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TOWER
HAMLETS A Report on the Housing Crisis in one of London’s most expensive borough by Tower Hamlets Citizens
INTRODUCTION Tower Hamlets is experiencing a housing crisis. The Fairness Commission’s report, released in 2013, set the
scene for the housing situation in the borough:
A serious lack of affordable housing stock: the waiting list for social housing in Tower Hamlets is
23,500 households, and there are 1,500 households living in temporary accommodation after declaring
themselves as homeless to the council. There are not enough affordable homes being built.
A rising demand for new builds from overseas investors: the London property market is booming
thanks to investment in new developments from foreign investors. Thanks to the success of the
Olympics, the East End has become a desirable location for wealthy people across the world to invest in
a second or third home. Some new properties in Tower Hamlets are even being advertised in places like
China instead of being offered to local people.
Ballooning rents in the private sector: an ever-increasing demand for housing in the borough means
that landlords and lettings agents can charge what they like to people to live here, as there will always
be someone willing to pay more.
The Mayor of London’s ‘Affordable Rent’ Model: Boris Johnson has declared that all new social
housing built in London must charge rents at 80% of the market rate. This means that new social
housing will only be 20% cheaper than renting a home from a private landlord. For Tower Hamlets
residents this is not affordable and many families are forced into living in overcrowded conditions as a
result.
At the end of their report the Fairness Commission told us that is was ‘time to act’. Tower Hamlets Citizens has
taken this call seriously, and this report is the result of our work. In collaboration with the School of Geography
at Queen Mary University, Tower Hamlets Citizens conducted a survey of the community in a four week period
over March and April 2014. A team of 23 volunteers from the local community spoke to 324 households across
each different housing sector in the borough about their experiences and opinions on rent, landlords,
overcrowding and their living conditions. This report contains the findings of that survey. The results provide a
snapshot of the housing crisis in Tower Hamlets today and what this means for the people who live here.
We present the housing situation from the community’s point of view, not to feel sorry for ourselves or to
apportion blame, but to prompt our politicians to act. After each problem that we identify, we provide a
solution. This report contains several policy proposals for Tower Hamlets Council to consider adopting and
experimenting with in order to meet the needs of our community. These proposals have been formulated and
refined through conversations with academics, experts and our community. The time for talking has ended. The
time to act is now.
66%
A large part of our community live in private rented homes, but when surveyed 21% of private tenants told us
that they do not have a good relationship with their landlord. The main issues that people have with their
landlord are difficulties in contacting them and delays in responding to maintenance and repair requests.
One lady in Shadwell told us how she, her
husband and her nine year old daughter had
to shower in their neighbour’s bathrooms for
3 weeks whilst they waited for their landlord
to fix their broken boiler. This is unacceptable;
a broken boiler should be treated as an
emergency. Why should we put up with our lives being disrupted in this way because our landlord is too lazy to
take responsibility for his tenants’ safety?
Apart from long and unnecessary delays, we are also fed up with the quality of the jobs they do. One family,
from the Teviot Estate in Poplar, told us that when they asked their landlord to fix their broken cooker, he
replaced it with a second-hand model that had been used by another family before them. Once this oven broke
too, he told them that it was their own fault for ‘cooking too much’!
Another mum, from Bethnal Green, told us that the cupboards in her flat had not been sanded-down properly
and there were jagged edges coming off the doors. After asking her landlord to fix this, he came and painted
over the wood. But this didn’t fix the problem and her daughter ended up with splinters in her hands. Some
landlords and agents just don’t seem to care about the needs of their tenants and disregard our concerns
without a thought for our children’s safety.
But this assumes that they actually respond to our requests. 28% of respondents told us that their landlord or
lettings agent is not easy to contact when they need them to attend to maintenance or repair jobs. Tenants
have to call up their landlord several times just to get hold of them. This takes up a lot of our time, which we
could be spending on more important things, meaning we have to put our lives on hold whilst we wait for a
reply.
We spoke to a woman from the Collingwood Estate in Bethnal Green who told us that her landlord never
responds to her requests for repairs at her home. Time and again she has asked for leaks to be fixed and the
damp to be sorted out, but he refuses to help her and has threatened to evict her if she keeps on complaining.
In fact, when we asked people if their landlord or agent pays for repairs and maintenance at their home, 27% of
private tenants said no, they never do.
