This is the last article you can read this month
You can read more article this month
You can read more articles this month
Sorry your limit is up for this month
Reset on:
Please help support the Morning Star by subscribing here
THE London Tenants Federation (LTF) challenged Mayor Sadiq Khan to scrap the so-called London Affordable Rent yesterday and use government grants to pay for new social housing instead.
Mr Khan recently urged the government to provide a £5 billion investment package to “increase the supply of new social homes.”
But the LTF claims that this is a reference to London Affordable Rent housing, priced in line with the mayor’s non-binding target for affordability, which is much more expensive to live in than council properties.
The 2018-19 benchmark London Affordable Rent for a bedsit was £150 — £44 per week higher than the average London council rent.
It was also higher than the average London housing association rent for that year by £21 per week.
LTF representative Pat Turnbull said: “This is a considerably higher cost for low-income households, particularly when 40 per cent of existing social housing tenants nationally already have incomes in the lowest 20 per cent.
“With the housing sector reeling from Covid-19, and tenants of all tenures struggling to meet rental payments, let’s please end this patronising game of smoke and mirrors around ‘affordability’.”
