Estate tenants entitled to decent standard of living

• AS a Tenants’ and Residents’ Association, we have been pressing Homes for Islington (HfI) to install new windows in line with the government’s Decent Homes programme (Double-take over bill for £12,000 windows, January 29). On the Whitbread estate we have suffered bad condensation, and health and safety and security issues. Now HfI is moving in families with children when the estate was originally for the over-50s. 

More than 100 people living on the estate signed a petition for new windows. Thanks go to HfI for taking this on board, despite opposition from a minority of leaseholders.

When the government saw fit to sell these properties to council tenants, buyers knew full well it would not be too long in the future when they would need modernising/updating. The sensible council tenants who took advantage of buying their properties sold them on. 

The people who bought them, as ex-council flats, paid only a small premium in comparison to what they would have paid on the open market and then mainly used them for second homes or buy-to-rent. 

Council tenants who pay rent on their properties are entitled to a decent standard of living. After all, we cannot sell our flat if present conditions do not suit, as others can. 

Most people who live on the Whitbread are council tenants. There are only a minority of leaseholders. 

Those who bought their properties at the beginning of the sell-off and still live here would like new windows as they are suffering damp, condensation and the risk of being broken into. If windows at balcony level are left open anyone can climb in. 

As the majority of people who live on this estate are elderly this makes them vulnerable. 

Surely they are entitled to a better standard of living as they have been on this estate far longer than leaseholders who have recently purchased. 

I agree that the use of scaffolding can be limited to where it is needed.

DENNIS KLEINBERG
Chairman, Whitbread Tenants’ and Residents’ Association