• LONG before the Covid-19 pandemic, I was becoming distressed by the number of pubs, shops and plots, sitting vacant for years on end while homeless people sleep on the street or are placed by the borough in temporary accommodation miles away from their jobs, families and community.

Temporary often means years, 10 or more for larger families, with drastic consequences on people’s welfare.

The pandemic has shown that action can be speeded up when necessary, so I have sent a petition to ask the Westminster City Council to list all property that has been empty for seven years or more, and consider taking exceptional steps to free it up to be developed for the benefit of those who need it.

The petition needs 500 signatures before April 19 to be debated. Please sign it at: https://petitions.westminster.gov.uk/nospacewasted/.

My vision is that these properties could be offered to housing associations, co-ops and co-housing groups and other not-for-profit organisations to be developed into housing for people and projects that particularly need space in the borough.

Examples:

Shops are usually street level and could be turned into accessible accommodation for wheelchair users.

Pubs often have spacious living accommodation upstairs and could be converted into housing projects for larger families, with communal and or community facilities in the ground floor premises.

The Samaritan Hospital, Marylebone Road, could be converted into affordable accommodation for nurses and other front-line public sector shift workers who need to live near their jobs.

I have listed some properties I know in the north west of the borough and would welcome any other suggestions (please send to emengel3@gmail.com):

• Pubs:
– The Lancer, Lancefield Street.
– The Flora, Harrow Road.
– The Chippenham, Shirland Road.
– The Neeld Arms, corner of Maryland Road and Harrow Road.

• Empty shops and premises:
– The shop under the boxing club, corner of Harrow Road and First Avenue.
– The old dairy, corner of Ilbert Street and Third Avenue.
– The old post office, corner of Lancefield and Mozart streets.
– The old HomeStart centre next to Coronation Mini Mart on Dart Street.

• Vacant building plots:
– Between the closed down post office and the nursery on Lancefield Street.
– No 260 Shirland Road.

EMILY ENGEL
Caird Street, W10