Housing campaigners in Southwark are urging the council not to lower its own targets for affordable housing after the Mayor offered developers incentives to deliver 20%
The Canada Water development in Southwark is one project where a developer, British Land, wants to drop the total number of affordable homes from 35per cent to 10per cent through a Section 73 application (Image: Facundo Arrizabalaga/MyLondon)
Campaign groups have urged Southwark Council to stick to affordable housing targets locally after the government and the Mayor of London agreed to drop the amount required for new developments in the capital.
Last month, Housing Secretary Steve Reed and the Mayor of London Sadiq Khan announced they would be slashing the target for affordable homes in the capital from 35per cent to 20per cent. If developers agree to build 20per cent ‘affordable’ housing, their applications will be fast-tracked.
The move has been opposed by London Labour MPs, including Florence Eshalomi, who is Chair of the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee, and Stella Creasy, as well as housing campaign groups such as SHAC (Social Housing Action Campaign).
Now local organisations including the 35% Campaign, Peckham Vision and Aylesham Community Action have also expressed concerns over the future of affordable housebuilding in Southwark.
The campaign groups have signed an open letter which is calling on Southwark Council to speak out against the new measures “so that people in Southwark will at least have some chance of securing a decent new home in the borough’s new developments”.
Cllr Helen Dennis, Cabinet Member for New Homes and Sustainable Development, said Southwark’s ambitions had not changed as a result of the proposals.
Cllr Dennis said: “We will always fight for the largest possible number of council homes, social rent and genuinely affordable homes in our borough, and will continue to work towards the viability-tested targets agreed in our Local Plan.”
In a letter addressed to Cllr Sarah King, Leader of Southwark Council, campaigners said: “If developers get their way, and affordable housing is slashed, hardly anyone in Southwark will be able to rent or buy a home on a new development.
“Most households in the borough earn only enough for affordable housing and fewer than 7per cent of Southwark households can afford free-market housing, according to the Southwark Plan 2022.”
The letter added: “Mr Khan and Mr Reed both evidently trust that relaxing developers’ obligations will somehow produce more affordable housing. There is no reason to think this will happen.”
The letter refers to two key housing developments in Southwark where proposed affordable housing targets are below 35per cent. The letter stated: “At Canada Water, developer British Land wants to cut affordable housing to 10per cent and at the Aylesham Centre, Peckham, Berkeley Homes wishes to cut affordable housing to 12per cent. These two big developments testify to developers’ determination to build as little affordable housing as possible.”
Southwark has been hit hard by London’s housing crisis, with more than 20,000 households on the council’s waiting list and 4,000 in temporary accommodation.
According to a report from the New Economics Foundation (NEF) from August 2025, the number of children living in temporary accommodation in Southwark rose by 77per cent in four years. The number rose from around 1,900 in 2020, to 3,500 in 2024. The report noted that this was a much faster increase than the 25per cent rise seen across England.
Cllr Dennis added: “We want to create a Southwark for everyone, not just the privileged – that’s why Southwark builds the most council homes of any authority in the country, and last year completed more social rent homes than any other London borough.”
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