There's been a lot of backslapping locally, about how Hackney Council has "saved" the Ridley Road Shopping Village (By taking a lease and paying £400K annual rent to the owners in a British Virgin Islands tax haven. Ed.), but the traders there are still waiting to hear from their present landlord Larochette (BVI) about their fate - are they to be evicted, when, where will they earn a living and store their stock? So are the artists upstairs, who the Council have decided need to be evicted to make way for its Market Security Services. (They call it 'Designing out crime'! Ed). Hackney says it's a crime hotspot. (It's not. Ed.)
