According to the 2019/20 English Housing Survey, 17 per cent (more than 137,000) of social-rented homes in London were overcrowded compared to seven per cent in England as a whole.

The negative impacts of overcrowded homes include poor health and well-being, and, during the lockdown periods of the Covid 19 pandemic, higher levels of deaths. Lack of space for children to do homework also potentially impacts their educational achievements.

With the obvious need for more large family-sized homes to address this issue, London Tenants Federation (LTF) has examined the data on the delivery of one, two, three and four-plus low-cost bedroom-sized homes from 2012 to 2022 on the Greater London Authority’s residential completions dashboard.

LTF has looked at low-cost rented homes – social-rented, London affordable rent and affordable rent – because these are the types of homes that tenants who need social-rented homes are allocated even if they struggling to afford them.

A total of 21,997 (61 per cent) one and two-bed low-cost rented homes were delivered during this period, compared to 13,824 (39 per cent) three- and four-bedroom plus homes. NB the GLA does not monitor separately the delivery of homes with more than four bedrooms.

Just 2,465 four-bedroom plus homes were delivered from 2012-22. The lowest delivery was minus 16 in Southwark.

There is an urgent need for targets to be set in regional strategic policy (both in the London Housing Strategy and the London Plan) to deliver year-on-year reductions in the number of overcrowded social-rented homes in London.

Link to our analysis of the delivery (in table form) of one, two, three and four plus low-cost rented homes in London 2012-22.

Press release here. Thanks to HASL for the quote and photo.