The Mayor of Newham’s promise to deliver more than 1,000 new council homes is already on track following a grant of £107 million from the Mayor of London.
The grant is a part of the Building Council Homes for Londoners programme.
The funding is the highest allocation out of all the London boroughs who applied and will be used to build 1,123 homes to be started by 2022 from a range of existing council owned sites earmarked for regeneration.
The Mayor of Newham, Rokhsana Fiaz said: “I am very happy our bid for £107 million of funding from the Mayor of London has been successful. This funding will kick-start our ambitious housing programme, which will see the construction of more than 1,000 quality homes across 40 sites in Newham, and available at London Affordable Rent.
“Newham residents are at the forefront of the housing crisis. Too many families are desperately in need of a sustainable home they can genuinely afford. We have over 27,000 households on our housing waiting list and more than 4,800 households in temporary accommodation. This is why I have committed to build over 1,000 new council homes at social rent levels over the next four years. Only through a massive council housebuilding programme can we begin to address the scale of this challenge.
“Since becoming Mayor I have been working closely with both Sadiq Khan and his Deputy Mayor for Housing James Murray to find a solution to the capital’s housing crisis. Collaborative working is essential to tackle the issues which face so many people in London. I am excited about what this announcement means for Newham and to start work on building hundreds of desperately needed new homes.”
In addition to the funding, the Building Council Homes for Londoners programme offers boroughs an innovative way to ring-fence their Right to Buy receipts to invest in new homes, alongside expertise and resources from City Hall to scale up their homebuilding programmes. It sits alongside the Homebuilding Capacity Fund, announced Friday 19 October, a £10 million fund which allows boroughs to bid for up to £750,000 each to help boost their housing and planning teams.