Jenny Jones AM has welcomed the Planning Inspectorate’s recommendation that the Mayor of London should reinstate the target to ensure 50% of new housing built in London is affordable. The Mayor dropped the target in his draft replacement London Plan, claiming that it "clearly does not work".
Jenny Jones commented: "We knew the 50% target was gradually increasing the number of affordable homes being built. The planning inspector’s verdict leaves the Mayor even more isolated. I hope he has the good sense to reverse his decision.
"No target will solve London’s affordability problem on its own, but we need a Mayor willing to use every tool in the box."
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Notes to editors
The target to ensure that 50% of homes in any new development were affordable was introduced by the former Mayor Ken Livingstone in his London Plan. In 2009 Boris Johnson issued his draft replacement London Plan, in which he dropped the target in favour of negotiating targets for numbers of homes with each borough individually.
The Planning Inspectorate Panel has recommended that the Mayor use both approaches – a 50% target for the total number of homes built in London, and an absolute minimum number of affordable homes – to maximise the amount of affordable housing being built.