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Jenrick sends scathing letter blocking Khan from publishing London Plan
Housing secretary Robert Jenrick has banned Sadiq Khan from publishing his development plan for the capital in its current form, in a scathing letter that criticises the London mayor’s housing record.
Mr Jenrick used his powers to direct that the new London Plan, which outlines the mayor’s spatial development strategy for the capital, cannot be published until it has incorporated changes laid out by the minister.
In a letter sent today to Mr Khan, the housing minister said his criticisms of the plan included its “over-restrictive stance” on industrial land and its focus on “one-bed flats at the expense of all else”.
Mr Jenrick said he was concerned the plan “actively discourages ambitious boroughs” and criticised the mayor’s small sites scheme, which he said includes a “combination of unattractive policies, such as ‘garden grabbing’ by opening up residential gardens for development”.
The housing minister’s letter also included wider criticisms of Mr Khan’s housing record, with Mr Jenrick writing that “housing delivery in London under your mayoralty has been deeply disappointing”.
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He wrote: “You have put a series of onerous conditions on estate regeneration schemes for them to be eligible for grant funding, such as the requirement for residents’ ballots.
“In attaching such conditions, you are jeopardising housing delivery and this approach will make it significantly more difficult to deliver the plan’s targets and homes needed.”
In 2018, Mr Khan introduced a policy requiring all estate regeneration schemes to ballot residents if they are to receive funding from the Greater London Authority.
Mr Jenrick also encouraged Mr Khan to take a “proactive stance on building homes for ownership” and said his plan “added layers of complexity that will make development more difficult unnecessarily”.
He wrote: “One may have sympathy with some of [the] individual policies in your plan, but in aggregate this approach is inconsistent with the pro-development stance we should be taking and ultimately only serves to make Londoners worse off.
“This challenging environment is exacerbated by your empty threats of rent controls, which by law you cannot introduce without government consent.”
Last week, Mr Khan launched his campaign to be reelected in the London mayoral election in May with a promise that he would make the election a “referendum on rent controls”.
Mr Khan must now send the government an updated version of the London Plan, based on the modifications laid out by the housing minister.
A spokesperson for the mayor said: “The mayor makes no apologies for trying to deliver genuinely affordable housing in the capital while at the same time protecting and enhancing the green belt.
“The secretary of state is trying to run roughshod over the mayor’s efforts to finalise a London Plan, which will deliver for Londoners and deliver on pledges from the mayor’s manifesto.
“The Secretary of State needs to realise that London is best served by the government devolving further funding and powers to the capital to build the affordable homes it urgently needs, instead of taking this heavy-handed approach.”
