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Tory councils 'get easy ride on cheap homes'
Pippa Crerar, City Hall Editor21 Nov 2008
BORIS Johnson was accused of letting Tory boroughs off the hook over affordable housing today by Labour council chiefs.
The Standard has obtained documents which reveal the 14 Conservative councils will have to provide just under 15,000 of the Mayor's 50,000 affordable homes.
The burden of building almost half of the Mayor's promised homes will fall on just nine Labour boroughs, if the targets are agreed.
The Mayor has announced ambitious plans to kickstart the London housing market with a multi-billion-pound cash injection. The full list of targets set by Mr Johnson, which City Hall refused to release, shows the eight local authorities with the lowest goals would between them deliver just nine per cent of the target.
Richmond, the City of London, Bexley, Kensington & Chelsea, Hillingdon, Merton, Kingston, and Sutton would be collectively responsible for providing just 4,133 affordable homes. Of these eight, four are Tory led and three Liberal Democrat, while the City of London does not have political affiliations.
Jules Pipe, leader of the Labour group on London Councils, said: "Under these targets the Mayor is asking the nine Labour boroughs to provide almost half of all London's new affordable homes over the next three years. We make up less than a third of all London boroughs and are geographically quite small, with high levels of housing density already. In contrast, fully half of the boroughs are Tory, but they are only being asked to deliver one third of the affordable homes target, despite having some of the biggest boroughs in London.
"The targets should share out affordable housing fairly to ensure that we have genuinely mixed and sustainable communities across the capital. The Mayor needs to ensure that every borough delivers a mix of social and intermediate housing. If he doesn't, Tory boroughs will be allowed to build no social housing, leaving the poorest and most vulnerable unable to get any foot on the housing ladder."
Sir Robin Wales, Mayor of Newham, which is expected to deliver 5,754 homes, said: "We're absolutely committed to delivering affordable housing, which is much needed throughout London, so targets across the capital should reflect that." Every council in London has received "indicative targets" from City Hall saying how many affordable homes the Mayor believes they can provide by 2011. The boroughs can respond before final numbers are agreed early next year.
Richard Blakeway, the Mayor's director of housing, said the proposed targets were ambitious but denied they were soft on any boroughs.
He said: "We are pushing harder than the current agreements with the Government, but we are proposing a reasonable share of the affordable housing for each borough. That is based on their capacity to deliver, it is based on what they have delivered in recent years, the programme they have in the pipeline, and based on their need."
Number of affordable homes
Newham (Labour) 5,754
Tower Hamlets (Lab) 5,164
Barnet (Conservative) 3,369
Greenwich (Lab) 3,295
Southwark (No overall control) 2,672
Barking & Dagenham (Lab)1,951
Islington (NOC)1,902
Brent (NOC) 1,836
Croydon (Con) 1,803
Lambeth (Lab) 1,803
Hackney (Lab) 1,779
Lewisham (Lab) 1,598
Ealing (Con) 1,500
Redbridge (Con) 1,484
Wandsworth (Con) 1,221
Westminster (Con) 1,115
Haringey (Lab) 1,115
Waltham Forest (Lab) 1,090
Camden (NOC)975
Havering (Lab) 877
Bromley (Con) 795
H'smith & Fulham (Con) 738
Hounslow (NOC) 730
Harrow (Con) 656
Enfield (Con) 648
Kingston (Lib-Dem) 631
Merton (Con) 607
Hillingdon (Con) 598
Kensington & Chelsea (Con) 574
Bexley (Con) 566
Sutton (Lib-Dem) 566
Richmond (Lib-Dem) 443
City of London (non-political) 148
TOTAL: 50,000
Reader views (3)
Once again, Jules Pipe is opening his mouth before thinking. The figures for housing are in response to need and availability of sites in the different boroughs - it has little or nothing to do with being a Labour or Tory borough.
- Neil, London, 21/11/2008 15:19
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Well the electorate in the Labour boroughs could vote Conservative and then the responsibility would fall on Conservative Councils. Next point please?
- Joe, London, UK, 21/11/2008 12:00
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The labour areas are probably more in need of social housing than the Tory boroughs so it seems right to put it there.
- Tom, Watford (UK), 21/11/2008 11:59
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