About HSG

HARINGEY SOLIDARITY GROUP SOME ACTIVITIES: 1990-2021 (PDF)

Getting involved in Haringey Solidarity Group

We hold regular monthly meetings, which are normally on the first Tuesday of each month at 7.30pm. Ideally we hold these in a local community centre. However due to Covid restrictions, we presently meet by Zoom/internet. If you want to come along, contact us (see below) and we can give you all the details.

Or, if you just want to find out a bit more about us, again get in contact – see below for how.

Getting regular updates

We have a couple of emails lists and we are happy to add anyone to either or both. Our announcement list is just that – and anyone on the list can post local or national events on as it’s there to facilitate people finding out what’s going on. Our discussion list is where we sometimes discuss issues anyone feels should be discussed.

Getting in touch

Send us an email – info [at] haringey.org.uk
Find us on Facebook /haringeysolidaritygroup and Twitter/@__hsg__
Send stuff to: PO Box 2474, London N8 0HW

In The Beginning

Haringey Solidarity Group (HSG) started life as the old Anti-Poll Tax group in Haringey. Once the Poll Tax was defeated most of the Anti-Poll Tax groups around the country split up. But in Haringey we decided there were other things to fight against which were just as important as the poll tax, so we stayed together and change our name to Haringey Solidarity Group.

HSG’s first Aims and Principles agreed on back in 1991 – PDF

Who we are and what we want

We are a group of local people who feel things need changing and we don’t have much faith in politicians and other “so called” leaders to do it for us. Things will only get better for ordinary people when we all decide what is best for us. It is not for some boss, landlord, or so-called leader to decide what they think we need. We believe in doing things for ourselves wherever possible and we try to encourage others to do likewise. We also feel that when ordinary people fight back against the system (be that your boss, the local council or some multi-national company) they need to be supported.

Building links

So we agreed from the birth of HSG onwards that, where possible, we would work with and support local campaigns and try to get them to support us. By this we don’t mean taking over a campaign, we mean sharing skills, giving each other confidence to do things and learning from each other’s successes and failures. People need to feel confident before they can even think of starting to fight back themselves. We know this may be a slow process but it is far better than starting something up and TELLING people what they MUST do. We don’t intend to just become the new set of leaders!

Right here, right now

We initiate our own campaigns, some of which you will find detailed on this website, but we also have our fingers in a lot of Haringey-based pies (and a few further afield). We have a general, monthly meeting, which is open to anyone and it’s where we make most of our decisions. We also have a number of working groups for specific campaigns/ideas, e.g. around housing and claimants issues, plus one that works on the newsletter. For more information about how we are organised you can have a look at our organisational document.

Our Manifesto: What we stand for

Our Homes – Our Neighbourhoods – Our Workplaces – Our Services – Our Lives – Our Voices

1. We are a local collective group, actively promoting non-hierarchical, anti-patriarchal, anti-capitalist, and pro-working class ideas and ways of life.

2. We believe the needs of people, communities and the environment must always come before money and power.

3. We encourage opposition to whatever keeps people dependent, fragmented and isolated, and we support actions aimed at raising people’s expectations and aspirations — including improving the situation faced in Haringey, or anywhere.

4. We are on the side of workers’ struggle for better pay, working conditions, and control over their workplaces. We believe public services, welfare benefits, people’s rights, and other necessities of life must be extended and improved.

5. Decent, affordable housing is a right for all. We support struggles for affordable rents and to improve people’s conditions and their control over their own homes.

6. We support actions and movements that help to defend the most vulnerable in our society, including refugees and other migrants. We believe in building a truly equitable society with justice for all at the core.

7. We promote and support alternative and radical ideas, and collective action. We resist all forms of oppression, exploitation, injustice, and discrimination that the global governmental/capitalist system creates.

8. Governments and capitalism need to be replaced by workers control of workplaces, and community control of neighbourhoods, horizontally federated across Haringey, London, England and the world.

9. The current environmental crisis requires an urgent cultural, social and economic change. We must create a new way of life based on humanity, respect, sharing, co-operation and free self-expression.

We call everyone to come together to take action. Now is the time.

“Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.” – Arundhati Roy