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Violent crime, filthy streets, drug dealing and prostitution - this is the reality that Kensington residents are dealing with everyday.

The ECHO was invited to meet with a small group of people who have lived in the area for decades - but believe they have been forgotten about by everyone.

The group - who formed the Kensington Residents Association four years ago - are too frightened to be named or pictured, but wanted to share with us the truth about what their once beloved home has turned into - a living nightmare.

We sat with nine residents for an hour and the stories we heard were harrowing.

One woman said that just yesterday she was awoken to see gangs of men in balaclavas attacking each other with baseball bats outside her house.

She said: “How can I go out of my house when things like that are happening?”

Another woman adds that prostitution has become so open in the area, that her children are now asking about it.

She said: “When I’m taking the kids to school in the morning and there are prostitutes off their head on drugs by the gates, what am I supposed to tell them?”

One of the more vivid and shocking accounts is from a woman who has lived in the area for more than 30 years.

She said: “The other day I saw a woman in broad daylight, defecating in the street - how is this happening?”

Another shocking tale showing the depths of crime in the area came when a woman explained how she had left her muddy shoes on the doorstep while she went inside her house - only to find them stolen instantly, she added: “They literally knicked my smelly old shoes, that’s how bad it is.”

The group formed to try and give residents a voice and to see if they could tackle the decline of the area but they feel they have been let down by everyone and have nowhere to turn.

In their opinion housing is the route of the problem.

'If you change a community it changes everything that’s there'

One of the group’s founders explained: “We all agree that things are not right and we believe it is down to cheap housing and that is the responsibility of the council.

“We have met with them and they agree with us, but nothing has been done.”

A man in the group added: “The big change is the change in property ownership, there are very few homeowners now, no families - there are examples of planning being flouted all over the place.

“Property developers are buying houses cheap, turning them into 6-bed houses, holiday lets or student housing.”

He continued: “If you change a community it changes everything that’s there - it changes the shops, the facilities everywhere.

“If you walk down the high street in Kensington now, it actually reflects the community - you can get a tattoo but you can’t get a stamp.

Another woman chipped in: “We’ve got no banks here - but plenty of phone shops and hairdressers - and plenty of drug dealers of course.”

One woman said she has lived in Kensington for over 50 years and doesn’t recognise the area she once knew.

She said: “It used to be a really lovely area - we had lovely shops, you couldn’t get houses because it was so popular around here - but the community is gone now, there are no families here.”

The group shared scores of photographs with us of streets left in terrible states, with masses of fly-tipping strewn everywhere and a clear lack of care from those involved.

One member explained: “When you get a very transient community like we have now, people don’t care about the area - there is no pride.”

The saddest thing about meeting the group of people is that they all clearly care deeply about Kensington, having bult their lives here - but after trying in vain to change things, the passion is being driven out of them.

One group member said: “I would say three quarters of the people who lived here before have now left - and those who are left are desperate to follow them”

“There are ten for sale signs up in my street - none of them are going to families.”

'All the drains are collapsing - there is actually sewage running down my road'

But trying to leave the area presents another major challenge - as one woman explained.,

She said: “I have got a men’s hostel next to my house where someone got stabbed recently and then the windows were put through - who is going to buy my house?

“All the drains are collapsing - there is actually sewage running down my road, the bin man said to me the other day ‘my god, how can anyone live here.”

With such a massive range of issues in the area, which have been allowed to develop over time - you can understand why the people here feel there is a more sinister plan in place.

The group’s founding member said: “I think there is too much that has gone wrong and been ignored for this not to have been done for a reason - It feels like we have been left on purpose, left to become a dumping ground.”

Is anything being done?

Liverpool Council’s cabinet member for the environment Cllr Steve Munby has visited Kensington for a walkaround with the residents group, he says he totally understands their feelings.

He said: “If I was the residents I would also be deeply frustrated and fed up with the situation and I would be angry with the council as they are.

“It will be no consolation to them for me to say that there is a complex combination of problems in the area which are really tricky to tackle.”

But he said there are things now being done to try and stem the tide of trouble in the area.

He explained: “A lot of the issues are to do with houses of multiple occupancy (HMO) in Kensington and there are proposals for dealing with this issue going to next week’s council cabinet meeting.

“In terms of the environmental issues, we have started work on a range of things like cleaning up the four foot alleyways. We have also launched three new specific Hit Teams who are tasked with dealing with fly-tipping specifically in that area as soon as it is reported.”

He added: “It will be like turning around a tanker, it is going to take time and I don’t expect the residents to take my word for it, they need to see results.

“By the end of September, if I haven’t seen a radical change in some of these issues in Kensington then I will be susprised and disappointed, but obviously not as disappointed as the residents.”