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London councils spend £22m a year renting back Right to Buy homes
Councils in London are spending more than £22.3m a year renting back homes sold under the Right to Buy, a study has found.
Figures gathered through the Freedom of Information Act by Tom Copley, Labour’s London Assembly housing spokesperson, also show that there are at least 54,000 ex-local authority homes sold under the famous Thatcherite policy that are being rented out by private landlords in the capital.
That is a rise of 11,825 in the past five years, and 42% of the total.
Inside Housing has previously revealed the nationwide scale of the ‘Right-to-Buy-to-let’ phenomenon.
Research by this magazine last year also highlighted how town halls are now spending millions using Right to Buy homes as temporary accommodation for homelessness households.
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The figures obtained by Mr Copley show that at least 2,333 ex-council homes are being used for this purpose in London – with 808 in Newham alone and another 650 in Westminster.
They also found that Ealing Council had bought back 516 homes sold under the Right to Buy, mainly for regeneration projects, at a cost of £107m. That is more than six times the £16.2m the authority received from the original sales.
“Something has gone very wrong when tens of thousands of homes built to be let at social rents for the public good are now being rented out at market rates for private profit, sometimes back to the very councils that were forced to sell them,” Mr Copley said.
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“At a time when the need for homes at social rent level far outweighs the numbers being built, it’s reckless to continue to force the discounted sale of council homes.”
Labour Party policy is to suspend the Right to Buy.
The discounts available under the Right to Buy were significantly increased by David Cameron’s government – reaching £100,000 in London in 2013.
At the time, ministers promised to replace additional homes sold through the higher discounts on a one-for-one basis within three years, but began missing this pledge from March last year.
A video from December 2017 promoting our research on Right to Buy re-lets:
