1968: How COMPULSORY PURCHASE reshaped a TOWN | Man Alive | Voice of the People | BBC Archive

Like many local authorities across the country, Oldham Borough Council used compulsory purchase powers when redeveloping and modernising areas of the town in the 1960s. Man Alive spoke to some of those affected, including Mrs Quinlan, who faced losing her family home, and gentlemen's outfitter Danny Corallo, who had to relocate his business.
Clip taken from Man Alive, originally broadcast on BBC One, Tuesday 25 June, 1968.
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[@Budbrothers420]

That danny was preaching the truth more so now then ever what a lad

[@theeggtimertictic1136]

He mentioned the book '1984' ... just think 1984 was the future back then!

[@suitcase_carwash]

I reckon Danny would only get a 30 second sound bite on any BBC piece these days

[@tjm3900]

These people suffered and fought through a war. Only to be treated like this.

[@JohnSmith-ei2pz]

That's councils wanting land to house immigrants!

[@siwynjones]

@@JohnSmith-ei2pzThey fought through a war, and it was people like you they were fighting.

[@JohnSmith-ei2pz]

@@siwynjones You could not fight yourself out of a wet paperbag! Racist!

[@Lav9944]

​​@@siwynjonesYou've got it completely backwards 🤦‍♂️ We fought to protect our country and keep it english, we fought against a group of people who wanted flood other countries with there own people and eventually replace the indigenous people. Ever heard of living space or the final solution? I find it funny how it's wrong when the Germans do it but everyone else gets a pass.

[@daydays12]

@@JohnSmith-ei2pz oh , really come on 😞 it has nothing to do with it it is about re-housing mistakenly making life "better" for people

[@babs675]

This happened to our house, in Salford. My uncle had the house before my mum. He was a lovely carpenter. He even built an add-on, in the backyard for a kitchen. The house was in great shape, as was the rest of our neighbour’s homes, but the council decided to take over and pull them down. My Poor widowed 70 year old mum was devastated and out a lot of money, with the pittance the council gave her. She ( scared stiff of heights) was sent to a high rise flat. 13 th floor, where the lift was out of order just about every day. It was an absolute disgrace that her home could just be taken off her, like it was.

[@-_-11k52]

Yes completely wrong. Council should have had to pay through the nose! Daylight robbery!

[@theeggtimertictic1136]

Put into a shoebox in the sky ... the poor woman 🥺

[@rensha8635]

At her age, a high rise flat, what a disgrace. Your poor mother.

[@SpeccyHorace]

Bloody awful.

[@michaelroberts7374]

Same here, in Salford, mam and gran and me moved to 11th floor tower block in 1970. Gran had had a stroke, and only left the flat a handful of times before she died in 1980

[@hilaryepstein6013]

I felt so sorry for that couple. They put everything into their home only to have it snatched from them. The move from terrace to tower block broke up not only families but whole communities.

[@JJONNYREPP]

1968: How COMPULSORY PURCHASE reshaped a TOWN | Man Alive | Voice of the People | BBC Archive 0929am 8.6.24 narrator sounded like Vyvian Stanshall.

[@growlerthe2nd712]

@@JJONNYREPPAnd now back to the Earl Court Olympia for the shirt event, I’ll repeat that the shirt event ……..😂👍

[@allykhan8594]

Tyranny of gvernment.

[@jow6845]

💯👎🏻

[@JJONNYREPP]

@@jow6845

[@TeddyBoy1962]

This happened to family friends in the mid sixties in Bow, London. The entire street of Victorian terraced houses were compulsorily purchased and demolished. The Lovering family had one of the cleanest, soundest, neatest houses in the street. Jim was retired and spent time freshening up the exterior paintwork and Gertrude was an excellent homemaker. Many of the other houses were run down although not slummy. However, every house owner got what they were given - three hundred quid, regardless of condition. They were then moved to Loughton - to a council house. From hardworking, fiscally proficient, working class homeowners to rent paying council tenants. No choice given.

[@WillScarlet1991]

That was disgusting 😠😢

[@daydays12]

Callous, ignorant , possibly corrupt, 'planners' with their idiotic ideas

[@bill3641]

@4:30 He's described so well what happens at city council and school board meetings today. Thats not much in the way of progress....

[@Bookmarkerer]

Time travelling back to 1968; thanks BBC Archive; and a good day to all of you in the present.

[@cb01ttr]

I wouldn't mess with Danny.