‘My landlord never responds, I have leaks and
damp in my house. He uses the law on me and
tells me that I’ll be evicted for making a big deal
out of nothing’
Mum of Three,
Private Tenant, Bethnal Green, 27.03.14
Agree with
the idea of
a Landlord
Register
‘My landlord took 3 weeks to fix our broken boiler, so my
husband, 9 year old daughter and I had to shower at our
neighbour’s homes for nearly a whole month’
Anonymous Resident,
Private Tenant, Shadwell, 06.03.14
LANDLORDS
Private tenants in Tower Hamlets are getting a raw deal, and we’ve had enough. We’ve had enough of quick
fixes, enough of waiting for weeks for a reply and enough of being bullied by landlords and lettings agents.
Something has to change.
But it isn’t just private tenants who are having problems getting their landlord to respond to their needs on
time; our neighbours in council homes and housing association properties also have complaints. We asked
people in all types of accommodation about the quality of the repair and maintenance jobs done by their
landlords. 65% of respondents from the private-rented sector were unhappy with the work done by their
landlord, but so were 60% of housing association tenants and 93% of council tenants.
On top of the delays, unresponsiveness and poor quality jobs as experienced by private tenants, council tenants
were particularly unhappy with the quality of their refurbishments done as part of the ‘Decent Homes’
programme in the borough. The standard of these refurbishments is shocking; people told us that their new
kitchen cabinets and bathroom tiling were coming off the wall within weeks of the work being finished, and
that the materials used are cheap and flimsy.
Some housing associations are no better. We have heard from residents who have complained about the lack
of respect shown to them by certain providers. It seems that whoever your landlord is, people across Tower
Hamlets are not getting the service they deserve.
So, What Do We Propose?
To solve the problem of unresponsive, threatening landlords and lettings agents who do not do their job
properly and treat their tenants with a lack of respect and duty, we propose that:
The council establish a register of all private landlords in Tower Hamlets and make it compulsory for all
landlords to have to apply for, and be granted, a licence before they can rent out their property in the
borough.
The council consult with the people of Tower Hamlets to write-up a code of conduct for all private
landlords to follow. If landlords fail to meet the standards set by this code, then their licence will be
removed.
The council provides adequate funding and resources to ensure that the register is implemented
properly by creating a new team or department to manage it. This team should be open to public
scrutiny by Tower Hamlets residents.
Housing associations also be required to follow the code of conduct if they wish to build homes in the
borough.
PERCENTAGE OF TENANTS WHO ARE UNHAPPY
WITH THE QUALITY OF REPAIRS AND MAINTENANCE DONE BY THEIR LANLORD
Of Private Tenants Of Council Tenants Of Housing Association Tenants
65% 93% 60%
‘The walls of this flat were black with mould
when we moved in. I think my boyfriend’s
lungs are rotting because of the damp air’
Female Student,
Private Tenant, Shadwell, 26.03.14
Tower Hamlets is riddled with damp. We asked people to rate the levels of damp in their home on a scale of 1 -
5, where 1 is the worst and 5 is the best. 65% of people gave their home a score of 3 or below. This borough is
fighting a never-ending battle against damp.
This problem is affecting our health. People told us how the damp
is causing their children to develop breathing problems and
allergies, like asthma and eczema. The moisture in our walls is a
breeding ground for bacteria and mould. As these grow they
release spores and fragments that fill the air inside our home.
Inhaling mould spores can provoke allergic reactions such as
sneezing and skin rashes, and bacteria acts as a medium for
spreading disease. When they go to bed, our children are breathing in this toxic air, which harms their lungs and
makes them ill.
Our kids have constantly got coughs and colds because of the damp and mould growing in our homes. This
harms their development and future prospects as they have to miss school too often because of illness,
meaning that they are persistently playing catch-up with their classmates. We know it’s not good for them to
miss so much class, but it is not our fault when bacteria and bugs breed best in our walls, and it is not fair that
our children are falling behind in life because of the damp at home.
We try to put an end to this aggravation, and every year we pay to have our damp painted over, but this does
not address the cause of the problem and is only a short-term fix. We are fighting a losing battle and sometimes
we have to admit defeat and abandon the rooms that have been affected the worst. Fatima from Poplar told us
how she had to move her whole family into one bedroom because the other room is covered in moisture and
mould. Her four kids now all sleep in one bedroom due to the damp.
