Kimberly Bekele is the editor-in-chief of the Observer. Follow her on Twitter here.

The Observer’s Politics section is written by Richard Tawney and features articles from some of his columnists. Follow Richard on Twitter here.

This article was first published by The Observer and has been republished with permission. It was originally shared on the Facebook page of the Observer’s London office. It has been republished with permission of The Observer.

I’m an English graduate and a London resident in my mid-40s, but I’ve lived in the area for nearly half a decade. My marriage is good and stable. I have lived happily in this area since 2004. But I’ve witnessed the deterioration of London’s reputation in the last eight years: the rise and fall of post-industrial industries of the north, the rise of a more xenophobic city. I see no political or social alternative to this. I am concerned about the political consequences of our growing isolation, and about the way this city is mismanaged – by a council who is less interested in making this city the best in the world, than in making it as pleasant a place to live as possible.

I’m also concerned about the impact of this failure on my community, and about a very recent and quite worrying one.

In 2010, after I was diagnosed as a mental health issue, the local authority (LHA) tried a radical experiment.

I was living with my partner, who has been struggling with his mental illness, in one of the most expensive places in the world. He was given one bed in a high-end local authority accommodation (where I lived) and another in another, which cost me another £400 a month. His family were also given a decent accommodation: my brother is a GP; his daughter a counsellor; his parents are a teacher and a lawyer. They were also offered me, for the first time, a social housing placement – a full-time placement, not an overnight one.

The LHA decided to give me one of the most expensive places, but one with the lowest provision of council accommodation in London. My partner and I were supposed – I believe from the correspondence I have read from them – to move in by April, so we could move out by the end of the year. They told me and my family that there were about four other families in this same housing, and