About 200 protesters chanting ‘social housing is a human right’ force guests from luxury property development companies to use side entrance of hotel

This article is more than 5 years old

This article is more than 5 years old

About 200 housing, anti-gentrification and Occupy campaigners have disrupted the beginning of the annual Property Awards on Tuesday evening in London, with one arrest made.

Nervous guests arrived in designer clothing and were forced to use side and back entrances as protesters blocked off the main doors to the Park Lane hotel in central London.



The protesters chanted: “Social housing is a human right” and held banners with slogans about social cleansing and empty houses.



Other campaigners attempted to gain entry to the hotel before storming the neighbouring Foxtons estate agents, forcing staff to retreat to back rooms.



The Property Awards is a hugely popular annual dinner, now in its 20th year, which celebrates the UK’s leading property developers and companies. Categories include deal of the year and developer of the year.

The protesters included representatives from various high-profile campaigns, including Focus E15, a group of mothers who successfully campaigned to remain in Newham after facing eviction; the Sweets Way Resists group, who have been campaigning against their own evictions in Barnet; and the Friends of the Joiners Arms, who fought to save a gay venue in Hackney which closed due to redevelopment. They were joined by organisers and participants in the recent March for the Homeless.



A spokesperson for the activists said: “It’s an opportunity to flip the script, and congratulate all the housing and anti-gentrification campaigns for their hard work in ensuring London remains open and accessible to people from all backgrounds, not just a rich elite.”

Among the companies shortlisted for the Property Awards were Land Securities, which builds luxury flats and lost a legal battle with HMRC in 2013 over a scheme that was described as flagrant tax avoidance.

Delancey, nominated in the property company category, is part of a large redevelopment project in Elephant and Castle where thousands have been evicted from their homes.

Its Tribeca Square development in the area reportedly doesn’t include any affordable homes. Up against it in the same category was Brookfield, a Canadian company which is behind the 50-storey Principal Tower in Shoreditch that is already marketed to investors in China and the Middle East. Flats start at £900,000.

Housing activists said the awards were vulgar at a time when there are 10 empty homes for every homeless family.

Katya Nasim from the Sweets Way campaign said: “These companies do not care for the human and social costs of their projects.”

Their desire for profit, she said, was leading the developers “to convert living spaces, social amenities and community assets into soulless investment opportunities which serve none but a tiny, privileged minority”.

The protesters want to see the mass construction of social housing, rent controls and the democratisation of urban planning.