Peckham could do with some Del Boy graft
Peckham’s most famous son, Del Boy, once observed that “He who dares, wins” – adding “He who hesitates, don’t.” It’s a motto on which Southwark Council would do well to reflect, considering there are more than 22,000 people on the borough’s social housing waiting list.
Southwark’s Liberal Democrats point out it will take the council 329 years to clear this backlog based on current rates of council housing development. Mind you, the Lib Dems might craft a good press release but they’re all over the place when it comes to housing policy. Their position is that they would “force developers to deliver 50 per cent affordable housing” in any project. Good luck with that.
In Southwark, the 12 per cent of affordable (subsidised) homes that had been agreed as part of a redevelopment of an old shopping centre was deemed too low for the council, who cited it as one of the reasons they successfully objected to a 960-home home development.
Berkeley Group acquired the Aylesham Centre in Peckham in 2021 and had committed to the construction of 790 open-market homes and 77 affordable (subsidised) flats along with new retail, hospitality and community space. The planning inspector supported the council’s objection on the grounds that the scheme would harm “heritage assets” including a listed clock tower.
London housebuilding has collapsed
The council leader claimed the decision to block the project constituted “a great day for Peckham” – as if no affordable (subsidised) homes is better than too few affordable (subsidised) homes.
Overall housebuilding in London has collapsed in recent years as land values increased and new regulations deterred investment. Berkeley Homes executive chair, Rob Perrins, said the ruling is “why developers, including Berkeley, can no longer invest in new London sites and the housing crisis continues to deepen.”
The group is considering a judicial review of this week’s decision to block the scheme, but the debacle stands as just the most recent example of the many reasons why the development of new homes and places in inner London seems to have become an impossible dream.
Del Boy would say “boeuf a la mode” meaning, in his own interpretation of the French language, “you win some, you lose some.” When it comes to housing in the capital, developers and, therefore, the rest of us, are losing too often.