[@skyrocketautomotive]

Yeah, totally agree. An old school kinda guy. But an honest and hardworking one it would seem. I really hope things worked out for him wherever he ended up.

[@cb01ttr]

@@skyrocketautomotive Definitely not afraid of a day's work.

[@factoryfactory7142]

Nae! Nae! Nae!

[@heinkle1]

Oldham shows up quite a lot on this channel. A place that has experienced a lot of change over the decades.

[@sutapasbhattacharya9471]

One of its Labour MPs Michael Meacher wrote that property should be for housing people but ended up as Environment Minister [don't be wasteful] owning a portfolio of about a dozen properties and leaving millions in his will.

[@bowwowrapha7790]

Danny is fantastic. I really feel for him.

[@jazztheglass6139]

Now PFI Schools, hospitals etc are all built through the compulsory purchase system. Planning permission is granted through central goverment automatically. Local authority is by-passed completely, local residents concerns and objections are ignored. I experienced this first hand in Wembley Park 20 years ago. A Academy school was built on TFL land, my leased 3 bed cottage and a sports ground was demolished despite strong local opposition. The company involved in the project got a 30 year contract for construction, maintance and servicing of the school. Over the 30 year period the fees paid were massive. The school is also exempt from local authority control

[@daydays12]

well written thank you

[@samuelsstuffyt]

Quite scary that the State can effectively just repossess your property with no input or consent from the property owner whatsoever. Even worse, it is never middle class neighbourhoods and streets that get demolished for these sorts of developments, only ever lower income neighbourhoods.

[@jazztheglass6139]

@@samuelsstuffyt Give it time. If Labour puts its full weight behind PFI housing and other infrastructure. It will affect middle class areas. Cricket and tennis club grounds, sports fields, Church halls etc. The land is too valuable, the profits are vast. The government can say its built developments and bought it on hire purchase, so to speak. My old cottage in Wembley, was on the edge of Wembley, almost a middle class area.

[@grinsko6741]

“The little bell only goes ‘ping’ “.

[@googlesucks6029]

I hope everything turned out ok for the shopkeeper. He had some good points though which are still valid today.

[@kieronparr3403]

The tailor?

[@theeggtimertictic1136]

@@kieronparr3403 Did he make the suits? .. I think he just bought them to sell

[@kieronparr3403]

@@theeggtimertictic1136 nah you can see his fabric, tools etc

[@astalavista_84]

People actually made stuff in this country back then, rather than importing it from sweatshops in Asia

[@johnmartinez7440]

​@@astalavista_84 People still do.

[@johnwhitehead1305]

Watching these films makes me cry, all those communities and hard working, decent people like Danny swept aside without any proper representation in the name of "progress ".

[@daydays12]

I agree with you. My heart goes out to those honest folks.

[@sarahcox9284]

Agree. In the name of Progress,what Progress? Absolute disgrace!

[@MrACOUSTICPETE]

Opportunity for a an investigative journalist to see who was making money from this scheme and how they influenced the decision making ! Like the Ernest Marples scandal which led to lots of motorways and the destruction of the rail network by Beeching !

[@daydays12]

Oh yes the odious corrupt Marples destroying the railways and profiting from motorways.

[@benohanlon]

Tell me more?

[@EdsCafe]

Heartbreaking. These wonderful people treated like s***e.

[@daydays12]

I so agree

[@theoldcoot55]

People are annoyed yet not once is the F Word used during the interview How times have changed

[@magravy1]

Real working people being crushed then and it still continues today 😢

[@pen2199]

English people are been irradiated

[@WilliamSmith-mx6ze]

Crushed? Uh?

[@magravy1]

@@WilliamSmith-mx6ze Hopes and dreams The cost of living!

[@stephenholmes1036]

Labour councils were the worsed

[@alibali2656]

There is another documentary uploaded on KZbin about the same destructive event on St Mary's, Oldham called The end of a Street, Coronation Street. Really interesting insight into the superior views of the council and developers over the lives of genuinely hard working folk.

[@theeggtimertictic1136]

I wonder what became of Danny and his business?

[@art-fw7ci]

I'm not british, in 1968 my father hadn't been born yet, but the story of that lady brought some tears to my eyes.

[@benchippy8039]

Compulsory purchase laws are still in effect and is absolutely disgusting. Goes to show just how free the people of this country really are if bureaucrat can turf u out with a fraction of what it’s worth to u to make way for new developments and the lucrative contracts they entail

[@stevecarter8810]

Yeah, I got the sinking feeling when I learned it's the council who get to do compulsory purchase AND the council who get to declare a building condemned.

