Just a few weeks after Highgate Conservatives highlighted the plight of tenants on the Gaskell Road and Hillcrest council estates, another instance of serious neglect has come to light. Local authority tenants in Highgate’s Tudor Close estate are living in flats in a state of disrepair because Homes for Haringey is failing in its responsibility to maintain their properties. On much of the outside of the flats, paint is peeling off or has been pulled away by plants that have been left to grow unchecked and have damaged exteriors. In one block, a boarded-up window has been left unrepaired, with residents reporting that this has been the case for “many months”. Inside many of the blocks the situation is no better, with swathes of paint that have “blown” and are flaking away, and yet again nothing has been done. Antony Denyer, Conservative council candidate for Highgate, says: “I have huge sympathy for the people who live in the Tudor Close estate because their homes have been allowed to fall into disrepair. Landlords have a responsibility to provide decent standards for their tenants. Local authorities should be leading the way, with proper maintenance programmes to keep homes in decent condition. Instead, Labour-controlled Homes for Haringey has a shocking record of failing its tenants.” When Highgate Conservatives took the council to task on behalf of Tudor Close residents, Homes for Haringey admitted that it had no plans to include the block in its “decent homes” programme until 2014 — or even 2015. Local Conservatives believe this is unacceptable,and have agreed to meet the chief exective of Homes for Haringey on site, so that the importance of helping Tudor Close residents sooner rather than later can be pressed home.