Sadiq Khan’s own prediction that just 3,000 new homes will be built on Transport for London land over the next four years have been branded “not good enough” by Conservatives on the London Assembly.
Since coming to office last May, the mayor has repeatedly vowed to boost both the overall number of homes and the number of affordable units built in the capital.
Central to these promises is a commitment to use publicly owned land to boost the number of properties built for low rent, as well as shared and affordable ownership schemes.
TfL’s business plan commits the organisation to “working to build 10,000 homes on 300 acres of our own land, as well as provide new workspaces and offices.”
The document adds: “We have increased the scale and pace of this development, and our target is for 50 per cent of these homes to be affordable.”
However Mr Khan has revealed that less than a third of the 10,000 new homes – just 3,089 – will be completed by March 2022 and that just 638 will be completed before the next City Hall elections in 2020.
In answer to a question tabled at last month’s Mayor’s Question Time by Green Assembly Member Sian Berry, Mr Khan said the annual completions would be:
2018/19: 367 new homes
2019/20: 271 new homes
2020/21: 495 new homes
2021/22: 1,956 new homes
In his response, the Mayor cautioned that: “These figures are based on the current TfL development pipeline and are estimates which may be subject to change due to planning, market conditions and other factors.”
Conservative AM Andrew Boff said the answer “shows a complete lack of ambition” on the part of the Mayor.
He added: “London needs 65,000 homes a year. Completing just over 3,000 by 2022 when the capacity on this land is so much greater is not good enough.
“If the Mayor is going to tackle this housing crisis without vastly overcrowding other parts of the capital he needs to make the most of these plots of TfL land. On the evidence so far he will fail to do so.”
