Growing up on the east side of Northampton, Billing
Aquadrome was something we generally associated with as fun. Over the years the
park has changed in a number of different ways with increasing numbers of
people choosing to live full time. For some it is being seen by some as a route
to having stable housing. But the thing is it just isn’t. I was on the site
yesterday, the day before it was shutting down for a month. With residents
required to be off site for four weeks of the year, the stability is limited. A
couple of years back my daughter took in a pensioner who’s family had said that
they had saved for a hotel for the four weeks break. When push came to shove,
when the money wasn’t there, the family went to a range of alternatives
including sofa’s of friends and tents. Unwilling
to see a pensioner living in a tent over January, my daughter took her in for
the four weeks.
Over the four week break, the site seems increasingly prone
to flooding. Over the weekend much of the areas around the paths and community
facilities on site seemed waterlogged. The burden on home makers and care givers
increase in such conditions, particularly when making a move for four weeks. A
far cry from the summer fun of the fair.
People talk about the advantages in only having to pay for
ground rent rather than Council tax but this in itself goes into the thousands.
Coupled to the fact that fuel has to be purchased from the camp management and
gas is about twice the cost of that off site. There are other hidden costs such
as the requirement for Gas safety certifications which have to purchased from
the site management and any improvements to pitches (decking or fencing) having
to be again be purchased from site management at inflated costs.
The concern is that people living in these environments are
disconnected from the rest of the community. With no access to postal services
and a long walk to most other facilities, it’s easy to see why people living on
the site have no voice. As just a market opportunity to be exploited, the human
cost of which is hidden. It is after all somebody else’s business, somebody
else’s choice. Of the people that I know living on this site many have taken
the option as a result of broken relationships, and with the leading cause of
homelessness being the cessation of private sector tenancies, the option of
living in a caravan park is increasingly an option. Much less of a choice than,
an option on an every reducing list of options.
Part of the reason for the voicelessness is the disconnect
from the rest of the system. This includes electorally with few if any being registered
to vote. With Tory Councillors on the borough and County Council having
responsibility for the area for the last fourteen years, (with the notable
interlude of a Tory councillor who defected to labour in 2011) there is no
interest in addressing these issues.
Over the Christmas new year period, the has been quite
rightly focus on the number of people sleeping rough on the streets, but
homelessness is so much more complex than that. With at least one woman saying
to me that the ones on the street are the only genuinely homeless people there seems
to be a reticence to deal with the wider aspiration of affordable housing in
the town that is available for all.