[@MargaretUK]

It is disgusting, you're right. Whenever I talk about the fact that we own our house my husband always points out that we don't really, if a compulsory purchase was served on us we'd be out no matter what we thought 😡

[@buckodonnghaile4309]

They stole (paid him a pittance) my uncle's farm in Canada, claiming they needed it for an airport. Land sat vacant for years and then was sold off to developer friends of the politicians to make way for overpriced condos and suburban sprawl. If they try that with my farm, I'll end up in prison.

[@whiteonggoy7009]

So sad especially those having gone through war then new start taken away

[@zippy963]

Wise woman.

[@chrisdstard5644]

This happened in Penzance. Heamoor used to be beautiful, now it's a grotty estate full of pikeys, my grandparents house and land devastated.

[@stephenholmes1036]

Im from Cape Cornwall and your spot on.

[@daydays12]

In my town of origin Plymouth... the houses that survived the blitz were bulldozed by the horrible motor obsessed American style planners and the people pushed out onto wind swept isolated 'estates' .... Horrible.

[@stephenholmes1036]

People still treated like rubbish by local authorities.

[@daydays12]

and by central government

[@NTRSN-Archive]

And there are still believers in rich criminals 😢

[@richardjames3356]

Just under a month, we get to vote for them.

[@Tiggy808]

Remember my great grandma had a house on Middleton Rd in chadderton, was compulsory purchased at a 'knock down' price about 1981, new houses sprang up and she moved to a flat in Rhodes. They can wreck your life at the stroke of a pen.

[@JohnHMarsden]

Great people from Oldham.

[@timhill8941]

This subject was tackled in the "Till death us do part" film (about 1968 , I think ) , when Alf Garnett has his home taken from him I'd recommend a watch

[@QuoPaperPlane]

Excellent spin off of the series. Although that scene is comedy gold, it's also tragic, mirroring real life situations. That surveyor is the same actor from Are You Being Served, if I'm not mistaken.

[@nick9669]

@@QuoPaperPlane he is indeed. Frank Thornton, aka. Captain Peacock. Also played Truly in Last of the Summer Wine for many years.

[@nick9669]

Great film. You can also watch “The Alf Garnett Saga”, which shows Alf adjusting to his new life in the Tower Block. Also starring the excellent John Le Mesurier.

[@timhill8941]

@QuoPaperPlane tragic, indeed. The scene that sticks in my mind, is when Alf goes to the pub , but the pub isn't there . Its boarded up , like the rest of the street . So sad , yet so true

[@gordonspond]

NEVER EVER let the government "help" you!!

[@stephenholmes1036]

Correct they despise us.

[@daydays12]

good advice!

[@gordonspond]

Nothing's changed in 56 years!

[@AnthonyMonaghan]

Nothing has changed...if anything, things have got worse. What a shameless bunch of criminals.

[@JJONNYREPP]

1968: How COMPULSORY PURCHASE reshaped a TOWN | Man Alive | Voice of the People | BBC Archive 0932am 8.6.24 then everyone who watches this goes off to watch Little Malcolm and his struggle against the proletarian eunuchry...

[@daydays12]

Agree 100%

[@JJONNYREPP]

@@daydays12 1968: How COMPULSORY PURCHASE reshaped a TOWN | Man Alive | Voice of the People | BBC Archive 23.6.24 when i was a lad......

[@Novacastrian]

Just because houses are old doesn’t make them slums,these were communities,where people looked out for one another,they may have replaced the buildings but couldn’t replace the community or the way of life,disgraceful!

[@apb3251]

Truthfully although some were looked after they were slums. 100 years old even then, damp cellars, single skin brick, no heat or insulation apart from a fire place. Social housing should have been good in 60s but quickly became slum estates or overspill for cities

[@Novacastrian]

@@apb3251 Local authorities aloud a lot of these areas to go to ruin, because the plans to replace the housing stock were already in place, if the people who lived there wanted to move fair enough, they may have received a better house, but a home is something personal, a community an extended family . On Tyneside these communities were scattered and replaced by real slums were no one wants to live now, according to an article in our local paper, I grew up in one of these slums, but I remember a place were people looked out for each other, we played in the street and used our imagination to invent games, yes we had an out side toilet , but I’d go back to that time and place in a flash if I could,this country was a better place to live then compared to now. Sad

[@apb3251]

@@Novacastrian seems to be a viscous cycle. Happened again in Liverpool in the 80s when Thatcher put it into “managed decline”

[@gregorymalchuk272]

The bolshevist central planners thought they knew better.