So, on top of everything else, some of us are now paying rent for rooms that we can’t even use and life has
become just that bit harder as parents and children, brothers and sisters are forced into cramped conditions,
with little room for manoeuvre. Damp is not just a bit of moisture on the wall that can be painted over and
ignored. It is much more than that.
65%
OF HOMES ARE DAMP
DAMP
Resident’s Flat, Shadwell
So, What Do We Propose?
To fix the problem of damp and put an end to this constant worry, we propose that:
Tower Hamlets Council either charge a fine, or increase the amount of council tax to the owners
of ‘buy-to-leave’ properties in the borough, and use this money to pay for damp to be fixed in
people’s homes.
This money be made available to fix damp across all housing sectors through a means-tested
application process
Yet, whilst we make do with these short term fixes, hundreds of luxury flats and apartment blocks are being
built all across Tower Hamlets. Many of these are out of reach of most local residents, with some even
marketed abroad instead of to locals.
We are aware of new flats in Stepney and the Aberfeldy estate being advertised for sale to people in China
rather than to Tower Hamlets residents. These homes are nothing more than financial investments for their
owners and can remain uninhabited for years. It is not fair that the desires of overseas investors for a safe
deposit box for their money are being met before the needs of local people for decent and sanitary homes.
Why should brand new homes stand empty whilst we are living in these unhygienic conditions?
Damp: Fatima’s Story
My name is Fatima, I am a single Mum who lives in a two bedroom, private-rented flat in Poplar. I have lived in this
flat with my four children, aged 5 to 11, since 2011 when we first moved to Tower Hamlets. This flat has awful damp,
caused by the structural faults with the building. One bedroom has got so bad that the walls were dripping with
water and the carpet became saturated with liquid. I have had to abandon this room and move all of my kids into
our one remaining bedroom, where they all sleep. I have no space for a bed of my own, so I now sleep on the sofa in
the sitting room. I am paying £1,200 per month in rent, for what is now a one bedroom flat.
Three of my children have developed asthma since moving into this flat and now have to use an inhaler every
morning and night to control their breathing. I am in the Royal London so often because of my children’s asthma
attacks that the nurses in A&E know me by name.
I have asked my lettings agent to fix this problem on numerous occasions but he refuses to help me. He says that the
damp is my own fault and that the only way to fix it is to leave all the windows open 24 hours a day. But how can I
do this when I have four young children living here? I informed Environmental Health about the problem and the
declared the flat uninhabitable, yet still he refuses to fix it, and tells me that if I don’t like it then I can leave and find
somewhere else to live. But I cannot afford the deposit for another flat, so I am trapped here.
Each night, I lay awake like a zombie in a haze, constantly thinking about how to get out. I spend most nights
cooking, in the early hours of the morning; to try and get my mind off these worries- my neighbours think I’m mad. I
have lived in this country for four years since fleeing my home country, Eritrea, where the government was harassing
my husband. I now wonder why I did this. I must have been stupid. In Eritrea we have problems with the
government, but we do not live in conditions like this.
‘The kids have asthma and whooping cough because of the damp. They are constantly coughing at home’
Mum of Two, Housing Association Tenant, Marion Richardson School, 26.03.14
‘This is where they grew up. It’s their home and
they have a right not to be pushed out’
Linda, Private Tenant,
Denning Point, Whitechapel, 03.04.14
Almost two thirds of our community feel that new developments of housing in the borough are unaffordable to
their family. Many of us feel like we are being priced out of Tower Hamlets by the high cost of rent on many of
the new apartment blocks that are springing up around the borough. Only 40% of us feel certain that we will be
living at the same address in three years’ time. The rest of us fear that we may not.
This is a tragedy for our community and for our children’s future. Just 23% of us, less than a quarter of the
population, think that our children will be able to afford to start a family in Tower Hamlets when they grow up.
New developments are not meeting local people’s needs and the high rents and a lack of affordable housing
pose a major threat to the future of our families and communities.
Our children should have the right to stay in Tower Hamlets and be able to start a family of their own in the
place they call home. Tower Hamlets is where they were born and bred, it’s where their friends live and where
their family remain. If they cannot afford to stay here when they grow up, then they face being cut-off from
their support networks and thrown-out of a community where they feel safe and comfortable. How will our
children be able to raise their own family if they are isolated from their parents and friends?
