The Mayor of London has called for Stamp Duty receipts and other property taxes from the capital to be devolved to the city so the money can be spent on affordable housing.
Sadiq Khan said he currently receives around £0.7bn a year from national government to invest in affordable housing, but City Hall calculations suggest he would need four times that – around £2.7bn a year – to build enough social and affordable homes.
It comes as City Hall data from the Housing in London report shows social housing has gone from being the capital’s largest housing tenure in the 1980s to the lowest in 2017, accounting for just 21% of London’s households.
London’s overall home ownership rate has also fallen. In 1990, around half of London households were headed by a 25-34 year, with around half of the households headed by someone over 65 owning too.
But now the proportion of young people owning their own home has fallen to around a quarter, whilst amongst the over-65s the opposite has been the case, with the proportion at almost three-quarters.
Khan said the capital’s rising housing costs now generate £3.4bn in Stamp Duty receipts, and should be devolved so he could invest in new homes and infrastructure.
He said: “London’s housing landscape has worsened dramatically over the past 30 years, and we now risk a whole generation of Londoners being blocked from enjoying the benefits of a good quality, genuinely affordable home.
“This data shows that accessing social housing or homeownership is now a pipe-dream for too many. London’s rocketing house prices mean we are contributing billions of pounds in stamp duty to the Treasury, when we could be using it to build new social rented and other genuinely affordable homes.
“Control of Stamp Duty has been devolved to Scotland and Wales and it’s vital that Ministers devolve it to London too, which has a population larger than Scotland and Wales combined.
“City Hall are doing everything we can to ensure new genuinely affordable homes get built, including our programme dedicated to helping councils build more housing.
“But the housing crisis facing our city, and in particular young Londoners, is immense. The Government must rise to the scale of the challenge and provide significantly more powers and funding so we can build the homes that Londoners so desperately need.”
However, Khan’s claims were quickly rejected rebuffed by London Assembly member Andrew Boff, who said the mayor has already had plenty of money.
He said: “Khan is the worst advocate for further devolution to London due to his inability to spend the £4.82bn that Government has already given him in the expectation that he will build the homes that Londoners need.
“If it’s a choice between churning out press releases or actually building houses, Londoners know what they want: An end to the excuses and for the mayor to get on with it.”
Comments (7)
Whilst I don’t agree with Sadiq Khan’s desire to take control of Stamp Duty receipts within the capital, there is a case to be made for allowing those Local Authority areas with a high proportion of Second Home ownership to have access to those receipts (i.e. the 3% higher rate).
The appeal of such areas can cause distortions in the service level that Local Authorities are obliged to provide and this modest added income stream might appease those local residents who can occasionally feel that through their council tax, despite recent changes, they are subsidising part-time residents.
Can the councils differentiate between Second Home and BTL? As long as they can do that, then I fully agree. BTL properties still pay council tax so there isn’t as much need for the council tax in those cases for the area to be subsidised, but for second homes I can see a case.
Although, don’t they still have to pay? Or is it because it isn’t a permanent home they are exempt, like the park homes.
Khan’t this interfering busybody just butt out of the housing market and get on with doing something about London’s soaring crime rate, the city’s atrocious air pollution and traffic congestion – linked maybe? (“To TFL and the London Mayor every journey matters”). This guy has to be the pits.
Monday: Sadiq Khan says that it’s unfair that tenants should have to pay thousands of pounds in refundable tenancy deposits each time they move house and criticises ‘rip-off’ fees.
Tuesday: Sadiq Khan says that he should keep the tens of thousands of pounds in non-refundable stamp duty that homeowners pay each time they move home and doesn’t think it’s a rip off.
Can’t wait to see what Wednesday’s announcement will be, perhaps London to vote to stay in Europe and join the Euro regardless of the rest of the country?
Politics by Tweet I’m afraid. I love the stats that in 1990 around 50% of homeowners were between 25 and 34 and 50% over 65. Today there is 25% in the lower age range that are owners and 75% are 65 and over. Looks like you aren’t allowed to own a property in London between the ages of 35 and 65.
That’s what I was about to say! What, do they take the 35-64 year olds out and release them in to the wild? Stuff them in a storage container?
What is SDLT actually used for? I know Road Tax probably isnt used on the roads, so what is the Homeowners Tax used for?