
(2) To make a proper study of what needs to be done for the young people of Camden who have nowhere to go and nothing to do.
Camden is made up of some 15 urban villages from Holborn to Highgate, from King’s Cross to Kilburn. We need at least 15 full-time youth workers. Can we get our priorities sorted out?
PETER CADOGAN
Hinchinbrook House
Greville Road, NW6
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