With a lack of affordable homes being built in the borough, many of us are stuck on the waiting list for social
housing. Every week people bid for a property but rarely succeed. If they do get an offer it is either too small for
their family’s needs or in a place they’ve never heard of and never dreamed of going to. Paula, from Poplar, told
us that her daughter was offered a council house in Manchester, 160 miles away from her family, her friends
and her job. She rejected the offer because she, like the rest of us, doesn’t want to leave Tower Hamlets; our
lives are here and we want to stay.
We are proud to call this borough home. It is where our parents and grandparents first put down roots all those
years ago. It is home to all of the services and facilities we need: the shops, the schools, the mosque, the church.
We love the place so much that even those of
us who have had to leave, and move out to
places like Dagenham or Islington, still travel
here each day to take our kids to school.
The community here is like no other. We look out
for one another and feel safe in each other’s
company. We are diverse but we get on well
together and respect our differences. However, people are uncertain about whether they can continue to live
here because of the rising rents.
The yearly rent increases mean that people move around a lot and cannot stay in the same place for too long.
This harms our sense of community by replacing neighbours with strangers, making us feel less safe and
supported on our street. We asked people if they would like a stronger sense of community on their street or
block and 98% of respondents said yes. We want to get to know our neighbours so we can feel less isolated,
insecure and make Tower Hamlets a friendlier place to live.
61% of Tower Hamlets residents do not think that
new developments of housing in the borough are
affordable to their household
UNAFFORDABILITY
‘A stronger community would look out for its members, it would be less lonely’
Anonymous Resident,
Council Tenant, Stepney, 24.03.14
A strong community supports each other in everyday tasks and through bigger difficulties. Good neighbours
look out for our kids, help us in from the car with our shopping and support us to take a stand against nuisance
gangs and anti-social behaviour. But if we cannot put down roots then how can be build community?
So, What Do We Propose?
To make our community even stronger and allow us to continue to call Tower Hamlets home we propose that:
Tower Hamlets Council take measures to ensuring the development of more CLT homes in the borough. This
could be done by:
Negotiating with developers to ensure that a percentage of the units on all new developments are CLT
homes, and making available plots of public land for CLTs to be developed
Yes 23%
NO 43%
UNSURE
34%
DO YOU THINK YOUR
CHILDREN WILL BE ABLE TO
START A FAMILY IN TOWER
HAMLETS WHEN THEY GROW
UP?
Community Land Trusts
By 2017, Tower Hamlets will be home to the first ever urban Community Land Trust (CLT) in the country, when 23
CLT homes are built at the St Clements site in Mile End. A CLT is a non-profit organisation that develops
permanently affordable housing for the benefit of the local community
In London, it is estimated that more than half the cost of a home is the cost of the land it is sitting on. On a CLT the
community owns that land. This means that the CLT is able to remove the value of land from the cost of the
housing and sell homes for a much lower price.
At St Clements, the cost of the homes will be set according to average wages in Tower Hamlets, meaning that a
mortgage will be no more than one third of the average local income. This will ensure that local people are no
longer priced out of the neighbourhoods they grew up in and that the homes remain affordable for generations to
come.
We asked people if their rent had increased within the last year and 67% told us that it had, with just 14% saying that it hadn’t. Rents in Tower Hamlets are going up and people are feeling the pressure. 62% of the people we surveyed revealed that they are worried about making their next rent payment. Rising rents are leading to rising levels of stress for many families in the borough.
The cause of this stress is simple. Rents are going up whilst wages are staying the same or going down. This is forcing families to cut their spending on everyday items to cope. When asked how they have coped with rent increases, 35% of renters said that they have cut back on their food shopping. Parents are buying lower quality food; replacing their usual shop with supermarket value ranges and cutting down on meat, fresh fruit & vegetables. Many of our children are going to school
hungry, or starting their day with an energy drink rather than a proper meal. Parents are facing the stark choice of paying the rent or feeding their family.
Other basics that we are going without include clothes for our children and utility bills. Many of us feel guilty that we cannot provide for our children and buy them the new clothes that they desperately need. Put simply, we are embarrassed to rely on hand-outs from friends and what we can find in charity shops.
