Commit to cease placing homeless people in newly-purchased Connolly & Callaghan properties where tenants may have been evicted for the purpose of profiteering from emergency accommodation provision.
Commit to an immediate renegotiation of the terms under which Bristol City Council do business with Connolly & Callaghan
Take immediate action to enforce decent living conditions in all Connolly & Callaghan properties where Bristol City Council has accommodated people.
Commit not to enter into any new contracts or other new business arrangements with companies such as Connolly & Callaghan who have been found to have evicted blameless tenants for their own financial gain.
Why is this important?
Connolly & Callaghan (owner of popular Stokes Croft complex Hamilton House) are the leading provider of homeless accommodation in Bristol. When Bristol City Council accepts a legal duty to provide housing for someone in need there is a strong possibility that it will be a Connolly & Callaghan property they are housed in.
An ACORN member who wishes to remain anonymous has discovered that Connolly & Callaghan have been buying up property in our city and evicting the existing tenants in order to create more homeless accommodation. These former tenants are then forced to look for somewhere else and some made homeless. More homeless people means more ‘customers’ for Connolly & Callaghan - whose rent is paid for by Bristol City Council. And these are no ordinary rents, often charging £250-£350 per week, Connolly & Callaghan are raking in a tidy profit.
In a recent letter evicting tenants from Carpenters Place in Knowle, General Manager Phil Callaghan wrote “All private tenants are being asked kindly to leave Carpenters Place and find alternative accommodation so that the company can continue with helping the ever growing need of homelessness...In order to make the transition period as easy as possible we will allow you to terminate your tenancy with us without a notice period…”
As if this wasn’t enough, there have been reports of terrible conditions in the hostels ran by Connolly & Callaghan, with cockroaches, rats and raw sewage in one in Bedminster.
It is unacceptable that Bristol City Council pay extortionate amounts to a private company that is cynically profiteering from the housing crisis by evicting tenants and providing substandard living conditions.
We need decent and dignified homeless accommodation at a fair price and we need the Council to take the lead in making this happen.
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UPDATE:
Independent media organisation The Bristol Cable have covered this story in detail. For full information read the article here. https://thebristolcable.org/2016/05/bristol-firm-profiting-from-housing-homeless-by-kicking-other-tenants-out/
