Deputy mayor slams Building Safety Regulator and ex-housing secretary Michael Gove for London's poor record on affordable homes starts
Tom Copley, the deputy mayor for Housing, said he is still confident that London can meet its affordable homes target, despite worrying early figures. Salamander looks at Lewisham's record on social housing and affordable housing starts since 2021.
London’s failure to build even a third of the affordable homes it is meant to have started by now is down to the Building Safety Regulator (BSR) and former Housing Secretary Michael Gove, the city’s deputy mayor for housing has claimed.
Tom Copley said the way the BSR – which regulates the construction of higher-risk buildings – was set up has led to “unacceptable” delays in building, partly due to its capacity and partly because of its interpretation of new post-Grenfell building safety regulations.
Work has started on just 5,535 affordable homes in London since 2021 – less than a third of City Hall’s target of 17,800 by 2026.
However, Copley said he was still “very confident” the mayor would hit the target – which was downgraded last year following an agreement with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) – and anticipated a “surge” in starts towards the end of this year.
He told the London assembly housing committee: “We are in an enormously challenging economic context, with some factors affecting London specifically.
“These include record material costs partly due to the war in Ukraine, increased labour costs due to Brexit, and 14 years of disinterest in affordable and social housing from the last government, and in the social housing sector in general.
“High interest rates have affected both supply, in terms of the cost of borrowing, and buyers, in terms of mortgage costs.
“Developing flats is more expensive and uncertain than houses – and has been affected particularly by high interest rates. Flat development in London makes up 96% of our new homes compared to 17% in the rest of the country.
“While the mayor supports the principle of the BSR, the way it was set up by the previous government has led to absolutely unacceptable delays. This government has begun the process of reforming the BSR so we do expect that to improve.”
Last month the mayor came under fire over his record after new figures revealed that just 347 new affordable homes were started between April and June this year.
Sadiq Khan has taken aim at the BSR as a primary factor in the lack of spades in the ground, saying last week that the “regulator hasn’t been fit for purpose”.
Copley told the committee: “The BSR doesn’t have the capacity necessary to operate. The way the BSR has interpreted regulations has not been particularly helpful and I am very hopeful that the new leadership are going to be able to make the necessary changes.”
A BSR spokesperson told the LDRS: “We don’t recognise this interpretation of our approach to enforcing regulation aimed at avoiding another tragedy like Grenfell.
“Most of the delays have been caused by developers failing to demonstrate their plans comply with longstanding regulations.
“We are working hard to speed up our processes while supporting industry to understand what they need to do. Ultimately, it is for developers to show their plans are safe, and already we are seeing more of them doing so successfully.”
In June, the MHCLG unveiled a new package of reforms for the BSR and appointed Andy Roe to help “evolve and improve” practices.
Sources at the Health and Safety Executive, which established the BSR in 2022, told the LDRS: “The most significant cause of delays right now is the quality of applications from developers. However, around 70% of applications fail to do this and are therefore rejected.
“We accept the enforcement of building control standards by BSR has delayed some higher-risk building approvals. However, not enforcing the law risks the safety of residents in high-rise buildings. The purpose of the Building Safety Act, 2022 is to prevent the failures that led to the Grenfell tragedy ever happening again.”
The deputy mayor also suggested Michael Gove’s delay in signing off the Affordable Homes Programme for London meant the capital was playing catch-up.
The former Conservative housing secretary did not rubber stamp the scheme until July 2023, with City Hall saying that work could not start on the new wave of affordable homes until later that year.
“We have had just 18 months,” Copley told assembly members. “For circumstances out of the mayor’s control and due to the previous housing secretary, the [housebuilding] figure is not higher.”
Despite the issues, Copley said he was bullish on London’s future when it came to building affordable homes.
He claimed there will be the “usual hockey stick effect” – a sudden, sharp increase – in the final quarter of 2025 “because there is a very strong incentive for partners to meet the deadline in order to access funding”.
In July, the MHCLG announced that London will receive up to £11.7billion over ten years, 30 per cent of the total national fund, to invest in building new homes for families on lower incomes.
Lewisham's record in affordable housing starts since 2021
Lewisham reports a low level of social housing and London affordable rent housing starts since 2021.
Salamander has questioned Lewisham council and local housing associations about the barriers to developing more social rent homes, and whether the Labour government's new spending on affordable housing will help.
Report from Kumail Jaffer, Local Democracy Reporting Service with additional reporting for Lewisham by Dorothy Stein.
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Dorothy Stein
Dorothy Stein