[@daydays12]

Scandalous uncaring greedy exploitative behaviour cloaked as doing good

[@clairebibby4519]

These terrace houses in Oldham were are part of history of the working classes of the North of England..there was o thought from the council went into knocking these properties down.. at least Lowry was able to paint these industrial towns and keep.their memories and history alive..

[@andscholovideos312]

I love the way they speak. Proper Oldhamers.

[@DOCTORWHOcentral]

@4:48Since his talking in 1968 he mentioned 1984 like his living in that era ???? Did anyone else find that weird and scary cause his mentioned the future 😮😮

[@RobertMulhern]

I guess he was on about Orwell’s book 1984

[@yammyrob]

Good ol danny. What a great man.

[@andrewp1075]

Danny knew

[@simon-oy6um]

Knocking down old slums to build new ones 😂😂😂

[@thomassmiththekingbee]

Danny is really well spoken, and every word he said is true

[@tangerinedream7211]

And what they built became slums very quickly, incredibly bad construction on 1960s flats. Councils still paying for them long after these new flats have been flattened.

[@vantheman1238]

This was happening under a Labour Government led by Harold Wilson.

[@WillScarlet1991]

No different if it were a Tory one.

[@vaughanrichards7438]

​@@WillScarlet1991 That's the point. You would expect better from Labour.

[@WillScarlet1991]

@@vaughanrichards7438 True.

[@thomassmith7374]

@@vaughanrichards7438 not anymore unfortunately 😞

[@WillScarlet1991]

All that history gone 😢😢

[@brijones]

happened to us in battersea 1968 we moved out all houses demolished and a big estate built

[@daydays12]

££££££££ for the developers. Shameful 😞

[@MiKeMiDNiTe-77]

Just amazing people

[@denzel270]

Remember, this was under Labour.

[@BeatUpRecordsCDs]

Danny the Tailor sounds like he is cutting a promo in a wrestling promotion.

[@kieronparr3403]

The challenger "Danny the Tailor"

[@pen2199]

Danny fury

[@EMEL-hr4ut]

They eventually brought us grenfell tower

[@OldManRunning-dj7qi]

BBC back in the day. The days when they had good journalists who looked out for the common people of this country and exposed the murky underworld of the political class who made and passed laws that suited their own agenda. I felt for both the couple and the local business man. I’m sitting here wondering how they got on. Their spirits seemed crushed however I like to think these people gave the two-fingers and got in with rebuilding their lives.

[@stevetheaker7286]

Mr Quinlen looks like he`s about to throw the towel in, walk off into the sunset and never come back

[@rensha8635]

How could it be better to be 60 meters up in the air? Removed from street life.

[@daydays12]

You are so right.

[@jagracershoestring609]

This happened in Eastbourne in 1972 to build a shopping centre. I watched the demolition crews knock the house down around an elderly couple who refused to move. Council jobsworths collecting backhanders. We bought our first house further down the street, with the council saying they would not knock it down after all. Two years later, I learnt that it was in the next phase of shops, previously cancelled. I found some government legislation that I used to get the council to buy me a brand new house, and fund it four miles away. So, been their, found a way out, and feel for those victims of modernisation.

[@nicolad8822]

Thing is every British city still has crumbling rows of old terraced houses which no one maintains properly even if they own them. Trees growing out of brickwork, dirty yards, it has only got worse. At what point does regeneration happen?

[@daydays12]

Absolutely true. Then once beautiful country is built over for up market houses to make ££££££ for developers.

[@Olivia-vn1tf]

@@daydays12 The "plastic" new build estate properties may have upmarket price tags but the build quality is very poor and they are densely packed.

[@josilvester9159]

This is going to happen again if people can't afford to keep up with all the 'climate' demands on how there home is insulated etc.

[@donnasmyth45]

I thought exactly the same thing!

[@PaddyWV]

They were still bulldozing stuff in the early 90's. I remember seeing half pulled down streets around Limeside then. Social Cleansing is another word for it

[@daydays12]

Yes 😞 So sad

[@garethjudd5840]

This appalling act cause social collapse and a subsequent drug and crime wave.

[@daydays12]

Indeed

[@suzannehaigh4281]

Yep, happened in Leeds, classed perfectly good houses as slums, bought them very, very cheap and then did they build more houses? NO, they built the already planned ring road, cheaper to buy slums than houses for redevelopment.

