Our Story

The Save Our Homes LS26 campaign, named after the Leeds LS26 postcode, was an ex-National Coal Board estate made up of seventy iconic post-war prefab Airey homes. Built in the mid-1950s, the estate was home to two generations of coal miners until local pits had all closed in the 1980s. 

The National Coal Board estate, circled in grey at the bottom. Reproduced from the 1965 Ordinance Survey map. Highlights by Jessica Field.
Two of the two-bedroom semis being constructed on the NCB estate. Photo kindly provided by the E. R. Manley collection, http://www.leodis.net

After the mid-1980s, many ex-miners stayed living on the estate and were joined by new renter residents. Recent tenants have been a mix of families and retirees – all low income, many elderly or living with disabilities, and many more with young children settled in local schools. In 2017, these settled households – more than one hundred people – received warning of imminent eviction. The landlord’s redevelopment plans threatened to force out hundreds of private renters who had nowhere else to go.

Our two-street estate, dubbed ‘Cardboard City’ decades ago by detractors and supporters alike, was the last neighbourhood of genuinely affordable rented housing in the gentrifying LS26 postcode. Tenant residents were long-time friends as well as neighbours – some had lived on Wordsworth Drive and Sugar Hill Close for more than 50 years. These prefab Airey houses also stood as working-class heritage: post-war dwellings designed and built for ordinary working people during a nationwide housing crisis. Redevelopment threatened to break an established community and demolish more than 70 years of social history.

When the landlord, corporate investment company Pemberstone, submitted their development plans to Leeds City Council in 2017, residents rallied to fight it – gathering petitions, hosting marches, speaking to the media, and lobbying the council.

Then, in 2019, Leeds City Council refused the application. VICTORY! Councillors pointed out that the proposed gardens were smaller than minimum standards. Importantly, the council also heard our plea: redevelopment – councillors unanimously agreed – would break up a low-income tenant community with nowhere to go. This was recognised as unacceptable; Leeds City Council supported community togetherness over housing market profit.

Then, Pemberstone appealed the rejection. As per process, the appeal went up to a government-level review by an independent inspector. The Save Our Homes LS26 Residents Action Group mobilised to fight once again. We raised money for legal representation, submitted more objections, received expert help and advice from a range of campaign organisations and Airey retrofit specialists.

But it was not to be.

In 2021, the inspector approved Pemberstone’s plans, pointing out that landlord rights over their properties were unassailable – at least for a tenant community in run-down housing. He determined that the poor condition of the houses meant that residents would have to moved out at some point anyway, so the redevelopment could go ahead. By spring 2022 almost all assured shorthold tenants had been evicted. 

Yet, residents didn’t stop fighting.

Due to campaign pressure sustained over five long years, housing association Leeds Federated Housing purchased the estate from Pemberstone in September 2022. Leeds Fed, with money from Leeds City Council, went on to rebuild 70 homes. But, rather than executive style middle-class housing for sale, they constructed 40 social rent houses, and 30 for shared-ownership. 

Since March 2025, many previous residents have been able to return and rent the ‘affordable’ social rent homes under a dedicated Local Lettings Policy. 

Not the victory we wanted, but a HUGE RESULT for all who can return.

OUR ACHIEVEMENTS

Apart from the occasional Victorian poverty study, tenants and tenant lives are hidden or obscured in the historical record. Especially working-class tenants whose mobile, hand-to-mouth lives leave little room for leaving a written record of the renting experience. And apart from the occasional eviction court case story in local newspapers, tenant fights against landlord injustice rarely make headlines. 

Save Our Homes LS26 are one of the few exceptions. Residents found their voice in national media outlets and campaigned on large activist platforms alongside other housing advocates. They kept the private renting experience in the public eye. This is a victory in itself. But more than that, Save Our Homes LS26 won important concessions as a direct result of our campaign. WE…

  • FORCED a corporate landlord to give up on their plans to build a middle-class home-ownership estate.
  • PRESSURED the landlord into selling the land to a housing association: Leeds Federated Housing. And pressured the council to financially support the sale – to the tune of £2.8 million. 
  • PERSUADED housing association Leeds Fed and Leeds City Council to increase the social housing stock in Cardboard City, from 11 (the legal minimum) to 40, and to give priority returns to evicted tenants. 
  • RE-UNITED many of the evicted and dispersed tenant community back on Cardboard City, under the creation of a bespoke Local Lettings Policy.
  • SHONE A SPOTLIGHT ON tenant communities and showed how close-knit and interdependent they are.

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