Tackling London’s housing crisis – have your say
Increasing the number of Council homes built in the borough, expanding enforcement against rogue landlords and campaigning against damaging Government reforms are among the ideas in a new housing strategy launched for consultation today by Hackney Council.
The draft strategy sets out how Hackney can play its part in tackling London’s housing crisis and respond to residents’ concerns about increasingly unaffordable rents and house prices in the borough.
Housing affordability was the top concern for people who responded to the Council’s landmark Hackney: A Place For Everyone consultation last year, with many saying that the private market increasingly did not cater for anyone apart from the wealthiest.
The borough’s house prices have risen more than anywhere else in the country during the last 20 years, with the average price of a flat now around £546,000 – 17 times the earnings of the average household. Rents in the private sector have risen 36% in five years – with a two-bedroom flat now averaging £1,820 per month.
Residents are now being asked for their views on whether the Council’s housing priorities to respond to these challenges are right, including plans to:
- Build high quality, well-designed, and genuinely affordable new homes
- Tackling housing unaffordability with innovative rental schemes
- Make better use of new and existing homes
- Address standards and affordability in the private rented sector
- Tackle homelessness and housing-related health and support needs
- Promote employment through housing schemes
London is experiencing an unprecedented housing crisis, and residents in Hackney have made it clear that they are feeling the pinch of rocketing rents, sky-high house prices and the struggle to find an affordable place to live.
Our city only works when the people who make its economy tick can afford to live and work here. This crisis needs national solutions, but while the Government refuses to take action, Hackney will not stand by and do nothing.
My vision is a Hackney that works for everyone. Our new housing strategy will help us deliver more genuinely affordable housing, tackle rogue landlords and find new ways to help people get a foot on the housing ladder.
We need residents to tell us what they think our priorities should be so that together we can help more families find the home they deserve.
The Council’s existing Estate Regeneration Programme will build nearly 3,000 new modern, high-quality homes – with more than half for Council social rent and shared ownership. Its Housing Supply Programme, launched last year, will see at least 400 more built on underused Council land across the borough.
Consultation will run until Monday, 22 May, before a final strategy is considered by the Council’s Cabinet later this year based on feedback from residents.
To have your say, visit the consultation page.