[@daydays12]

Yes. The same everywhere in UK. Shameful

[@YHBW1001]

Nothings changed. Large corporations and faceless government stamping all over the spirit of the people. When are we going to stand up to them?

[@QuoPaperPlane]

Liebour. The voice of the down trodden, hard working people of Britain sacrificing their health, lives and families at war only to be shat on and replaced by the raggedy illegal who wants for nothing.

[@daydays12]

Come the revolution.

[@windogmassey1]

It's happening right now in the UK and we stand by and watch it happen to the entire middle class.

[@grantmiller1077]

Is there a full version of this excerpt anywhere?

[@lodersracing]

I'd love to know the history of Danny and his life.

[@Evemeister12]

This is why people nowadays don't look after council properties. Why put your blood, sweat and tears into something that can be so easily destroyed at any time?

[@jackstrop7520]

not much changes does it!!!!

[@jerryorange6983]

Even houses can be stolen.

[@SteveSmith-zo4ml]

CPO legislation requires the market value to be paid for land and property. Obviously if you condemn a property as unfit for human habitation, then it has a very low market value. So it’s really the ‘public health regulations’ used to condemn the property that I’m wondering about. They probably doesn’t exist any more, but one would think that people had the right to challenge a proposed condemnation. Unfortunately, that would probably be beyond these people.

[@factoryfactory7142]

Shopkeeper was a reet dude!

[@perlefisker]

Did the BBC broadcast this program? Astonishing if so. It seems to be concerned with reality.

[@fluffyfour]

Old BBC. Not current BBC - totally out of touch with anything but Woke, PC and dumbing down.

[@nicolad8822]

Think yourself bloody lucky. How many publicly funded broadcasters produced the quality of thought provoking content they have over the years?

[@daydays12]

My point of view exactly. What happened to the socially conscious BBC?

[@NoosaHeads]

The tyranny of governments "doing what's best for the community". Some government is necessary, of course, but give a little man a bit of power and he becomes drunk with the delight of ruling over his "inferiors." The problem is that those who are best suited to be politicians never want to become one. Those least suited to be politicians are often the ones in power. Politicians should be personally liable (in civil courts) for grossly irresponsible or financially unreasonable decisions. That would make them think very carefully before they caused their citizens to be socially or financially disadvantaged. Compulsory purchase should be something permitted only as an absolute last resort. (Otherwise, it's legalised theft).

[@1972hermanoben]

Greed in action. Instead of investing in improvements, pile ‘em all into tower blocks where they take up less space, leaving room for more buildings. Disgraceful, disrespectful and dehumanizing, this policy sowed the seeds of the neoliberal nightmare of a political landscape we live in today. No wonder Thatcher seemed to offer such a lifeline to working people.

[@elkpaz560]

Danny gives the most articulate rationale for the need to respect property rights in a good society. What was happening here was communism and we will be seeing more of it under StarWEFmer.

[@seanrm]

"reshaped" is doublespeak for, "destroyed"

[@daydays12]

Exactly.

[@celestialteapot309]

What possessed their children to vote for Margaret Thatcher?

[@neverfeltguilty1786]

2024 and nothings changed. Same struggle for all time..

[@peterharvey1762]

Danny told them Oldham

[@annacomnena217]

It sounds like Danny attended an early Delphi meeting.

[@JonnyInfinite]

This was pure theft

[@buffplums]

Such injustices…and after each new generation comes along, the hardships, injustice, pain and anger of the previous is swept under the carpet…. Those at the top don’t have an empathy for the working class, treat them lower than dirt. Nothing changes.

[@paulhargreaves1680]

In 1968. All this under a labour govt and local labour mp too probably. I felt very sorry for those people, worked hard all their lives and for what.... absolutely disgraceful.

[@sarahcox9284]

Compulsory purchase should not be allowed. It is disgusting and disgraceful that people lose their homes and have no say in the matter.

[@premikyam2726]

a telling insight of how big government destroys the lives of hard-working people.

[@user-ji5hb8wl4b]

"Streets in the sky"!

[@daydays12]

Shameful. These disgusting 'planners' don't live in their blocks

[@JoeK25301]

Ah, the days of house-proud wives.

[@johnmartinez7440]

...what?

[@northwaleslife4844]

They had no right to do this, they should have restored these houses

[@mariacrouch7109]

I TOTALLY AGREE PAST GOVES HAVE RPPED THE HEARTS OUT OF STRONG COMMUNITES SOME OF THESE HOUSES COULD OF BEEN RESTORED

[@GeoffDavis1974]

Still happening

[@bryanmceneaney]

it was only just the beginning of the end of civilisation. I wonder how he got on after?

