Darren Johnson, Green Party Assembly Member, lambastes the Mayor of London for boasting “about the number of affordable homes he is building” whilst keeping the number of demolitions and sales “much quieter”.
Darren Johnson, Green Party Member of the London Assembly, has accused the Mayor of London of misleading the public over his record on building social housing, by not accounting for the number of homes demolished or sold off. City Hall financed the completion of 43,220 social and affordable rent homes between 2008 and 2014, but once sales and demolitions are accounted for the net increase in the stock over that period was only 13,585. The Mayor today acknowledged that Darren was “absolutely right to draw attention to it”.
Many of the demolitions are from estate regeneration schemes that the Mayor is part-funding. For example, the Aylesbury Estate scheme will see 1,468 affordable homes built, but it will result in a net loss of 934 low rent homes. In the last decade, estate regeneration schemes have led to a net loss of 6,510 low-rent homes.
Darren commented, “The Mayor boasts about the number of affordable homes he is building. But he keeps the number of demolitions and sales he has supported much quieter. The overall picture is that he is dramatically failing to increase the stock of social housing to keep up with London’s population growth.
“With Right to Buy for housing associations on the horizon, and talk of more estate regeneration to come, we could see a large net loss of social housing in a city again. The Mayor should oppose these policies that erode the social housing stock, and lobby for a larger budget so the pressing need for genuinely affordable homes can be met.”