LUTFUR RAHMAN U-TURNS ON KEY HOUSING PROMISE

The Tower Hamlets Labour Party has criticised Mayor Lutfur Rahman for quietly dropping his promise to build 4000 social homes for rent over the course of his administration.

The commitment was quietly dropped from the Council’s annual performance report and annual delivery plan with the original manifesto commitment “Work with developers and housing associations to build a minimum of 1000 social homes for rent per annum (4,000 over the next four years)” changing to “Assist the delivery of 1,000 affordable homes this year” .  

Elsewhere in the cabinet papers there are also only references to “affordable homes” with no mention of rented or social rented properties.

Despite the broader definition applied to the target, the number of homes consented and completed remain significantly below the 1000 home a year commitment that Mayor Rahman made.

According to the latest Borough of Tower Hamlets performance report, the council has failed to meet its targets for delivering new affordable homes, reducing homelessness, and consenting to new affordable projects.

The report shows that only 585 new affordable homes were completed in the borough, far short of the mayor’s pledge to build 1,000 social homes a year, as well as the number of homes being consented also being below target at 591.

The report also sheds light on the impact that the ‘chaos’ in the housing service is having on residents with the council also failing to hit targets relating to homelessness and property licences. The departure of four housing officers in this quarter is given as a reason for why performance is below target within the report.

The sluggish performance and chaotic management of the service calls further into question some of the controversial decisions taken by Mayor Rahman and his Aspire councillors in recent months, such as the decision to gift 12 pieces of council owned land to property developers and waiving the council’s affordable housing quota on the large-scale Marsh Wall development.

Labour’s Shadow Member for Housing, Cllr Asma Islam said:

“The new direction that Mayor Lutfur Rahman and his administration are taking on housing is concerning for residents in Tower Hamlets.

His commitment to build 4000 homes for social rent was a central plank of his policy platform and if he can’t keep that promise then he needs to be honest with the people of this borough.

There are different definitions of ‘affordable’ within local government and what is ‘affordable’ can also mean different things to our residents.

We are in desperate need of more social rents, we have more than 20,000 residents on the housing waiting list whose needs won’t be met by the type of properties the mayor seems to be prioritising.

It’s important that the Mayor does not just make promises for the sake of winning the election but actually is delivering on the needs of the people of this borough.”