[@joycejackson9315]

Blackrock 1960s.

[@WaynesPokeWorld]

I know it said Oldham but she sounds like she’s from Bolton … That’s a very Lancashire accent

[@jamesburke2094]

Nb Worth bearing in mind that leyton was once quite prim Then, in the 80s pretty junky It's how the locals behave that matters. Things move on

[@sallyarmstrong8612]

Still happening today. Now we have the likes of Sadiq Khan in London telling people they’re cars are suddenly “not compliant” and demanding money from them.

[@johnmartinez7440]

That wasn't 'sudden' at all. That's just correctly taxing pollution.

[@urbanplanner7200]

You can't fight city hall.

[@doodle3161]

Nothing has changed.

[@techElephant]

Nice cuddly Labour government...

[@RussellAlami]

A Labour Government - in power ! ! 😮

[@BOZ_11]

The old boy at the end is a bit of an anarchist. You can't allow a private individual (even 100 of them) to block e.g. a much needed cross country railway service, or some other piece of critical infrastructure. He'll receive the market rate for his business, and he can open another shop half a mile away with the proceeds from the sale. Out of respect, it should be market rate plus 50% for the anguish

[@saltedmutton7269]

I'd agree with you on that if it wasn't for the fact that it seems most of the time nowadays infrastructure doesn't even get built. With HS3, for example, the government took the houses before it was cancelled, and rather than giving them back when it was, they rented them out to earn a little more money! Also, what qualifies infrastructure as critical? Allowing the government to decide that would give them too much power over what they can take (especially in areas with high-value properties... the more they can charge for rent the better!)

[@BOZ_11]

@@saltedmutton7269 They're not taking, they're opening up Govt coffers to compensate the property holders under the CPO. It's not like MP's added his business to their investment portfolio 🤣🤣 Representatives are democratically elected, that's the process. You act like they're lords.

[@birdsnest69]

So you don’t own anything in the UK?

[@mushroomhead3054]

I don't know how we managed back then without half the 3rd world on our doorsteps.

[@JohnSmith-ei2pz]

Theproperty was used to house the shy-te, of the world!

[@bonnetdedouche437]

Fantastic narration by Lawrence Lewllyn Bowen! 👌

[@antmerritt]

For real?!?

[@alankent2849]

It was a way of moving these people into cheap council accommodation and removing any influence they had over the future of their communities. Give them a few quid a week dole money to keep them quiet and they won't be politically motivated anymore.

[@Seminal_Ideas]

Well said.

[@ShubhamBhushanCC]

It was a way to house them from unsanitary unsafe old crumbling houses into more up to date houses for no cost or very low cost. Most people considered it an upgrade. Remember those early houses didn't have integrated bath/toilets. They were outdoors and shared and poor sewage systems often broke down. They were already living in cheap council accommodations, this was just to move them into cheap, modern and safer council accommodations

[@ChartreuseDan]

​@@ShubhamBhushanCC Councils don't have to forced purchase order council property. These were privately owned properties. The official line was that the tenants were mostly low-income renters in poor conditions with uncooperative landlords but ultimately, given that if regulators were concerned about the conditions landlords were providing they could have tried to implement legislation to protect renters, the choice to draw a line around an area and say it all comes down to be replaced with concrete tower blocks was one made of political expediency. If the national government HAD tried to implement total adequate reform to the rental market the landlords and the fiscal right at large would have kicked up a fuss so it was "better" to empower local councils to blunder about like this and avoid most culpability for any of it in the public consciousness for the parliamentary party.

[@nicolad8822]

It was paternalistic but that’s what the immediate post war generation voted for. Many people were more than happy to escape these environments.

[@eleanorwalmsley635]

​@@ShubhamBhushanCCthat is a myth and a PR lie.. Those houses were built by the Victorians, therefore built to last. Any restorations would have been a hell of a lot better than what replaced them. These people were robbed of their homes, given a derisory one time offer for potential profit, naked greed.

[@Hullabaloolah]

This looks like a propaganda promo for today to allow compulsory purchase of your home so you can go live in a ' 15 minute city' tower block. You will own nothing but be happy

[@johnmartinez7440]

"I don't know what a 15-minute city is but I'm still mad about them."

[@Ian-gw2vx]

You ain't seen nothing yet Danny.

[@shakmo8810]

6 minute 30second Danny