We are also embarrassed when our kids complain that they’re cold when inside. We cannot afford to leave the heating on, so we keep them warm with jumpers, tops and extra socks. We are forever going round the house making sure lights are switched off and sockets are unplugged.
On top of these most basic of necessities, people are also having to sacrifice simple pleasures. 37% of the community have cut back on days out with their children, and 50% say that they cannot go on holiday because of the cost of their rent. Days at the park may be ‘free’, but parents have got to think about the cost of the bus, ice creams and a new football- even these are becoming unaffordable.
In addition to this, many parents told us that if their rent was lower they would spend the extra money on their children’s education, paying for tuition and laptops. The schools are encouraging our children to spend more time online, meaning these computers are a necessity, not a luxury. But we just can’t afford them at the moment.
‘Most people are being priced out of Tower Hamlets. Only single people, without kids, and with a high salary can afford to live here nowadays. I can only see this getting worse in the future’ Anonymous, Owner-Occupier, Bow, 23.03.13
HIGH RENTS
‘My 6 year old daughter is always woken up when
her older sister turns the light on as she goes to bed.
Her sleep is disturbed and she is tired every
morning’
Mum of Four,
Council Tenant, Cyril Jackson Primary School, 19.03.14
The other effect of high rents in Tower Hamlets is overcrowding. 50% of the people we spoke to do not feel that they have enough bedrooms or living space to meet the needs of their family. This means that half of the borough is living in overcrowded
conditions. Overcrowding has a major impact on our lives. We spoke to a mum at Cyril Jackson Primary School in
Limehouse who shares her 2 bedroom flat with her husband and four children. Her kids all share a bedroom,
and each night, when her oldest daughter goes to bed, her 6 year old daughter is woken up by the light being
switched on. This mum went on to say that her youngest wakes up tired every morning because her sleep has
been disturbed at night. For this little girl, overcrowding means feeling exhausted at school and having less
energy to get on with her work or play with her friends.
Another mum, Rabia from Stepney, talked about the impact of overcrowding on her kids. Four of them, girls
and boys, share a bedroom, and so each morning when they get dressed they want their brothers and sisters to
leave the room. Because of this, her youngest son gets changed in the bathroom, where people have already
been showering. This boy gets changed in the wet bathroom and starts every day with damp socks. The next
chance he gets to change them is when he gets home from school at four in the afternoon. For a small child,
having wet socks is a challenge to the day before school has even begun.
For older kids this lack of space means that there is nowhere for them to do their homework. Many parents told
us that they cannot fit a desk in their homes because they have to prioritise room for beds. This leaves children
to do their homework on the floor, on their bed or at the kitchen table. Mums and Dads are worried that their
children do not have any quiet space to concentrate on their studies, and that this will harm their grades.
On top of this, children have no space to play indoors so many of them spend hours outside with their friends.
This is fine in the summer, but in the winter it is too cold to stay out for long and teenagers face being cooped
up indoors, bored and restless.
A lack of space is not good for our personal relationships and mental health. Everyone needs a space of their
own to recharge get away from the world for a while. But high rents mean that people are living on top of each
other in cramped conditions. Based on our survey, the average number of people per bedroom in Tower
Hamlets is 1.9, compared to the London average of between 0.5 and 1.
This causes problems when brothers and sisters have to
share, as both lack the privacy that they need as they grow
older and become their own person. For adults, parents feel
that they have no space of their own in their home to be
away from their children and have some ‘me time’. We have
no space to breathe.
‘My 13 year old daughter is having to sleep
in the same room as her parents, whilst her
brothers share the other room. Everybody
lacks the privacy that they deserve’
Mum of Four,
Council Tenant, Shadwell, 26.03.14
‘The cramped conditions cause me so much stress;
I cannot relax at home, I cannot rest’
Lotifa, Council Tenant,
Burdett Estate, 09/03/14
OVERCROWDING
The lack of storage space in our homes is another issue linked to overcrowding. People explained to us how
they have no space to store household items and clothes because rooms are not built for the amount of people
living there. People are making do by stacking boxes in the living room and passage, but this makes them feel
suffocated as there is no space to move. This is making us depressed and anxious, claustrophobic in our own
homes.
