jrobertson
15-08-09, 09:54 AM
www.dailymail.co.uk (http://www.dailymail.co.uk) - Mail Online - 15-Aug-09
£1m neighbours from hell: Meet the gipsy family terrorising an entire street (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1206652/The-1m-neighbours-hell-Meet-gipsy-family-terrorising-peaceful-street.html)
By Rachel Porter (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/search.html?s=y&authornamef=Rachel+Porter)
There are neatly trimmed privet hedges, rose beds and top-of-the-range family cars parked outside all but one of the houses on this broad and leafy avenue in the outskirts of the North London commuter belt.
In the peace and quiet of a summer’s evening, family life in Totteridge — where professional couples pay up to £1million for a substantial home a stone’s throw from good schools, shops, restaurants and trains direct to the city — appears to be a picture of idyllic suburbia.
That is, until the Connors arrive.
You hear them before you see them.
http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2009/08/14/article-0-0601480F000005DC-588_468x688.jpg
Playing the system: John and Serena Connors, gipsies given luxury housing
To a cacophony of effing and blinding, a family of nine, packed like sardines into a dusty seven-seater people-carrier, pull up between the piles of rubbish and broken paving slabs on the driveway.
Little hands poke out of the windows with their middle fingers raised defiantly aloft.
John and Serena Connors and their seven children — an Irish traveller family — have been in residence at this five-bedroom £1million home since February, when they were moved by Barnet Council into privately-owned accommodation under the Local Housing Allowance scheme.
The scheme was introduced by the Government a year ago to encourage private landlords to take on council tenants in a bid to alleviate a housing shortage.
Since then, there have been several cases highlighted by the Daily Mail where families, living off benefits, have been rehomed in some of the most exclusive and expensive neighbourhoods in Britain — all at the taxpayers’ expense.
Read more (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1206652/The-1m-neighbours-hell-Meet-gipsy-family-terrorising-peaceful-street.html)
£1m neighbours from hell: Meet the gipsy family terrorising an entire street (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1206652/The-1m-neighbours-hell-Meet-gipsy-family-terrorising-peaceful-street.html)
By Rachel Porter (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/search.html?s=y&authornamef=Rachel+Porter)
There are neatly trimmed privet hedges, rose beds and top-of-the-range family cars parked outside all but one of the houses on this broad and leafy avenue in the outskirts of the North London commuter belt.
In the peace and quiet of a summer’s evening, family life in Totteridge — where professional couples pay up to £1million for a substantial home a stone’s throw from good schools, shops, restaurants and trains direct to the city — appears to be a picture of idyllic suburbia.
That is, until the Connors arrive.
You hear them before you see them.
http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2009/08/14/article-0-0601480F000005DC-588_468x688.jpg
Playing the system: John and Serena Connors, gipsies given luxury housing
To a cacophony of effing and blinding, a family of nine, packed like sardines into a dusty seven-seater people-carrier, pull up between the piles of rubbish and broken paving slabs on the driveway.
Little hands poke out of the windows with their middle fingers raised defiantly aloft.
John and Serena Connors and their seven children — an Irish traveller family — have been in residence at this five-bedroom £1million home since February, when they were moved by Barnet Council into privately-owned accommodation under the Local Housing Allowance scheme.
The scheme was introduced by the Government a year ago to encourage private landlords to take on council tenants in a bid to alleviate a housing shortage.
Since then, there have been several cases highlighted by the Daily Mail where families, living off benefits, have been rehomed in some of the most exclusive and expensive neighbourhoods in Britain — all at the taxpayers’ expense.
Read more (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1206652/The-1m-neighbours-hell-Meet-gipsy-family-terrorising-peaceful-street.html)