BEHIND THE RENT STRIKES

Will have something rather more substantial up after the weekend on the subject of rent strikes, but here's something to whet your appetite.

Behind the rent strikes, Nick Broomfield's project as a graduate of the National Film and Television School, portrays a cluster of people forced into the underclass and obedience to their masters, under the backdrop of the 1973 Housing and Finance Act. The grim-ripper copper who visits the local school in part 3 is especially scary - like Jack Straw if he said what he really thought.



Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6
Part 7
Part 8

The most prophetic thing about this film is the lack of support given to the tenants by local Labour Councillors and local industry. The stereotype is of a militant early 70s Union movement - yet this was not to be found in Kirkby. The weary irony is that neither tenants associations, nor local politicians, nor trade unions finished off the Housing and Finance Act. Instead it was finally put to bed by the defeat of the Tory Government at the general election the following year. An even tarter irony is that Labour's re-election signalled the gestation of Thatcher, and consequently the world we find ourselves in today.