Neil Gray
@NeilGray00
Editor, 'Rent and its Discontents: A Century of Housing Struggle'. Writing 'Take over the City: Spatial Composition in 1970s Italy' for CommonNotions, NY.
Extreme racism and sectarianism combined in Ballymena, NI. Really horrifying stuff.
Does anybody know, does anybody care, about the extent of the fear people are living in in Ballymena? Do we now forget the black and brown people - and locals - living under this terror because the flames are out? The extent of this is jawdropping. Grim, depressing, shameful.
They want rent control exemptions for build-to-rent and mid-market rent because these business models are premised on continual rent increases. A good reason to tell them where to go. Also why rent control demands should include public housing demands. scottishhousingnews.com/articles/spf-r…
Read about Herbert Lom in Jules Dassin's mighty 'Night and the City' courtesy of our (free) noir minor substack. noirminor.substack.com/p/herbert-lom
The chronic endpoint of Lisa Mackenzie's working class identity politics. Tacit support of Farage's 'common sense' politics in the gutter of Spiked magazine. Can Reform become the party of the working class? spiked-online.com/2025/06/01/can…
Can't discuss housing supply without discussing the *type* of housing supply and the land supply that makes public/social housing supply economically feasible or not.
Note to haters: This shows that for North American center cities, already built out by WWII, adding lots of housing did not have the effect of lowering prices, compared to those center cities that added less. docs.google.com/document/d/1AJ…
A very exciting post day - proofs for Ed Emery’s ‘Letters to a Future Republic’ have arrived! They’ll be available to order very soon, and with a limited print run. Watch this space
80% of South Bronx was burnt to the ground in the seventies. For all those who've wondered about the 'urban myth' of deliberate fire-starting as a means of urban displacement and renewal. decadeoffire.com
🚨The consultation on rent controls ends tomorrow. ❌ Shamefully, Scotgov is buckling to landlords & their lobbyists who are intent on making rent controls unworkable & wrecking the bill. We can’t let this happen - back @Living_Rent before it’s too late! livingrent.org/landlords_ruin…
Strike fear into landlords - go and sign our petition to stop them ruining rent controls! livingrent.org/dont_let_landl…
Sign the petition: Don't let landlords ruin rent controls! livingrent.org/landlords_ruin…
Only 9 Labour MPs voted against proscribing Palestine Action as a 'terrorist' organisation. 276 Labour MPs voted in favour. votes.parliament.uk/votes/commons/…
Makes you wonder if collective capital even gives a shit about economic growth anymore - its supposed modus operandi. But then maybe that was never the intention of two decades of austerity.
Since 2008, the UK economy has seen the most severe growth-slowdown of any advanced economy.
Please consider sharing and supporting this fundraiser for the wonderful Keith McIvor (JD Twitch) who has recently been diagnosed with a terminal brain tumour and needs access to urgent care: crowdfunder.co.uk/p/love2jdtwitch Sending endless love to Keith and his family. Optimo forever.
This guy is on the Parliamentary Liaison Group for Housing. Utterly cheesy and predictable analysis: deregulate; build, build, build. Starting off with an ode to likely the most neoliberal rentier city in the UK is telling, plus no accounting for land costs.
🧵 Why doesn’t Sheffield (or South Yorkshire) build more high-quality buildings and glass skyscrapers like Manchester or Leeds? I hear this a lot online, in the news, and in conversation. The answer is simple: viability. A short thread.
This is insane, and surely criminal? I had to check this wasn't AI or mocked up before reposting.
🧵 Why doesn’t Sheffield (or South Yorkshire) build more high-quality buildings and glass skyscrapers like Manchester or Leeds? I hear this a lot online, in the news, and in conversation. The answer is simple: viability. A short thread.
As part of #Glasgow850, Chris Leslie joins us for his talk this month titled Wounded Landscapes. In his lecture #WoundedLandscapes photographer Chris Leslie draws haunting visual parallels between the war-ravaged cityscapes of Sarajevo in the mid-1990s and the.. (1/4)
Beautiful contraband of my youth.
MADE IN BRITAIN (1982): Tim Roth made his explosive acting debut in David Leland and Alan Clarke's astonishing ITV play as Trevor, a 16 year-old racist skinhead. The great Eric 'Sgt Bob Crier' Richard plays his social worker.
Great film with some great performances, not least Art Smith. noirminor.substack.com/p/art-smith
On this day, 78 years ago, Jules Dassin's "Brute Force" (1947) premiered in Los Angeles, California.
Sad to say that Mark Saunders of Spectacle Media has died. Quiet anarchist who briefly found fame with his film of the #PollTax Riots in London. Leaves a massive under-appreciated archive of video much of it on Youtube. youtu.be/BdCUl6zlD_4?si… #Bookschin
The entire UK political/media narrative on welfare is that it is "burgeoning", "a burden" & "unsustainable". But how high is it compared to others? UK welfare is 10.8% of GDP in 2023 (including pensions). Finland spends 25.7% of GDP; France 23.8%: both double the UK.
Did you know that every landlord in Scotland was invited to respond to the Scottish government’s consultation on rent controls? Was every tenant told? Nope! We need to drown out the landlord lobby; make sure you sign @Living_Rent’s petition! livingrent.org/landlords_ruin…