London mayor fails to hit revised affordable housing targets
The mayor's targets for affordable homes were reduced by 22% last year, but the new report from the GLA says he still failed to meet them.
A new report produced with and for the London Assembly housing committee shows that the mayor of London failed to meet the revised affordable housing target set by the government, by thousands of homes.
Sadiq Khan was allocated £4bn from ministers for the Affordable Homes Programme (AHP) running between 2021 and 2026.
His original target of starting between 23,900 and 27,200 affordable homes was reduced last year by 22% to a range between 17,800 and 19,000, after interim reports showed progress was slow.
However, the mayor failed to hit the revised target as well, with just 14,335 affordable housing starts delivered under the 2021-2026 AHP, according to the new report.
Homes England, the public body which funds affordable housing, announced that it would extend its March deadline on the programme by up to six months, on a case-by-case basis.
The report found that 73% of homes started under the previous 2016-2023 AHP were completed, but 32,081 were started but not yet completed.
In 2024-25, the net addition to London’s affordable housing stock was just 8,184, compared to estimates from the Greater London Authority (GLA) that the programme must deliver 45,500 affordable homes each year between 2026 and 2036, to meet housing needs.
Assembly Member Lord Bailey, chair of the housing committee said: “Affordable housing delivery is still falling far short of what London needs. Even after targets were revised downwards, they were not met.
“That reflects the severe challenges facing housebuilding in London, but it also raises important questions about what must change if future programmes are to succeed.”
Benali Hamdache, a Green Party London Assembly member, told the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS): “The data shows that the current model for delivering affordable housing is fundamentally broken. The hope was that building more luxury flats would deliver new council housing. It’s clearly not the case.
“Since 2015 only 10% of affordable home completions were social rent homes, the type of homes we need the most. Things like shared ownership are not affordable, but represent the most common type of so-called “affordable” housing being delivered.
“One of the top priorities for the mayor should be to work with the incoming PM Andy Burnham to be address this housing emergency, and start reimaging a new way to deliver housing for people, not profit.”
However, there were some silver linings for City Hall figures, who have been adamant that improvements to the Building Safety Regulator (BSR) and an emergency housebuilding package agreed with ministers, will see London’s housing crisis start to turn around.
Last year, 39% of all completed new build homes were affordable, compared to just 19% in 2016-17. Similarly, 86% of all new homes started were affordable – a sharp increase on the 46% figure eight years prior.
The report finds that Tower Hamlets is the borough with the most GLA-funded affordable home starts since 2023 and that 1,484 of the total 15,715 GLA funded affordable homes across London, were in the borough.
The Royal Borough of Greenwich came a close second, with 1,448 GLA-funded affordable home starts.
However, four boroughs – Chelsea, Harrow, Bexley and Richmond upon Thames – all saw fewer than 60.
The report claims that there are currently 341,421 households on social housing waiting lists across all London’s boroughs, a quarter of the national total.
Newham has the longest list, with 41,223, followed by Brent, Lambeth and Tower Hamlets.
A spokesperson for the London mayor told the LDRS: “Tackling our urgent housing crisis is one of the mayor’s top priorities and he is doing everything he can to deliver more homes of all tenures.
"Sadiq has been warning for some time that the impact of Brexit, the pandemic, high interest rates and the economic shocks caused by global instability mean that we are amid the most difficult period for housebuilding since the global financial crash.
“The mayor is backing housing associations and councils with a record £11.7bn London Social and Affordable Homes Programme over the next decade. The new City Hall Developer Investment Fund adds £322 million in grants and £1.5bn in ultra-low-interest loans for housing associations, unblocking stalled sites and speeding up affordable and social housing across the capital.
"There are new powers for City Hall to review and call-in housing schemes, and stronger powers to deliver Mayoral Development Orders. The Mayor is also delivering 6,000 new rent-controlled homes for key workers.
“New measures will continue to ramp up housebuilding in London and bring forward thousands of homes more quickly, as we build a better London for everyone.”
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