London affordable house-building plummets 88 per cent in a year, with some boroughs starting just one each

The fig of affordable homes started successful London has fallen 88 per cent, caller statistic person revealed, with immoderate boroughs starting conscionable 1 caller affordable spot each successful the abstraction of a year.

Only 3,156 affordable homes began operation crossed the full of Greater London betwixt April 2023 and March of this year, down from 26,386 starts successful the erstwhile 12 months, according to Government data.

Bexley, Harrow, Richmond-upon-Thames, and the ‘square mile’ of the City of London each saw lone 1 caller affordable spot started. Work began connected conscionable 2 successful Kensington and Chelsea, and lone 3 each successful Brent, Enfield and Lambeth. In Newham, 4 got started.

‘Affordable housing’ is simply a wide-ranging class which includes homes fto astatine rents of nary much than 80 per cent of section marketplace rates, arsenic good arsenic shared ownership homes and societal rent properties which are acceptable astatine astir 50 per cent of marketplace levels, among different spot types.

London’s 88 per cent simplification successful affordable homes started successful the past fiscal twelvemonth compares with a 39 per cent autumn crossed the full of England, wherever starts fell from 71,771 successful 2022/23 to 43,439 successful 2023/24.

A Government spokesperson said the statistic “emphasise the standard of the lodging situation we person inherited” and that changes to the readying system, on with accrued backing and making section lodging targets mandatory, would amended the situation.

“The £500m uplift announced successful the caller Budget was welcome, [but] the grounds suggests it volition not beryllium capable to present the fig of societal homes needed - estimates scope from £4.6bn a twelvemonth arsenic a minimum, portion a broad programme could necessitate up to £15.1bn annually.

“That’s wherefore the upcoming spending reappraisal [in the outpouring of adjacent year] is crucial. The Government needs to perpetrate to a existent step-change successful investment, collaborating with the mayor, section authorities, and lodging providers to present connected their housebuilding targets.

“These are important sums. But lodging is simply a foundational contented – it affects our health, our productivity and is cardinal to sustainability. If the Government truly wants to hole the foundations, trim waiting lists for the NHS, kickstart a caller epoch of maturation and execute its net-zero targets, lodging is the spot to start.”

The London boroughs which saw the astir affordable homes started successful 2023/24 were Barking and Dagenham (584 starts, down from 1,021 the erstwhile year), Greenwich (406, down from 2,615) and Redbridge (351, down from 575).

Andy Hulme, main enforcement of lodging relation The Hyde Group, said: “At a clip erstwhile grounds numbers of stateless children are surviving successful impermanent accommodation, this crisp autumn successful affordable lodging starts should beryllium concerning for everyone.

“Unfortunately, this volition pb to much radical becoming stateless successful the coming months and years, arsenic little affordable lodging is being delivered astatine a clip erstwhile the request for affordable lodging is increasing.

“However, the astir acute lodging occupation is the steep semipermanent autumn successful the proviso of societal housing, which has fallen disconnected a cliff implicit the past 30 years…

“To tackle the lodging emergency, we request much assistance backing to physique much societal homes and we request a much ambitious ten-year rent colony that includes a just attack to rent convergence.”

A spokesperson astatine the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government said: “These statistic emphasise the standard of the lodging situation we person inherited. We volition hole this by delivering the biggest summation successful societal and affordable lodging successful a generation.

“We volition besides marque changes to the readying system, reconstruct mandatory lodging targets for councils, and we person boosted the Affordable Homes Programme by £500m.

“Everywhere indispensable play its portion to bring the lodging situation to an extremity and we volition enactment successful adjacent concern with the politician to radically boost housebuilding successful the superior and physique the homes that London needs.”

A spokeswoman for politician Sadiq Khan said: “The disastrous inheritance from the erstwhile Government has near nationalist housebuilding connected its knees, with developers antecedently predicting housebuilding could autumn to the lowest level since the Second World War.

“While the interaction of this bequest is being felt astir acutely successful London, it is evident crossed the country, with the Office for Budget Responsibility projecting lodging completions volition autumn this twelvemonth and next.

“Despite this, thousands of affordable homes are inactive being built crossed London, with the mayor’s occurrence connected affordable lodging meaning the superior is good placed to transportation connected gathering homes, adjacent during this incredibly pugnacious period.

“Under his tenure the politician has started much caller assembly homes than immoderate clip since the 1970s, and Sadiq volition proceed to enactment hand-in-hand with the caller Government to crook the tide connected the past 14 years of underinvestment successful housebuilding, helping to make a better, fairer London for everyone.”

A spokeswoman for London Councils, the capital’s section authorities association, said: “Despite monolithic challenges, boroughs are moving hard to accelerate housebuilding and person made coagulated advancement successful caller years. London saw much council-built homes started successful 2022 than immoderate twelvemonth since the 1970s.

“However, marketplace conditions for starting to physique caller lodging are presently incredibly tough. There are 287,000 imaginable caller homes successful London with readying permission, including 70,000 affordable homes, that person yet to beryllium built. There are a batch of barriers to unlocking these sites – specified arsenic skyrocketing operation costs, and successful caller years, a deficiency of superior backing and infrastructure.

“On apical of this, London's higher onshore values mean that existent assistance levels are insufficient to unafraid the viability of schemes. Many boroughs can’t marque up the shortfall – crossed London there’s a cumulative £700m backing spread successful societal lodging budgets.

“We are committed to overcoming these barriers to our gathering ambitions, moving intimately with Government and the Greater London Authority.”