London Remade will look at all London Mayoral candidates’ strategies on the housing crisis. This article will examine David Lammy’s plan, he will be up against Christian Wolmar, who also seeks Labour’s nomination and whose article on the same subject we published in June.
“London faces a daunting task. Our capital will be home to 10 million people by 2030, an unprecedented increase in population that speaks to its global appeal. Yet, a broken property market and decades of inaction have created a housing crisis in which demand vastly exceeds supply and prices are rising while wages fail to keep up.”
– reads the opening statement of MP David Lammy’s new report on London’s housing crisis, which he published along with his announcement that he is to seek the Labour nomination for London Mayor in 2016.
David Lammy, MEP for Tottenham and London Mayoral candidate.
Lammy says that it is evident more homes are needed. We agree. As do the facts, for that matter.Boris Johnson himself estimates that 42,000 homes are needed yearly. This is conservative compared to the 49,000 suggested by his very own market research study last year or Real Estate Agents Savills’s estimate of a minimum of 50,000.
According to the new mayoral candidate’s 41-page report, London needs to be even more ambitious than that and aim at 63,000 new homes a year as building less than that will just tread water and contribute to a sustained unaffordability crisis.
Lammy argues that his target is not unrealistic! So, what’s his plan?
He says that there are three core elements to London’s housing challenge: build significantly more homes, ensure that these are affordable and keep rents down.
Building more homes
Where can all these new homes be built?
According to his report, on
-
Brownfield sites, including privately owned;
-
Greenbelt sites that “are not worthy of the name”;
-
and in and around London’s surrounding area.
After getting the ‘where’ right, let’s look at ‘who’ is going to built them. Currently, there only a few firms building, killing competition and not alleviating the affordability problem – the playing field therefore must be levelled and smaller developers need to be able to access land. To help the process, planning departments must become more efficient to avoid planning delays which are not only cumbersome but a serious obstacle to developers.
Affordability
Homes not only need to exist, they need to be genuinely affordable. ‘Affordable’ must be re-defined to be in line with average incomes in the area, with an upper limit of 60% of market value (as opposed to the current 80%) – and be held firm to make sure developers will not negotiate their way out of them.
Lammy would also make sure “to prevent London’s social housing disappearing into the mass of private rented sector accommodation,” and do more to promote shared ownership.
Keeping rents down
The final challenge according to London’s new prospective Mayor candidate is to keep rents down. Indeed, two-thirds of the new supply of market homes in London is in the private rented sector. But how would he keep rents down?
He’d introduce a “sensible system” of rent controls and rent caps and create a compulsory London landlords’ register.
“If we put in place effective long-term policies now, we can ensure that the London of 2030 will still be the greatest city in the world.” Lammy concludes that, “There is no quick fix, no magic wand to be waved at a problem that has been left to worsen for decades, but there are substantial steps we can take to address the crisis.”
If we “continue to practice wilful ignorance for the scale of our housing challenge, however, and 21st century London will fail to deliver on its promise.”
