Thirteen years ago: the way we were

Thirteen years ago, more than a third of the residents of the Deighton and Brackenhall area had been burgled. Over 70 per cent of households had nobody with a full time job and a similar number had no car.


Yet despite these apparently gloomy statistics, the people responding to a household survey carried out in July 1998 were by and large a satisfied bunch. Seventy-five per cent described themselves as very or fairly satisfied with the area, with many saying it was quiet and peaceful and had a good community spirit. Eighty per cent were very or fairly satisfied with their home.


So why was a regeneration initiative needed? Well, closer examination of the statistics suggests that life on the estate couldn’t go on as it was. More than half the respondents were afraid of being burgled, while drug dealing, poor environment and unemployment problems came high on list of issues that concerned local people.


In addition, there was a widespread feeling that not enough was being done to help children and young people. When asked to choose from a list of things that would improve the area, ‘having more activities for children’ came top (62%), even ahead of reducing the level of crime (61%). ‘More or better play areas for children’ came third (59%), closely followed by ‘having more activities for teenagers’ (58%).


Also, more than a fifth of respondents said that lack of affordable childcare was stopping them from getting a job or accessing training. In fact, only 15 per cent of all respondents had undertaken any training in the previous year and just 18 per cent said they were certain or very likely to enrol for training over the next two years.


And although the residents of the estate were largely happy to be there, according to a Daily Telegraph article in 2006,

‘the estate carried a stigma as a grim trouble spot, dating, rather unfairly, back to the 1960s, when some former residents of Huddersfield's slum areas were cleared into Brackenhall. By 1997, out of 1,050 once proud, mostly grey pebble-dashed homes, nearly a fifth were unoccupied. Kirklees Metropolitan Council, which owned them all, could not find tenants willing to move in.’

Over the next few weeks we’ll be looking at what has happened since 1998, what has changed, what has been learned, and how people feel about it now. Bookmark this page and come back soon to find out more. And if you have any views, stories, memories or pictures you’d like to contribute, please get in touch with us - email joanna[AT]urbanpollinators.co.uk