Overview
London’s social housing is under massive pressure and too many tenants are not receiving the high-quality services they deserve. London boroughs have developed a new report which sets out a shared set of principles for improving services as social landlords. Led by the London Housing Directors’ Group, through consultation with housing officers and tenants from across the capital, Delivering for Tenants: The Foundations of an Effective Local Authority Landlord Service sets out how boroughs can deliver the highest possible housing standards for council tenants.
Social housing is a vital part of London’s infrastructure
- Boroughs are proud of their role as social landlords. Social housing helps tackle homelessness and inequality by helping lower-income residents afford to live in the capital. More than one in every 10 homes in the capital is let by a local authority (around 390,000 social homes).
London’s social housing is under pressure
- Research for London Councils suggests tenant satisfaction levels in London are lower than the rest of the country. The capital accounts for 19% of England’s social housing stock, but between April 2019 and March 2021, 57% of all damp and mould maladministration cases (a formal decision against a social landlord) reported by the Housing Ombudsman were in London (across all types of social housing provider).
- London’s housing stock faces a number of challenges that make it more difficult to maintain good standards. Housing in the capital is generally older than elsewhere in the country; there is a higher proportion of flats, which makes maintenance more complex; and London’s severe housing pressures mean the capital has higher rates of overcrowding.
- Worsening resource pressures are also having an impact. London local authorities’ Housing Revenue Accounts – through which all income and spending related to council housing must be recorded – are forecast to be almost £600 million worse off over the next five years as a result of the 7% rent cap introduced by government on the social housing sector in 2023-24. The annual 1% rent reduction policy in place from 2016 to 2020 left rental income across London HRAs an estimated £459 million lower in 2021-22 than it would otherwise have been.
London boroughs are determined to secure improvements
- Boroughs are committed to delivering high standards, to ensure tenants’ voices are heard and acted upon, and to co-ordinating their landlord services with the council’s wider strategic objectives for their local communities – from supporting economic development through to raising housing conditions and securing net zero carbon objectives.
- Delivering for Tenants will help make those ambitions a reality at a local level. Boroughs also highlight that national policy decisions on funding and regulation are key to the future of social housing.
