The Clockwork Orange estate residents staying put

The estate featured in Stanley Kubrick's film A Clockwork Orange

The few residents still living in a brutalist estate in south-east London marked for redevelopment have called developers "pure evil" for trying to displace them.

A scheme to demolish the Lesnes Estate in Thamesmead and replace it with 1,950 new homes was approved by Bexley Council in 2022.

Since the plan was approved to redevelop the 1960s estate, made famous for featuring in the 1971 film A Clockwork Orange, most of its residents have found accommodation elsewhere.

Developer Peabody has said it is trying to keep the "strong community" of south Thamesmead together by offering residents financial support to buy new homes in the area.

Residents and campaigners who remain on the estate appealed to the former Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government Angela Rayner to call in the planning application and overturn its approval.

However, officials on behalf of the housing ministry declined to call in the application last month.

It is thought there are still between 80 and 100 households on the Lesnes Estate, which is made up of nearly 600 properties.

A handful of these are currently in negotiations with Peabody about moving, but several families are refusing to leave the estate that now feels like a ghost town, full of dilapidated and boarded-up homes.

Rose Asenguah raised three children on the estate

Those that remain are unwilling to uproot themselves from the estate they call home and from the properties they purchased years ago.

Rose Asenguah has lived in her house for 18 years. "It's been home to me," she said. "I love it. I feel comfortable and happy here."

The 69-year-old says she will go "to the ends of the earth" to remain in her house, even threatening to bring her case before the United Nations and the European Court of Human Rights.

"I don't think that Bexley and Peabody have a right to sell my house, to sell the land without my permission," she told BBC London.

"That's tantamount to stealing, to trespassing. This is England. You can't just come into people's homes and say you want them."

The estate is mostly derelict

A Peabody spokesperson said: "The south Thamesmead community is strong, and we want to keep it that way.

"While Lesnes Estate residents will need to move from their current home, there's no need for them to leave south Thamesmead, unless they want to.

"We have provided resident homeowners with different options to move to a home close by.

"Resident homeowners have the chance either to buy a 1960s home like theirs on the neighbouring estate, a new home in the brand-new development, or another home in Thamesmead - or elsewhere - if that's what they choose."