The tenant from our dispute with Youngs estate agency, Patrick, provides an update on the campaign. Patrick began organising with Brighton SolFed in December 2017 for better living conditions and for compensation and reimbursement for work he has undertaken on his flat. Following this, he was served with an eviction notice in late January 2017, in what appears to be a clear example of a revenge eviction by a landlord unwilling to undertake necessary works to bring his property up to a liveable standard.

In October 2017, Brighton Solidarity Federation was organising with a tenant who was facing a £344 deduction from their deposit after moving out of a house administered by the lettings agency The Property Shop in Kemptown. The tenant approached Brighton SolFed for support to organise a public campaign against this, which concluded successfully with full replayment to the tenant after around one month of actions. Below, the tenant tells the story of their experience of this situation, as well as of the public campaign.

In Manchester, Empty Cages Collective, Manchester No Prisons, Smash IPP, & Unis Resist Border Controls felt the urgency of not only discussing and pushing against border regimes and the hostile environment policy, but also fighting prison injustice. As it was reported in Corporate Watch, the current Conservative government are pushing to build 6 mega prisons, one of which has already been built in Wrexham, North Wales. The crisis of violence and overcrowding inside prisons is causing huge damage to communities across the UK.

Below is the write-up of a successful campaign organised by a tenant and Brighton SolFed against a deduction to that tenant's deposit. The three month public campaign concluded in April 2018 with a £450 payment to the tenant, who had had £390 deducted from her deposit. Please note that the article contains brief discussion of post traumatic stress disorder.

Brighton Solidarity Federation has escalated its campaign against Youngs estate agency, after a landlord they represent refused to enter into negotiations regarding a revenge eviction of a tenant, Patrick, who requested repair works to his seriously dilapidated flat.

A Brighton hospitality worker supported by SolFed has won a victory against the exploitative conditions prevalent in the local hospitality sector, as a restaurant paid £1,200 in response to pay demands made by the worker.

The public campaign in support of the worker ended after a single picket - and some back-and-forth emailing - with the worker receiving all the money she had asked for.

Cuddly Jeremy’s fight to turn the Labour Party into a red blooded socialist party has some way to go, if Manchester is anything to go by. The city is virtually a one party mini-state with Labour holding 95 of the 96 council seats, so the perfect place, you would have thought, to start the Labour fight back against austerity and inequality in the UK. Well…, not quite!

The new rates for the National Minimum Wage and the National Living Wage from
April 2018 are set out below:

● £7.83 per hour for ages 25 and over
● £7.38 per hour for ages 21 to 24
● £5.90 per hour for ages 18 to 20
● £4.20 per hour for those under 18
● £3.70 per hour for apprentices.

The new rates for the National Minimum Wage and the National Living Wage from April 2018 are set out below:

• £7.83 per hour for ages 25 and over
• £7.38 per hour for ages 21 to 24
• £5.90 per hour for ages 18 to 20
• £4.20 per hour for those under 18
• £3.70 per hour for apprentices.

For your boss to pay the apprenticeship rate there must be a genuine apprenticeship agreement in place. This agreement must be based on training being the main purpose of the agreement, with working being secondary.

The apprenticeship rate only applies to apprentices aged:

• under 19
• 19 or over, who are in the first year of their apprenticeship.

Apprentices aged 19 or over in their second year of apprenticeship must receive the National Minimum Wage or National Living Wage Rate their age entitles them too.

Brighton Solidarity Federation has concluded its campaign against the student lettings agency G4Lets. The campaign was in support of two groups of tenants who had just over £3000 deducted from their deposits. One group of tenants had £2000 taken from their deposit for fire safety, redecoration, and pest control, in spite of an Environmental Health Report from the council informing G4Lets that these issues were their responsibility to resolve as part of landlords' general obligations to the properties they let out. Another group of tenants had £1080 taken from their deposit for cleaning and redecoration, in spite of the fact that they cleaned the property before leaving it, and had it professionally repainted, which they had an invoice for as evidence.