Overcrowding is a result of the extortionate rents being charged for homes in Tower Hamlets. Renting in the
private sector has become virtually impossible for a large section of the local community, so we pack ourselves
in like sardines into social-rented housing or sub-let our bedrooms to strangers. The waiting list for social
housing in Tower Hamlets has over 23,000 households on it, meaning that around one fifth of the borough’s
needs for truly affordable housing are not being met.
To make this situation worse, Boris Johnson has decided that all new social housing built in London should
charge rents that are 80% of the market price. He calls these ‘affordable homes’. But these are not affordable
to us. The market price for rent in this borough has been inflated way beyond the resources of most local
people due to the high demand from wealthy professionals and investors from elsewhere.
In countries like Germany it is widely accepted that people should not have to pay more than a third of their
income on rent. In Tower Hamlets action is needed to bring our rents closer to this level. We need landlords
and housing providers to start charging a ‘Living Rent’ that is no more than a third of the average income for
our community.
So, What Do We Propose?
To relieve the pressure on our budgets and allow us to provide our families with the quality of life that they deserve; to end the tragedy of overcrowding; to give us space to live a life of dignity and comfort - we propose
that:
In the Social-Rented Sector:
Tower Hamlets Council works with housing associations and other registered social landlords to calculate the cost of a ‘living rent’ for Tower Hamlets residents.
The calculation of this cost is to be based on the principle that nobody should have to pay more than one third of their income on rent.
The Council work with social landlords to develop and promote a Living Rent Model for Tower Hamlets, by accrediting providers as ‘Living Rent Providers’.
In the Private-Rented Sector:
Tower Hamlets Council encourages private landlords to become accredited as ‘Living Rent Providers’,
which would mean that they can only increase the cost of their rent by 2% above inflation each year, and that they guarantee their tenants minimum of a 2 year tenancy.
35%
OF RENTERS HAVE CUT BACK ON
FOOD SHOPPING
33%
OF RENTERS HAVE CUT BACK ON
CHILDREN’S CLOTHES
30%
OF RENTERS HAVE CUT BACK ON
GAS & ELECTRIC BILLS
VOLUNTEER RESEARCHERS ABU JAHER | AMRIT GURON |ANASTASIA | BILAL AHMED |EMDAD RAHMAN | EDOARDO PACENTI
EDWARD SZEKERES |FARHANA CHOUDHURY |FARJANA AKHTAR|HABIBA KHATUN |HENA BEGUM
JESS WALKER | LIAM HARNEY |LYDIA SIGNORE |MAHMUDA AKHTAR |RIJAN MIAH
SHAHEDA BEGUM| SARAH BEYDOUN | SAM KAMMERLING |SANDEEP LARD
TOM WEIGHTON | YUSUF ISLAM| ZINEBE MAACH
Without your commitment, dedication and effort this project never would have been possible.
WITH SPECIAL THANKS TO
QMUL SCHOOL OF GEOGRAPHY | For their support and assistance in making this project possible.
QMUL CENTRE FOR PUBLIC ENGAGEMENT| For funding this publication’s printing and design.
CANON BARNET PRIMARY SCHOOL | CYRIL JACKSON PRIMARY SCHOOL | SALVATION ARMY STEPNEY
ST PETER’S CHURCH BETHNAL GREEN | DARAL UMMAH MOSQUE SHADWELL | POPLAR HARCA
STEBON PRIMARY SCHOOL | MARION RICHARDSON PRIMARY SCHOOL | THE LIMEHOUSE PROJECT
OUR LADY OF THE ASSUMPTION CHURCH BETHNAL GREEN | QUEEN MARY STUDENTS’ UNION
TOYNBEE HALL | TEESDALE & HOLLYBUSH TRA| LAWDALE PRIMARY SCHOOL
TOWER HAMLET’S PARENT & CARER COUNCIL
For your warm welcome and providing spaces in which this research could be conducted.
SEAN RICHARDSON| For designing this publication.
Tower Hamlets Citizens is an alliance of over 25 community institutions in Tower Hamlets, uniting schools, churches and
mosques to work towards the common good. We are a branch of the national community organising alliance, Citizens UK.
If you would like more information on this report or Tower Hamlets Citizens, or to discuss the issues and proposals
contained within it please contact:
Sotez Chowdhury Tower Hamlets Citizens lead organiser [email protected]
Liam Harney Research coordinator and lead author of report School of Geography, Queen Mary University of London [email protected]