Friday 10 June 2016

Who is David?


SO in order to fund another website among thousands of others, offering an undefined selection of content to an undefined audience, featuring an undefined selection of writers, with no paid staff beyond an editor, in an environment where even fully-staffed professional media companies aimed at much larger audiences can't sustain themselves, you want to evict a building which houses eight groups doing the following tasks: - Corporate Watch: Regularly publishes investigative magazines and books - Freedom Press: Maintains a bookshop, website, freesheet and publishes books (whether you like them or not is irrelevant) - Haven: Distributes literature to thousands of prisoners nationwide - SolFed: Regularly publishes pamphlets and books - Afed: Regularly publishes pamphlets and books - Bargee Traveller Association: Campaigning organisation for river dwellers - Advisory Service for Squatters: Campaigning organisation for squatters - DeCenter: Open social space hosting talks and workshops on A Modest Proposal for Freedom Press

5 comments:

Unknown said...

Don't tell 'em Pike, I mean David

bammy said...

Corporate Watch & Haven Books already have established premises/ headquarters down South (in Reading & the Gloucester Road, I understand)so they wouldn't be out of House & Home if the premises were sold off would they? As for the Squatters, well the clue is in the name: they can always find premises! I won't mention the comical situation with regard to the bookshop that won't stock a northern anarchist publication and has sold all of 5 copies of the 'Boys on the Blacklist' published by Tameside TUC. The AF & Sol Fed are independent affiliated organisations that now use Freedom premises, the Memorandum of Association does not cover for the random renting of the building: it was never intended as a Doss House! In short, it ought not to be a 'Hang-Out'. Whatever, David or poor Adam say, and however eloquently they express it; the building is not being used for the purpose it was originally intended for.

Anonymous said...

It's hardly a "doss house" - the groups who use the building are well-respected and make good use of the available extra office space.
The Advisory Service for Squatters (the clue is in the name) aim to provide legal and practical advice for squatters, and others without secure housing, and to do this effectively need a stable base and a working land-line. Which is why they have always rented office space, rather than squatting it, and have been able to do such a good job for over forty years.
Your comment betrays your utter ignorance of the situation, and the active anarchist movement that exists.

bammy said...

Be that as it may, and I don't dispute your comments in any way, accept to state the obvious: that the Articles of Association governing the Friends of Freedom Press clearly does not provide for the renting-out of the property. Hence, any contracts agreed between the Collective and the tenants are illegitimate as the Collective has no legal basis. It is as simple as that. If Andy or anyone else has set up agreements with any of these 3rd parties then he has acted ultra vires: that is they are in breach and have acted beyond their powers. That is the legal and constitutional position as I understand it. The Friends must know this and should act upon it accordingly, otherwise they will be in breach themselves. Usually, when I have to deal with cases like this I am chasing the union bosses or management.

Unknown said...

The Freedom Collective does not rent out any of the property. We're a Collective of Anarchists who work in the building and on various Freedom projects such as publishing, website, news sheet. Everyone involved pays what they can to keep the project going. Freedom is run by a Collective that has meetings every month open to anyone in the movement. You get to join the Collective by turning up and doing stuff. The "Friends of Freedom Press" are a company who owns the building in trust. As you might guess from their name they are "friends" of the Collective. Mostly former Collective members and generally good eggs. If we need a group called "Annoying Dicks who want to fuck up Freedom Press" we'll leave you know