Chance for Southwark to be First London Borough to Declare Housing Emergency Blocked by Southwark Labour 

At last night’s council assembly, the Liberal Democrats moved to declare a housing emergency, which would make it the first to do so in London. 

Edinburgh and Chelmsford are among some of the councils who have already opted to sound the alarm, but no London borough has yet made that declaration. The declaration would have been similar to the Climate Emergency, which the council unanimously agreed to in 2019.  

The motion also called for measures to tackle poor practice in housing associations, by hauling them in front of scrutiny committees to hold them to account.  

But Labour councillors unanimously slapped down the motion, claiming that they are already doing all they can to tackle the issue. 

Meanwhile, council home starts have collapsed over the last year by 96%, and the council gave planning permission to just 16 council homes.  

At the same meeting, Liberal Democrat Group Leader Cllr Victor Chamberlain gave the Labour council leader an opportunity to join calls from across the political spectrum to scrap the child benefit cap, but Cllr Williams declined to do so. 

Commenting, Liberal Democrat Group Leader Cllr Victor Chamberlain said:  

“Liberal Democrats put forward a credible set of policies to tackle the housing emergency, but Labour once again have chosen to bury their heads in the sand and comfort themselves with massaged statistics. It’s deeply disappointing but not surprising that Labour have chosen to continue down this path.”