St. Agnes Place

St Agnes Place was a squatted street in Kennington, south London, which resisted eviction orders for more than 30 years. When a number of derelict houses were scheduled for demolition to extend Kennington Park in 1969, squatters occupied the properties and a High Court injunction prevented the demolition. The street was run by a housing cooperative until 2005, when Lambeth London Borough Council obtained an eviction order. Demolition was completed in 2007.

On 1 June 1969 house number 54 was the first to be squatted. The council had acquired the unit and planned to demolish it for the extension to Kennington Park. The derelict buildings were completely rebuilt by the squatters. An attempt to evict it in 1977 was successfully resisted on the rooftops. An emergency High Court injunction, obtained by solicitors in Lambeth Law Centre, ordered the demolition to stop. The resulting furore and publicity on a national scale prevented further demolition, and led to the fall of the Conservative Council, and the resignation of Councillor Stimpson, the leader of the council.

A block of buildings were demolished either side of the road, and some were badly damaged and scaffolded. But a large central block on both sides of the road were completely untouched, and were in occupation on the day of the attempted demolition, and thereafter. Some damaged ones were renovated again by the residents, and made habitable i.e. one was re-roofed, and several were re-wired and had basic services restored.

The residents of St Agnes paid utility bills and for several years were run by a housing cooperative with diverse occupancy, and in the last few years a larger number of young homeless people. In November 2005, Lambeth London Borough Council finally obtained a High Court of Justice order to evict the residents of 21 properties. This mass eviction was completed on 30 November 2005.

There were several community projects at St Agnes Place:

St Agnes Place was responsible for producing music and also broadcasting Wireless FM and pirate radio station Rasta FM, which was raided by Ofcom in October 2005.

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